Nine ball in the corner pocket. The Braves sweep 3 from the Orioles and run the table on the 9 game road trip.
All the scoring came in the 4th inning. Jorge Soler hit a 1 out solo homer, and after a Freddie Freeman double and a Dansby Swanson walk, Adam Duvall‘s 2 out double concluded Atlanta’s scoring. The Orioles responded in the bottom of the inning with a leadoff double by Trey Mancini and a 2 out double by Ramon Urias. Soler and Duvall had 2 hits apiece.
There are no foregone conclusions in baseball, but the last 5 innings felt as close to one as is liable to come along. The Braves have now won 16 out of their last 18, and the Orioles have lost 18 in a row. The game wound down with that kind of energy.
Touki Toussaint lasted 5 1/3 innings, giving up 5 hits and 3 walks, while striking out 5. The bullpen allowed 3 hits over the remaining 4 2/3. A.J. Minter got his 2 guys to close out the 6th, and Luke Jackson struck out the side in the 8th. Will Smith worked around Urias’s 2nd double to pick up his 28th save.
The Braves remain 5 games ahead of the Phillies. Atlanta is clearly better than Washington, Miami, and Baltimore at this point. The Yankees come to town on Monday; Huascar Ynoa and Jordan Montgomery scheduled.
Thank you, Rusty S.
Yankees is half a word.
I will say that the Orioles appeared to be a much better team than the Marlins. I hope they start winning some from here on out.
On another note, Atlanta is now tied with Cincinnati for the 4th best winning percentage in the national league. It is still hard to comprehend how the turnaround has come so quickly.
This team has shocked me, and that’s an understatement. I had buried these guys. Imagine if RAJ was still around.
Nine-game winning streak vs. nine-game winning streak… and no DH.
I didn’t realize that the Yankees had also won 9 games in a row. The Braves have them beat in team OPS, .755 to .726, but the Yankees are better in ERA, 3.63 to 3.98. On paper they look pretty evenly matched.
Though they’ve blown some really big 9th-inning leads — some truly shocking collapses — the Yanks’ pitching has been pretty good all year, for the most part. (And Montgomery’s a weird one — he’s a gigantic lefty, but he’s a junkballer.)
It’s only recently that they began to score some runs.
Is he sort of like Chris Young The Pitcher?
CindyJ from last thread,
It’s really debatable whether or not Bryse Wilson is a better pitcher. Right off the bat, the odds that Wilson exceeds Rodriguez’s career bWAR of 5 is debatable. He never had any lengthy success in the minor leagues, and in 89 big league innings, he had an ERA over 5. I mean, maybe he becomes good one day, but if you can trade a failing starting pitcher with a low ceiling for an established reliever, most teams would make that deal any day.
And nevermind the fact that we were dealing from a position of strength (starting pitching) to improve an area of weakness. How often can you not only get a better player in return, but you can improve where you need to improve the most? I’m surprised you don’t like this trade; this was the best one of them all.
Braves 2021 outfield:
Ronald Acuna: 360 PA, .283/.394/.596, .990 OPS, 24 HR, 52 RBI
Soler/Duvall/Pederson: 300 PA, .241/.344/.459, .804 OPS, 14 HR, 43 RBI
Every other outfielder*: 984 PA, .212/.295/.328, .623 OPS, 22 HR, 100 RBI
* Marcell Ozuna, Orlando Arcia, Abraham Amonte, Guillermo Heredia, Christian Pache, Ender Inciarte, and Ehire Adrianza. (I only included Adrianza’s PAs when he appeared as an outfielder.)
@9
@9
But really what the means is that at the deadline, we replaced what we hoped Ozuna would provide: .800 OPS and 30 HRs. But we have not replaced Pache or Acuna. Because while those are indeed 3 outfielders, they are only producing that .800 OPS because they’ve been mixed and matched. If you played them all full-time to try to replace Acuna and Pache, they wouldn’t produce that result.
If you add Heredia’s performance against LHP (.276/.341/.461 in 85 PAs) to that list, then we get closer.
Speaking of outfielders, is Eddie Rosario actually healthy?
He did go 3-5 on Saturday, however.
Final thing on Rosario: once he has a good stretch, they’ll want to call him up. I take it he replaces Almonte on the roster, but who does he replace and when in the lineup?
From Moylan latitudes, classic new Spoonerism over the weekend from N.Z. Health Minister during TV address to the citizenry urging healthier lifestyles.
‘Go outside, get lots of fresh air, spread your legs.’
In such moments comes immortality.
@8
I, as well, disagree that Bryse Wilson is better than Richard Rodriguez. And even if he is, we didn’t need like four No. 5 men in the rotation but we did need to burnish the bullpen. It was an absolute no-brainer trade to make.
8 – I’ll pick nits a little and argue that the Soler trade was the best, given how little we gave up. Bryse Wilson was something and may yet turn into a big league starter. It was a good trade and I think it’s a long shot we regret it, though I could see it being a trade that helps both teams.
#7
Not quite as tall & a lefty, but similar… a curve/sinker/change kinda guy. Great curve, when he’s on.
I’ve seen him pitch a fair amount the last few years (he often seems to be starting when I go to games in The Bronx) & he appears to be fully returned to form since his TJS.
He’s a South Carolina guy — went to school in Columbia — so, I’d imagine he’ll be up for this game.
Also, very happy to see Ynoa pitching an interleague game at home.
@8 Had the Braves simply moved Bryse to the bullpen he likely would have had better results than he had as a starter. I don’t hate the trade, I just think it was unnecessary. For some reason the Braves pigeonhole pitchers as only relievers or only starters. In the past they found some of their best relievers as failed starters (Venters). They won’t even try it now. They should try to get some value out of Kyle Wright by moving him to the bp.
The Soler trade was the best by far, followed by Peterson.
Wilson, to me, is a lot like when we traded Charlie Morton for Nate Louth. He had great stuff, but absolutely could not harness it, and was sort of stalled in our minors. He had really struggled in a cup of coffee, was already 24, and needed a change of scenery. I’m honestly thrilled that he eventually reached his full potential and I am absolutely certain that he never would have done so if he had stayed in the Braves system.
I hope Bryse Wilson becomes everything he’s capable of, except when he pitches against us. He needed a change of scenery. Good luck to him.
New thread. Game thread.
https://bravesjournal.mystagingwebsite.com/2021/08/23/rock-paper-scissors-shoot/