It’s finally here. I’m really excited for this season. Not because I think this season will be looked back on the same as a 162-game season would be. Not because I’m in love with all of the health and safety implications of players being around each other right now. I’m excited because, well, it’s baseball, and baseball’s always great. Unless your team gives up 10 runs in the first inning of Game 5 of the NLDS). That’s never great.
I’m also excited about it because it makes Braves Journal a more hoppin’ place. Ryan’s done a really good job getting tons of great content pumped into this place on the regular. We have some great, new faces. And a season means that this community gets better. I couldn’t imagine trying to keep content going for the longest offseason of my lifetime, but Ryan and all of the writers did a great job of keeping it going. And now we get a season to enjoy.
But I know how hard it is to keep a site like this going. It’s really hard to ask people to keep pitching in content, creating ideas for content, editing, organizing, moderating, etc. And Ryan is doing a great job of pushing all of that forward, and the site is much better for it.
Would you consider being a Patreon supporter? I’m a $10 per month guy, but I don’t expect you to do that. You can go $3, $5, whatever you want to do. I feel anybody, even right now, can do $3 per month. If you appreciate the site, that’s a drop in the bucket. You just simply can’t find the blend of community and content anywhere else in the Braves blogosphere. You can go here, they hook up with your bank account, and it comes out once a month. Nothing further is required. It’s funded by the Patreon and the t-shirts. That’s it.Â
Hopefully you’ll do your part in keeping this site running and growing. Until then, I hope everyone enjoys Opening Day!
@Rob I agree 100%. I can not imagine the amount of work that had to go into producing new content as regularly as Ryan and the writers have done. I am also excited that we can focus on games and really open up the discussion around here like normal once again. The off-season talk is good, but the in-season talk on here is great. As always, thank you for keeping this site going and giving us somewhere to go and do what we love to do. Go Braves!
Here are our recappers that have signed up for the year! If you’re on this list and cannot commit to recapping, send me an email (cothrjr at gmail dot com) and I’ll remove you.
Just a gentle reminder that recaps will either go up after game on the same day or the next morning and there’ll likely be many days where we’ll have another post go up as a game thread.
Recappers:
Sunday: Rusty S
Monday: Cliff
Tuesday: TFloyd
Wednesday: JF
Thursday: Rob
Friday: Roger
Saturday: Seat Painter
Fine words, Rob. I can’t imagine baseball without Braves Journal.
Rosters have to be finalized in 2 hours.
#TeamMatzek
#TeamBigCity
Get your 30 in, crew!
Does the signing of Adams remove the need for signing Puig? In my mind, no. One, I don’t think Adams is going to hit righties as well as Puig will, and two, Adams’ lack of positional flexibility will be a problem with the roster size decreases. It’s my impression Adams is Freeman insurance, not a longterm DH-against-RHP option.
I think Adams is here for the duration. We need a LH smasher. Puig, IMO, would replace Culberson.
@3, amen.
Wow-Carson Fulmer DFA
Juan Soto got the CorollaVirus.
I’d like him to get healthy ASAP so that he can help his team lose 60 games. Get well soon, Juan.
Sam Freeman made Washington’s OD roster. Man, good for that guy. Doesn’t have elite size, height, or velocity, but he throws with the right hand, and good enough to keep it going. Wish him well. Not against us.
I don’t know how much a lack of positional versatility matters in the the new American league world we’re living in. I’d imagine Thoppy is more concerned about adding some left handed pop to his right hand heavy lineup that will almost exclusively be facing right handed starting pitchers.
Rumor has it in light of Soto’s positive test, the Nats game might get postponed as next round of testing results haven’t made it back to the team.
Looks like they got the deal done to expand the playoffs to 16 teams for this year only.
I think this makes sense given the season is only 60 games longs, so I approve of the expanded playoffs for this season only.
Looks like Hamels is our new Mike Hampton.
Top two teams from each division qualify for the playoffs, and then the two best remaining teams in each league by record also get in.
Haven’t seen a full write-up from anybody yet, but most reports are saying that the first round will be a best-of-three series hosted by the higher seed (with straight seeding as opposed to the weird pick-your-opponent thing) in its entirety. Then the LDS, LCS and WS go on as normal from that.
I like anything better than the one game wildcard play in. Given the circumstances, I think 8 teams per league isn’t bad.
I was disappointed with the Hamels signing before it was cool.
Watching Gerrit Cole now down the defending champs on the same day Atlanta’s big free agent starter hit the IL got me pining for the Ted Turner days.
Chief called it. They can’t even get through the very first game of the season.
@17: He’s gotta jack a few three-run shots before getting that title.
Be fair to him, he cost a lot less.
@17, makes me think about Mac’s awesome Hampton videos.
Good morning – Go Braves!
I wish the 1st round wasn’t best of 3, and the divisional round wasn’t best of 5. It really is a crapshoot.
Braves Opening Day Post and Three Flags Flying Opening Day podcast thread!
https://bravesjournal.mystagingwebsite.com/2020/07/24/braves-opening-day-thoughts/