Braves Notch Successful Week Despite Offensive Challenges

00:00:22
Speaker 1: Hello, everyone, Welcome to episode seventy of the Hemmer Territory Podcast. I am your host, Sprad Roland, coming to you on a Sunday afternoon, and I'm joined as I always am, by Scott Coleman. Scott, that Brings have won four series in a row doesn't always feel that way when we're talking about the team, but they've actually been playing pretty well in recent days.

00:00:37
Speaker 2: Hey, Brad, Yeah, four series wins in a row, and the Braves have won six of their last eight games. However, you would never really know it watching this offense try to hit a baseball every night. It has very much been the pitching carrying the load for this team for I mean really months now, but especially lately, this team just can't score runs. Hey, their winning series and that ultimately should get them into the playoffs as long as they can keep doing it.

00:01:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's definitely the case. This is gonna be one of those mixed episodes. If you were a long time a listener to the podcast, you'll know that it's always challenging on some level when the Braves lose on Sundays. One of our regular podcasts recording times dating back to the beginning of this podcast. They lose on Sunday afternoons, so there's a little bit of that shadow cast over the podcast, but at the same time, a lot of positives because generally speaking they went five and two this week. That is a positive on the whole, six and two overall on last a games as you mentioned, and plenty to discuss, even if the offense has been certainly challenged in recent days. We should say it was top of the show, especially if you're a new listen. We are part of the foul Territory network of podcasts. Please check out the entire network as well as this show. Please subscribe, rate review, check us out on Apple, check us out on Spotify, overcast, YouTube, et cetera, et cetera, and we'll dive into the weekend if you've missed anything from this previous week. We did four episodes like five Days Scott and I last Sunday and also on Wednesday. Our co hosts and colleagues Sean Coleman Stephen Tolber records twice as well Monday. I believe in Thursday, it was our last show on this feed, but since then the Brits held Serve beat the Nats in a series by winning two out of the out of the three games, including the first two. But what was we kind of have to start here broad and we'll kind of dig into the game in the second We talked around it. But the Braves have now scored nineteen runs in the last seven games. If that's all I told you, Scott, is that the Braids we're gonna have nineteen runs in two series across seven games against division rivals and the Phillies in the Nationals. What would you have projected the record to be in those seven games, Probably like two and five, certainly not better than three and four. I have to say three and four would have fought good with that. And the Braves, by the way, again as a reminder, they won five of those games somehow despite averaging less than three runs per game.

00:02:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, and again, pitching deserves all the credit this week. I mean, really, everybody was great, and this team needs the pitching to be great right now. The way it is going, we knew there were going to be challenges without Riley and without Akunya and without so Laer for the better part of the week, and everybody else who's banged up, and then you just have a bunch of regulars who are continuing to struggle offensively. Matt Olsen had a home run on Sunday, but he has not been sitting in the world on fire. Sean Murphy continues to be in a bit of a funk over the last five or ten games. Really just it is both frustrating to watch on a nightly basis because they just every game is seemingly like three to two or two to one. But at the same time, they're winning and that's all you can ask for. And at the end of the day, it does not matter if you win a game twelve to nine or three to two. But I think, just for all of our sanity and blood pressure, the Braves have to find a way to start scoring a few more runs because trying to win all these games when you were putting up two or three every single night.

00:04:04
Speaker 3: Is just not going to be sustainable, right.

00:04:06
Speaker 1: The margins are just too thin for comfort. Our guy Steven Tolbert was making fun of this this week as well, like these guys are gonna kill him and I'm just gonna read the scores of the week's games. It's actually kind of funny. Three to one, three to one, three to two, three to two three to two, and ten innings four to two, and then a super blowout today on Sunday five to one. I say that with obviously some snark attached. So basically every game was competitive. Even the one today that kind of got broken open late was tied pretty deep into the game. So nothing has been comfortable since last Sunday's eleven to three dominant win. It's been a nail batter every single night, and the margin Forreeer has been tight. We'll get into kind of how the Braves are handling all of this offensively, what's been challenging them, How good the pitching has been this week has been a carryover for the whole season, and so then we've tried to emphasize all year long, and every once in a while it's worth taking a step back and just remembering that this is not supposed to be what this team was. It's really wild every again, not trying to do this every single show, but the Braves were historically dominant last year with a very similar personnel to this year. Obviously you lose a Kunya and the injuries, as we'll get into maybe later on this podcast. Always always always need to be around the corner for this team. But the formula for this team was supposed to be offense first and everything else secondary, even if they were really kind of void of like going weaknesses. We like the bullpen, we like the rotation, et cetera. The rotation's overperformed almost certainly, especially when you removed Rider, like it's going to get this out of the rotation all year long has been relatively unbelievable, to be honest with you, from Chris Sale especially to Raial to Lopez, special Small and mocka course coming out of relatively nowhere to be doing this. And the bullpen has been great all year long as well, even if today was kind of a hiccup on that front. But it really is like from a thousand, ten, one hundred and two thousand, you know, view of things, the offense being what has been all ye year long and the Braves still being ten or five hundred is actually truly remarkable. And you know, as we're talking, Scott, I'm not sure that if you evend know this, but as we're talking, the Braves currently lead the National League. It runs allowed. That is how they're here.

00:06:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah, it's remarkable and no matter how this season ends. The pitching staff is such a big reason why the club has been successful really since day one, And it pulled this stat the other day and it really blew my mind. So the Braves is we'll call the Braves is big six offensively of Acunya Olsen, Riley, Murphy, Alby's, and Michael Harris. In twenty twenty three, those six players combined for thirty three point two war. That was the largest war of any team's top six players. Again, Acunya Olson, Riley, Murphy, Alby's, Harris thirty three.

00:06:58
Speaker 1: War five and a half person. Just for the record, just a quick math there, that's that's five an half is starlevel performance.

00:07:06
Speaker 2: So yes, there's there's maybe two dozen players who get even close to that kind of number. And obviously rond Acuna Junior was the MVP, Matt Olsen was fourth, Austin Riley got votes, so on and so forth. This season, the Braves is big six of Acunya Olsen, Riley, Murphy, Albi's and Harris have combined for six point eight.

00:07:30
Speaker 1: It is late August Scott.

00:07:32
Speaker 2: I mean, I say this without trying to be obtuse, but if you told me five months ago when we were doing our season preview podcasts that at the end of August the Braves would have six point eight war from that six that group of six players. I mean, I would have thought something like catastrophic happened, like like a buck a bus crash or something, or like a I don't even know, right, just shocking that last year, that group thirty three war. This year they're probably going to end around eight or nine war combined, depending on how the last month of the season goes. It is truly a miracle that this team as of today is in the postseason. And I mean I just even in your wildest dreams, your most pessimistic dreams, I'm not sure anybody could have seen this performance offensively combined with all the injuries.

00:08:27
Speaker 1: I'm with you one hundred percent, and I wanted to start the show here because you know, obviously, coming off of a loss on Sunday, it's not always upbeat, and you and I have a tendency to be a little bit skeptical generally speaking. I'm sure a lot of listers are laughing at that, because we are more than that, probably in some respects, but taking several steps back and just realizing that they are seventy and sixty despite pretty much the season from hell. In most ways, a lot's gone right too. Obviously we mentioned Sale Schwellenbach. Things have gone right, some of them, but more has gone wrong to be sure, and that's that you just laid out there is probably the perfecting capsulation of that. To be you know, twenty five winsbo replacement behind on just the six players and still be where they are is a testament, and that's more of a natural perspective. I think people that if you get outside the bubble of Braves fans, like when I ask people around the lead to cover baseball gon nessary with the Braves, they're kind of more impressed with the Braves hanging around than they are frustrated. And we're obviously frustrated day to day. It's been frustrating all year long, but it's still been a pretty impressive show of resiliency despite the fact that it's not always been smooth sailing this season.

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00:10:50
Speaker 1: Scott let us dive in to the weekend's results. The first few guys were obviously more favorable than the last one. Friday's game was there fifth straight game while scoring three runs or less. That's actually remarkable in itself, as we bridge to the previous segment, But they end up winn to get in ten, benefiting from a poor defensive play by the Nationals in the tenth inning. What did you make of that performance? Obviously, Chris Sale, We'll get to rest Sell in a second, but big picture, continuing to sort of winning ways at the end of the Filly series.

00:11:21
Speaker 2: When watching on Friday night, I tweeted out that it felt like this was the fifty fifth time this season that the Braves have played that exact same baseball game, low scoring opportunities to score that they couldn't take advantage of. But I think friend of the podcast Brandon Gordon said it perfectly on his call in the tenth inning. Somehow, some way, the Braves found a way to win that game. It was great to kind of bounce back with how anemic things were. Michael Harris hit a lead off homer, which was great, but then the offense was basically invisible the rest of the game. No walks in ten innings is not going to cut it. And thankfully the newly acquired geo Orchella had a big hit in the seventh to come around and tie it. And then shout out to C. J. Abrams, who had a terrible weekend defensively. He also helped the team out on Saturday quite a bit.

00:12:18
Speaker 3: But hey, you.

00:12:19
Speaker 2: Know what, this time of year, win, ugly, win pretty it really doesn't matter in the big picture.

00:12:25
Speaker 3: The Braves won, and.

00:12:26
Speaker 2: It was obviously a good to get that momentum, you know, continued after beating the Phillies two out of three earlier.

00:12:33
Speaker 1: In the week, for sure, and you know, Chris Sale doing Chris Sale things is very helpful. Didn't have a his strikeout game, necessarily working only four and seven innings on Friday, but certainly did his job as he almost always does. We should just We've been praising him all year long, kind of on purpose. I'm glad we have. We're looking kind of smart right now. But Russell Iglesias had this ridiculous run that I guess came to an end quote unquote on Friday, even overally didn't come to in but he threw two innings of almost perfect baseball on Friday. Where would you that the bricks asking him to throw two innings, But he did. And this is the crazy one. I think people kind of finally thought out about this this weekend. He actually generated thirty eight consecutive outs, which translates to like a perfect game and a half. Basically, just to kind of tell you how hard that is, twenty seven outs is a perfect game. Of course, in a row. He was at thirty eight. And even though I think almost appropriately, the streak ended on a hit by pitch, so it's like heat, like a home run. He just hit. He just hit somebody and they got to this guy out.

00:13:34
Speaker 2: He's really good, yeah, I mean, and good for Rice El because he picked up some real national acknowledgments over the last week. I know the MLB official Twitter account was tweeting about him. I think ESPN had a couple of numbers about Rice Elle's historic run. Now, he has been unbelievable this season and especially lately. I mean you mentioned, I mean, thirty eight straight outs. That is impossible to do, and ricecell has somehow done it. He has done a fantastic job in the ninth and tenth innings. Working double innings is also really impressive, and you know he's had a heavy workload lately. Really the whole bullpen has been taxed, which is kind of a hidden bad part of all of these low scoring close games is that you don't want the bullpen to be getting worn out in August going into September and October. So hopefully again, obviously you want to score as many runs as you can, but a hidden advantage of when you are putting up more runs is that you don't have to rely on your top guns out of the bullpen every single night.

00:14:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll circle back to that in a second. We'll talking about Sunday's game and the fact that Luke Jackson was pitching, and that became a topic to be sure, in between there that got it went on Saturday as well, four to two. Did it scare you at all that Horice Olayer does not start the game and play in the game on Saturday? I know, the greatest we're saying that was planned. I was a little bit eyebrought. Raising He did come back and start today, so maybe nothing to worry about, But he doesn't look that comfortable to me with the hamstring, like physically obviously he still hit, but uh, I was a little bit worried until they basically said, hey, guys, just precaution, Like all right, I guess I guess I feel better about that he puts it the play today. But I was a little bit worried, I got be honest.

00:15:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, anytime you're talking about a player with a hamstring issue, it's always a little concerning. And this season for the Braves, yeah right, I mean, just another one to add onto the pile. You know, Jorge on Friday night, there was that play in right field where a Paul just kind of like perfectly blooped on the right field line. Jorge was not exactly sprinting to get to it. No, I don't know if that was by design, like if he clearly is not one hundred percent or I mean as an inexperienced outfielder at this point, I mean, I couldn't believe that ball landed fair. I mean, you know, a foot to the right and I think it would have been foul. So is it a concern, I think a mild one. At this point, you just have to hope that that hamstring calms down and he's able to you know, every day he gets a little bit better, especially with all the injuries right now. I know the defense has been an adventure for Joorge out and right field, but his bat when it is going is just so impactful at the top of this order and can only hope that he's going to be fine.

00:16:23
Speaker 1: Did you notice, like I did, that he kind of got lamb lamp lamb basted by the Beat guys on Friday for that defensive play. People were really mad about that, like really mad.

00:16:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, defense, Yeah, I mean to be to be fair, the defense has been an adventure.

00:16:37
Speaker 1: Oh no, definitely, it's been bad. Don't get me wrong, it has been very poor. I just thought it was like notable to see, like the aggression and like all of them were mad about it. It's just interesting to me the timing of it all, Like it's like everybody took thought, take off their their journalism caps and got mad all at the same time. It's just kind of interesting. Yeah, you're right, though, the bad ist what matters, And I think that was what we would say. Certainly they knew they were getting getting into every time there's a bad play defensively from so layer it's gonna be the same round of takes about him being a DH. And by the way, he's a DH. We said that when they trade it for him, but they have they was don to play DH, So what are you gonna do about that? Speaking of the additions, though we should always point this out Ramon Loreano had a home run. It was kind of a big insurance play in the game on Saturday. Uh and the new additions, that's been ridiculous all year long. Basically, I do think that, uh, you know, it's they didn't all arrive at once, but they kind of did, you know, so Layer was the big trade. Loreano just kind of appeared out of nowhere, say with Maryfield and Orchella. Orchella obviously recently post deadline, all those things. But somebody asked, I can't remember who was my apologies for not naming this person. Somebody asked us to kind of shed light on this. The four of them have all been good at the plate. It's kind of funny in contrast to what we just said about the offense is kind of not being particularly dynamic in recent days. But this is my WRC plus. Since they arrived, Loreano has a one forty. That's excellent, So laire one thirty six excellent with Mary fills of one to twenty eight WRC plus with a three ninety six on base percentage, and even Gio Urshela, who's had a couple of nice timely hits, has a ninety four RC plus and a tiny sample size. They've all been, I would say, personally better than anyone could have expected. Maybe you disagree, but the Braves have just kind of found this goal and that's part of why they've been able to kind of inch away some of these victories and not a small thing like you could not have assumed any of these guys. Maybe I guess I should to be fair, so larrer, you probably assumed the other three guys you couldn't have assumed really much of anything from, and they've all been quite helpful.

00:18:43
Speaker 2: Oh, it's been fantastic, And the front office deserves a lot of credit for kind of plucking this ragtag group of guys, especially the three free agents, and getting something out of them, let alone really high production. Offensively. I made this point couple of days ago on the show. But if Alex would have gone out at the trade deadline and traded for an outfielder and traded for a second baseman, and traded for a third baseman. And they had these numbers, especially Loreano and Mirrifield. I mean, we would be talking about yet another fantastic trade deadline for Nthopolis and they signed all these players for minimum money off the scrap heap. They have done a fantastic job in stabilizing this lineup, especially with all the injuries. And I mean, I know Wit Mirryfield had a bit of an adventure in the field on Sunday afternoon. Today was not the Wit Maryfield game, to be sure, it wasn't, but basically every other game since he joined the starting lineup has been the Wit Mayfield game. He's been great getting on base, solid defense, adds some speed to the lineup. So yeah, I mean, for a team that has seemingly had to battle a new injury every single week for about four months now, that group has been really solid. And it least in the early going, Geo Orschella has been fine at their base and yeah, he can just be good enough and catch the baseball and give them a little something offensively. I think you have to take it just knowing that. Of course, Riley's injury was after the trade deadline and you basically had no other options.

00:20:17
Speaker 1: For sure, I'm gonna pick up Maryfield in a second about Sundays game because he was a little rough. But I will also say, even as a renowned Ozzie Albie's apologist, Maryfield has turned a couple double plays the Ozzie would have had no chance to turn, like a zero chance to death. Yep. So that's that's worth noting too. A couple of us safe runs, big moments that have happened in the last few games that Maryfields dide a great job swinging the ball from one side to the other. The other thing that we should we mentioned, because I am again contractually obligated, is that Charlie Morton pitched well again on Saturday. It wasn't always smooth Scott eight hits in five to two thirds innings, but two runs, six strikeouts did his job. Charlie has three. That's three in a row. I'm I'm just counting with my giant scoreboard on my desk about Charlie Morton. I'm kidding, but he was good.

00:21:01
Speaker 2: In your Charlie Morton, Suresey and is the posters.

00:21:05
Speaker 1: You can't you can't see me right now, Scott. But I might be worrying Charlie Morton's you know, I'm actually not doing this. But what if I had a shirt with In fact, when we go to a video at some point in my life, I might just have a giant like Charlie Morton face on my on my back wall.

00:21:18
Speaker 2: What'd be funny, you know, Like, is it PTI that has all the y the fat.

00:21:22
Speaker 1: Heads that they have? Yeah, there you.

00:21:25
Speaker 2: Go, Chuck Morton, The roller coaster season continues.

00:21:29
Speaker 1: It's true, you know, I mean it was.

00:21:31
Speaker 2: It was real bad for a stretch of four or five starts about a month ago. But his last three starts have been really good and he did his job only two runs. Thankfully, the offense was safe to score just enough with the four. There was a note on the broadcast that when Ramon Loreano hit a insurance home run in the eighth inning, the Braves were on the cusp of breaking a nineteen sixteen Boston Bean Eater record for the fewest runs scored over a stretch of six or seven games. I mean, the Boston Bean Eaters. Brad, you don't want to be messing around with records from that era of baseball. So again just the overall theme. The Braves won the game. Pitching was really good, the offense was not. But you take two out of three against a pesky Nationals team. I mean, we don't want to be too greedy here.

00:22:27
Speaker 1: Everyone wants to be greedy, including us, But objectively, this is where I do my bit. Even if you're playing the worst team in the league. Maybe not the White Sox, they're historically bad, but just pick anybody else. Projecting a sweep is never is never the right projection, like it can obviously happen. You'd like to sweep a team. But the Nats, as you've pointed out several times incorrectly so, are not absolutely terrible. And yesterday was in Atlanta. But the I would say, the medium, the media, sorry, the media outcome in that series would have been a two to one braz victory and that's what happens, So no worries there.

00:23:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, I believe the Braves are ten and four since the disastrous weekend at course Field. I mean ten and four, Brad, I you know you take that every single time.

00:23:11
Speaker 1: You have to. It is I mean the infamous nine to eight Sunday loss to fall to five ers hundred, five hundred, Yeah, there's something like that. They're nine and four ten whatever it is. Since then, they've been quite good. Yeah, since that's stretch, we should talk about Sunday's game. We should lead with the injuries as well. We don't know, so we'll time stat this. Scott I records earlier than usually. There was an earlier game today. It was a noon start. We have lives and things, but it is three forty one pm Eastern time as we're recording this podcast. Keep that in mind. Michael Harris exited the game on Sunday. He actually got hit with the first on the first battery of the game in the hand by a fastball. Stay in the game for three more innings, which in theory would be a positive. I'm not sure. The Braves then announced that he was gonna come out of the game quote as a precaution that was in the release. And then postgame Bryce Snicker said that the postgame kind of tests were still being done as he spoke to the media, they'll probably get results at some point today. We won't know that as we're recording this podcast. You might as you were listening, So just keep out in mind for context. Perspective. I don't know, Scott, I'm a little bit less. I'm knocking on worry now. I'm a little bit less worried that it was about Riley, where we kind of all assume the worst. With Riley. It seemed like the rollout here has been a little bit more positive. At the same time, nothing's been positive on injury front this year, so who knows.

00:24:31
Speaker 2: No, you know, I think we're holding our breaths, but if recent history is any indication, maybe we shouldn't be, because we might be holding our breath for a long time. You know. The fact that Michael did not immediately react in the way that we're like Austin. Riley was hunched over and just in clear and obvious pain. Now Michael, I'm sure it didn't feel good, but he trotted to first base. The cameras caught him with the Braves training staff doing some strength tests. He looked like he was able to grip the trainer's hand pretty well with his injured hand. That's all encouraging. And the fact that Michael stayed out there for four or five more innings and had an at bat where he swung a couple of times. I think that's at least somewhat encouraging. But I mean, if I had to guess, I'm guessing after four or five innings, the hands started to either swell or become sore, and the Braves did use the word precaution, although that doesn't necessarily mean a whole lot because they used precaution on joegeeseil air and he ended up missing a full week.

00:25:34
Speaker 3: So we'll see.

00:25:35
Speaker 2: Let's all sincerely hope for good news on this one. You know, if I had to bet, I would imagine the Braves are going to get okay news and avoid yet another injury. But man, the way this season is gone, I mean, nothing would shock me at this point.

00:25:50
Speaker 1: I would like to not have to do any more emergency podcasts this year. Yeah, as we always say post deadline, we don't want to do any more podcasts pre deadline. That's fine because usually usually, not always, usually those are good. That means they're trades or exciting things. Post deadline when you can't trade a new one. The only reason why we would do it emergency podcast is for an injury and a bad one. So no more of those, please, But yeah, we'll have coverage later on the week. If we need to on that front. The other injury that happened was late in the game Marcel's doon fall folled a ball off of his left leg. It was clearly in some pain. He told the media I believe was from gay birds bab to see that he expects to play tomorrow. I trust Marcel. We'll see on that. But uh Sin didn't talk about it. Then I saw post game, so that one, it didn't seem like it was terribly alarming. He finished the play, He finished the play appearance. But another guy they obviously can't afford me without. He's been their best hitter by a lot this season. So just yeah, goes about saying they need they need more solos of them.

00:26:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe, I mean the fact that Marcel is the DH is obviously helpful here. It's not like he really has to put stress on that knee.

00:26:59
Speaker 1: He tried to, he tried to run and stretch one stretch one this weekend. It didn't go very well. Yeah.

00:27:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe maybe eight years ago, Marcell, you could have gotten too second base. But I think I'm sure when he wakes up, especially tomorrow morning, it'll be bruised, it'll be swollen, let's hope that. I mean, even if Marcel has to miss a game, that's obviously not the end of the world. But you know, just yet another thing, man. I mean, it's something about the Sunday afternoon games lately. I've just been some kind of curse because you know, just no matter what, there's always something. But it does seem like Marcel is going to be fine and in.

00:27:34
Speaker 3: The good column.

00:27:35
Speaker 2: I was very, very interested to see what Ronaldo Lopez was going to do today.

00:27:40
Speaker 1: Yep.

00:27:41
Speaker 2: And he pitched really well and the velocity was really good, and that was I think notable considering he was pitching on regular rest, coming off of his first start in a couple of weeks.

00:27:52
Speaker 1: He was a fair bright spot of Sunday afternoon for the Braves despite the loss, you know, one run allowed and six innings. Some strike outs look like himself certainly, you know, the pitching other than what happened with Luke Jackson. We'll get to in a second. Marge Raer goes both ways, like I feel like, and this is just part of the natural reaction of fandom when the team loses games or his trailing that people get really mad at the pitching. I would just stress that being mad at anything about the pitching right now is just kind of a misguided It's the offense. If you lose a game three to two, it's the offense's fault. It's not really the pitching's fault. If you hold your opponent of the three runs or less, you're supposed to win more often than not. So there's that. But yeah, as for Ronaldo, he was really quite good. I was encouraged by that they didn't have to give him a break, which they didn't fel like they did. The Braves are. I think they've changed for two in a little bit, as we've discussed last couple of weeks, like they're kind of pressing peller to the metal right now with their pitchers, not necessarily overusing them, but just not being as cautious for obvious results based reasons. But Ronaldo returned favor with that sort of aggressiveness by pitching quite well, giving them a chance because look, they were still tied in this game at the end because of Ronaldo.

00:28:58
Speaker 2: He did a really nice job and you just have to hope that he's able to keep building on the start. The fact that he is seemingly no worse for wear after that elbow injury is very very good news. And despite all of the Braves's challenges and obstacles this season, I still have in the back of my mind that if this team can get into the playoffs, and if they can avoid more serious injuries, they really are built as a team that could win a playoff series or two or three or four. It's just going to be a bit of a rocky road getting to that point. Yeah.

00:29:33
Speaker 1: I mean, any team that has the pitching depth that they have on both starters and relievers is built for the postseason. I'm looking right now to do the live stats, but I'm pretty sure the Braves are like number one or two. Yeah, they're actually number two right now in Fangraft's war for the entire pitching staff this season, nearly behind Philadelphia. They're number two in the majors in era as a full staff. I believe they are number one in FIP like their number one strike out right, I believe too, Yeah, they are. So they've basically been, if not the best pitching staff in the league, in the top three, and if you just start there, that's a good place to be for your pitching staff, especially when when you also have the aces to you combine the aces of Sale and Freed with enough depth and a high end bullpen with a dominant closer, like that's a pretty strong fundation.

00:30:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I mean you just have to try to get there, right, you know, I think we've probably said it.

00:30:30
Speaker 1: Not a lock by any means still here in late August.

00:30:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, but all right, Brad, should we do the seventh inning Luke Jackson next time?

00:30:38
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's just discuss this briefly. Look, we don't always try to go super deep into the single games for the rever season, but interesting situation here, So I'll start here before this try to put your pre knowing what was going to happen had on what did you make of Luke Jackson in a tie game and a seventh inning, Because you did say earlier that they have taxes the willpen, and that is fair and that's good context people should point out, because it's not like they had everybody available for their I means, I guess everybody was available in theory, but there might be a reason there. But at the same time, I don't think that anyone really trusts Loop right now, so to have him been a close game in the set sorry, not even a close game, a tie game in the seventh inning. It's not ideal.

00:31:18
Speaker 2: I kind of closed my eyes because I just I have no confidence in Luke man the fact that, okay, so let's start here. Was Luke Jackson good today overall?

00:31:31
Speaker 3: No?

00:31:31
Speaker 1: No, But he also had.

00:31:33
Speaker 2: A lot of things work against him that were not his fault. That's correct, and that's all part of the Luke Jackson experience. To answer your question, I would have not put Luke out there. I would have thrown Aaron Bummer. I would have thrown Dylan Lee. I would have thrown Grant Holmes. I mean, any of those guys are better choices than Luke Jackson in a one to one game. But it's not his fault that whit Mayorfield made an error, and it's not his that the umpire missed strike three. And it's not his fault that there was a Sean Murphy passed ball that erased what could have been a double play set up. So it's probably an even pendulum on Luke was not good, but there were also some things out of his control that obviously worked against him in the worst way possible.

00:32:19
Speaker 1: That's a great way to put it. And I do think that it's pretty clear that at the moment, with their current active twenty six men roster, Luke is their worst pitcher. Maybe you could argue Chavez, it's one of the two. I can't see anybody else being in the in the mix there. So to have your probably worst pitcher in a TI game in the seventh inning, it's not great. But yeah, you just laid it all out there. You never know what would have happened had they gotten the call. But I mean it could have been as simple as the what was It should have been strike three by the pitch metrics that we have. Literally the next pitch is a wild pitch that scores a runt, so the game goes from being tied to not being tied. Then to give him the double that was that was a real double to go three to one, and then the insurance run the I think it probably should have been another era. I wouldn't I went in the same inning. It was called a single, but it was probably should have been. I'm playing the he mix, so yeah, it was both. And I don't want to tell everyone that Luke would have gotten out of the inning, because honestly, I believe they were about to go away from the many way. If Luke gets that out and gets the call strike three. In theories coming out of the game there they had someone warming. I think was it Bummer. I believe it was Bummer. Yeah, he probably comes out of the game.

00:33:34
Speaker 6: I don't know.

00:33:34
Speaker 1: That's what the radio guys thought was listening to the broadcast at the time, So we'll never know. It's one pitch it was. It was it was bora line. It wasn't like it was like down the middle of the plate, but it was probably strike. He didn't get the call and cycle from there. But as we both said before, if the Braves score one run, they probably are gonna win. So that's that's another part of this. Like, yeah, it was frustrating to watch. Luke wasn't good. Mary Food out a tough endings he also, I believe, yeah, it was the first inning that Maryfield had the pretty wretched play appearances with the bases loaded in the first inning. Oh yeah, Like, yeah, that was tough. He had a bad day. We did pray similarly, so we're allowed to say that he had a bad day to day.

00:34:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean rough at bat for with the bases loaded in the first inning. Felt like the Braves had a real opportunity to put up a crooked number in the first inning, which has been.

00:34:20
Speaker 3: Very few and far between the last couple of weeks.

00:34:22
Speaker 1: But instead they scored zero runs. Right, yeah, even not even not even one could have scratched one across there did not And uh yeah, I still think on balance it was the today it was an offensive loss. I mean that's pretty clear to me.

00:34:37
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean I tweeted it during the game.

00:34:41
Speaker 2: At some point, man, they just have to score some runs, right, I mean, that's that is the end all be all. You have to score runs to win baseball games. And when you don't score runs consistently, your margin of air is so small. And I know they went five and two this week, but you cannot expect to win games when you only up one or two or three runs every single night.

00:35:04
Speaker 3: Offense kind of cures all.

00:35:06
Speaker 2: And at this point, the Braves just don't have any offense to talk about.

00:35:10
Speaker 1: If they scored nineteen runs this coming week, they're not one of that games. I am. I'm quite confident in that. So it's good fortune and good ren prevention. This week. That was all that was all positive, but replicating that is not something you want to try to do if you can help it. Speaking of this coming week, I wish you have thoughts on Harold Ramirez, who the Braves signed to a matter leag deal this week. That was the only bit of news beyond the injury stuff that we could mention, but probably just death there.

00:35:36
Speaker 2: I would guess I was gonna say, if Harold Ramirez plays a single inning of Atlanta Braves baseball this season, something has probably gone very, very very wrong. But yeah, I mean it's it's depth for Gwinnette. Funny enough, Brad. Just a note on old friend Eddie Rosario. Eddie signed with the Mets on a minor league deal and was released about a week later, So Eddie is on the market.

00:36:04
Speaker 3: I cannot.

00:36:05
Speaker 1: I think Eddi's cooked. I think that's that's just me.

00:36:09
Speaker 2: That is a I guess a tip of the cap to the front office for catching that before they.

00:36:15
Speaker 3: Re signed him.

00:36:15
Speaker 2: I mean, the Braves did decline Eddie's I think eight million dollar option last winter. Not that Jared Keelnick has been anything special on the outfield, but I think we all know it's Eddie's time. Thing for the memories. But uh yeah, Harold Ramirez probably never going to be talked about on this podcast ever. Again.

00:36:34
Speaker 1: I wanted to want We'll see, I wanted to, but this is just a sidebar kind of related. I just looked at the Braves active roster listing on edGB dot com, like the official team sanctioned roster. It made me laugh. They only have three players list as infielders on the entire team. Now, obviously you have to play four each and every inning and each and every game you have to beleave four Arcia, Arcia Olsen and are Alla says infielders. They actually have Merryfield and Luke Waives Listen's outfielders, which is just basically.

00:37:05
Speaker 2: Oh sure, I was gonna say, because mirrorfielder is playing some outfield with the Phillies.

00:37:08
Speaker 1: Yeah, and Luke can playoff field too. It's just was funny the way they that was just a non sequitary is just kind of made me laugh like that. That's a pretty good backgrounds of this season. The Brays have free and fielders on the roster on the team has to play four every day. Okay, moving on a big week ahead, we will preview the entire thing. But they do play Minnesota three times they have to go on the road after being home this week, they're actually on the road for all seven this coming week. The Twins are pretty good. That's worth just saying out loud. The Twins are not like a sexy team. They're not always talked about, but they are. They have seventy two wins already as they're still playing right now. They're playing right now speaking against the Cardinals. But that's a good baseball team. And the Braves will use some of their best pitchers this weekend, which would be interesting. But it's all kind of a maybe there's some look ahead risk with Philadelphia, the big, big, big four game showdown sort of looming in Philadelphia this weekend. But the Twins are not team you can kind of look over because they are very good.

00:38:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, solid ball club. And raise your hand if you had the best division race in baseball this season, being in the American League Central between the Cleveland Guardians the Kansas City Royals.

00:38:15
Speaker 1: The Royal Mine. That gets me. The Royals being there is actually well and they actually have the best run inferential in the entire division, which blows me away. Now, it helps when the White Sox are in the division and they are thirty one and ninety nine. But I think we agree though about divisional race. It's actually quite fun and you don't actually like baseball. I know there's a lot of people that don't like watching anything with brapes, but I want to track the stuff. It's it's fun for me.

00:38:38
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah.

00:38:38
Speaker 2: Twins solid club, good run differential, really good pitching and kind of quietly their offense is fourth in war this season, so they're a talented team. They are very much in the playoff picture in the American League, just like the Braves. Every single game matters for the Twins because it feels like the al race is going to come down to maybe the last day of the season, so a test for the Braves, three in Minnesota and then four enormous games in Philadelphia. It feels like this is going to be a very important week ahead and two quality playoff level.

00:39:12
Speaker 1: Teams for sure. And I think you note that you'd know this on our dock here, like there was maybe a chance the Braves were gonna not use their best possible guys and maybe give him an extra day day off as far as pitching is concerned. That is not the current plan by the probables. The probables are freed on Monday, Schwellenbach on Tuesday, and Chris Saale on Wednesday, which is the order that they would have been in. No matter what, the Braves do actually catch a break. Minnesota's best pitcher by far is Pablo Lopez. He's very, very good. He's not scheduled to pitch, so a pitching advantage to Atlanta prove the Lenza of their top two guys pitching and Lopez not. Despite the games being in Minnesota. I guess they could still pull a fast one on us and throw in like Smith shav or Ian, but it seems like it's going to be the big Guns of the big Guns only. And then we'll see what happens with Phildelph And.

00:40:02
Speaker 2: Just a roster note here that I believe on Friday is September first. That's when rosters expand, so the Braves will get to add another pitcher and another hitter. Now the hitter, I don't even know who it'll be, maybe Eli White or the outfield, but nothing of consequence there. But the team will get to add a very valuable arm. I would assume it's days Bell Hernandez to add another power right handed arm to the bullpen. It would also give you a full month of being able to see Day's Bell and see if he's a potential playoff series option, or that they could opt to add one of their starters, whether Ian Anderson who's been pitching really well and A. J. Smith Schauver has been much better lately coming back from that oblique injury. So we will see a couple of days away now. Of course we will have a podcast whenever that roster move gets made. But just worth noting that you can add two players to your roster. Although I mean, remember when teams used to have like thirty five of their.

00:41:05
Speaker 1: Forty roster you could carry, you could cary if you can care, you care everybody. At one point it was forty, you could, you could do forty. It was just absolute chaos. No, I think your riot's a good point. By the way, it's Sunday, not Friday. Sunday is the first. It's weird, but Sundays the first. But yeah, uh, Day's Bell seems like an absolute luck to me to be one of them. Uh, we'll see if it's another guy, another starter like you mentioned, maybe like if you want to go relieve reliever, you go to Jackson Stevens always been I think it's been hurt.

00:41:34
Speaker 3: I think I think the rule is one hit or one pitcher?

00:41:37
Speaker 1: Is it one and one? I've missed that, I think.

00:41:39
Speaker 3: So, which with the DH.

00:41:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, with the DH is.

00:41:43
Speaker 2: So dumb because teams don't really use their bench anymore. I wish they would change that.

00:41:48
Speaker 1: I would certainly expect it to be Eli White and Day's Bell then through that once. I mean, it doesn't mean it's going to be that. It could be somebody else. But they have those guys on the forty man, which makes a big difference. Of course, they're are like they're like, for instance, people always ask abou Julie Guriel. He got hurt number one I think a couple of days ago, but also not on the forty min, so you gotta have the maneuvers there. He's also like one thousand years old. Nacho was on the forty men, I guess, so that would be a guy to keep an eye on at some point maybe, but they probably they probably want him to keep playing. I would imagine every day until the mile season's over. So if I if I had to bet right now without any inside info, I would I would bet on Eli Whiten Days player name this, yeah, I would concur could be Zach log I guess he's on the forty men or aj I will say this as a curve ball. Daves Bell is much safer than these guys because he's actually a reliever. But I think both Smith Shaver and Hirston Waldroup could be reliever candidates with their stuff if they had to.

00:42:49
Speaker 2: And you know, obviously you only get to add one roster spot. But if the Braves want to give, like a j. Smith Shaver a real test and it's like a multiple bullpen arm down the stretch, you can always say that Jesse Chavez has a sore elbow, or.

00:43:06
Speaker 1: You could df Luke Jackson. All apologies to Luke, he's my he. I still I didn't. I think it was like you called it not about a week ago. I still think that they don't want to dfa him. They've made that clear. They probab would have done it already. But there might be a point where they just have to be like, all right, we've enjoyed our time together. Uh maybe we move on here and Jesse They're not going to do that. I think it's a good point. I'm glad you said injury for Jesse rather than DFA. They're not gonna dfa him, but I think that they can give him two weeks off pretty easily they wanted to. So yeah, uh did I el staid for old? Yeah?

00:43:39
Speaker 2: Enjoy three paid weeks in vacation, Jesse. You can still be around the club. But yeah, I mean we're just spitballing here. But you know, man, it's it is crazy to say that there is about five weeks left in the regular season. I feel like the month of August flew by, like yesterday, felt like we were doing the trade deadline podcast. And here we are, man, I mean, this is officially the home stretch, final month of.

00:44:05
Speaker 3: The season for baseball. I mean, football is back.

00:44:07
Speaker 2: It really does feel like maybe the first half of this season kind of slogged for me, but the second half has flown by, and we'll be ready for hopefully, god, let's hope we will hopefully be ready for playoff baseball here soon.

00:44:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, we'll know some more about the way the races stack up. The Mets and Padres play each other today after we're recording this podcast, so the Braids will either be closer to the Padres in the standings in the second wilid Card race, or they'll be closer to the Mets. We'll see, but you know, it is what it is. That's kind of a root for wherever you want to kind of situation. Philadelphia, I believe one today they're about to win. Whether' up. They're up six to three, so they're probably gonna win. So the Braves, if that holds, will be six games back in the division. Not over by any means, but it will big weekend that we'll preview later on this week because I think that we could probab agree if the Braves don't win at least two or three in Philadelphia, the division race is probably going to be uh no more.

00:45:05
Speaker 3: Well, we'll see it. Yeah, probably fair. Let's hope they can.

00:45:10
Speaker 2: The Bats wake up a little bit on the road again, good, you know, two good clubs with Minnesota and Philadelphia. But another twenty week. I mean, hey, if you can go four and three this week, I know it's kind of boring or conservative to say, but four and three against two teams like this on the road, I think you have to take it.

00:45:28
Speaker 1: I was about to ask you and you read my mind, what would be a good result, and I think we are in lockstep. Obviously you want to get greedy. But if you go on the road against two seventy plus win teams already and win four out of seven, that would be very very good. We'll see if it's only more than that. What you don't want to do is go too and five and dig yourself the whole. That's seems obvious, I know, but this is a on paper, a difficult stretch, both for opponents and being on the road and all that stuff.

00:45:55
Speaker 2: So in the good news looking ahead here, because you know we're in the time of year, I think you can really look at the schedule in the calendar. You know, the schedule gets significantly lighter after this tough week. The Braves return home, they get the Rockies for three, then they get the Blue.

00:46:11
Speaker 1: Jstcott the Rockies on the Braves. I'm not sure you wross the same series I did, but just saying.

00:46:17
Speaker 2: Let's hope they will not be the benefit of course field in that one. But you get the Rockies, you get the Blue Jays who sold off some pieces. You get the Reds for a makeup game, who kind of have fallen off, then you get the Nationals again, which is hardly a guarantee, so you do have a couple of softer weeks of schedule after this tough week ahead to hopefully keep winning games.

00:46:40
Speaker 3: And just you know, it's.

00:46:42
Speaker 2: Probably the theme of the podcast, just keep winning series and the Braves should find themselves in the playoffs in some capacity early October.

00:46:51
Speaker 1: Keep winning Series is a good piece of advice for the Alanta Professional Baseball Club. Scott. Anything to plug or share at the end of the podcast, because if not, let us get out of here on a Sunday afternoon.

00:47:03
Speaker 3: Nothing to plug, go Braks.

00:47:06
Speaker 1: You like that like five words? That was very I was thrown off. It was very concise from you there, Scott. Please's subscribe to this podcast. Just search Hammer Territory on your favorite podcast platform or platforms. If you want to go ahead and do it more than once, that'd be huguely helpful for us. Please also subscribe, rate, review, download all that stuff, tell your friends, tell your family about the podcast. Post on social media on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter so people can find the show on their own. Also, please check out our sponsors always on this podcast. That's how we are able to keep the podcast going is to have sponsors, so please patronize them in the near future. Please follow Scott on Twitter at Scott Calm fifty five follow me there if you want to. At bt Roland. The show Twitter account and this is also the same for Facebook and Instagram is at Hammer Territory. Expous to everybody, We definitely appreciate it and enjoy your week and we'll see you all next time.