Braves Wallop Dbacks in Series Opener as Winning Ways Continue

00:00:25
Speaker 1: Hello everyone, and welcome to the Hammer Territory podcast. I'm Scott Coleman, and it is deep into the night, but with good reason. I am joined by the great Stephen Tolbert and tonight's Steven. We were a little fifty to fifty on if we were going to do a show. The Braves are, of course out west in Arizona. It is twelve thirty in the morning as we are recording this on the East coast. But hey, the Braves just blew the doors off the Diamondbacks on Thursday night. A great start to the road trip out west. And really the Braves just continue to play good baseball all the way around.

00:00:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's up, buddy. So tonight's game was the one thing we haven't seen yet was just the offense just dump truck somebody and make it a laugher. And I was, you know, really hoping to see it in the In the Kansas Kansas City series the Oakland series neither happened. The offense actually had moments where it actually looked pretty poor, a lot of flashbacks to the twenty twenty five offense at times the first two series, and so people are already kind of panicking. So the win is obviously good, but to have the offense come out and just dominate a game, and we're gonna go through the details here in a minute, and the game's actually still going on. That's how much of a laugher it is. We're recording as the game still happening. But that was good to see. It was good to see that everybody just kind of have a fun night and make it pretty much a no contest from about the fifth inning on.

00:01:49
Speaker 1: You know, maybe the stat of the game is that every single player who started for the Braves on Thursday night recorded at least one RBI. I mean, I don't know, I can't imagine that ever happened last season, and I mean even in like the historic twenty twenty three offensive season, I don't know, maybe once or twice that happened. But everybody got to eat on Thursday. It was really just an all around good performance, both offense and pitching. There was even some good defense too that we'll talk about in a little bit. But let's just kind of go through the game. It's going to be a unique episode. We only have one game to really talk about, and then a couple of injury notes at the end. As well as a preview of the rest of the series. But early on, both Matt Olson and Dom Smith absolutely launched home runs. Funny enough, both of them went four hundred and thirty feet was the estimate at Chase Field. In the first inning, Matt just crushed the ball to center field that landed just above that yellow line at Chase Field, which I mean, I've been to that stadium many times. You really have to hit a ball in order to get it to dead center. And that Dom Smith hit it like twenty five rows deep to right field, which was really really impressive. So a great night offensively for the boys, and Dom Smith continues to be a nice story and it was really good to see Metals and kind of come to life and really get going as well.

00:03:10
Speaker 2: Yeah what about Dom smith Man, But I mean what I just you know, obviously that walk off grand slam during the home stand and then everybody kind of learned his story and what he's been going through very recently, I mean in the last few weeks, and the dude just keeps putting up really good at bats. I'll be honest, I didn't know a ton of I mean, I know he played with the Mets and I knew him a little bit from there, and I knew he had a good eye, but I didn't realize quite how much of a weapon he was against right handed pitching. And I don't expect him to hit like this all year. This is probably a little bit out of his shoes. But I mean he's just stacking good at bat I mean every night, he's one of the best at bats in the game. He had a right after that, Homer came up and had like an eight pitch walk, So really impressive at bats. And again it's at the bottom of the order, you know. I think he's batting like seventh or eighth most nights, so it's helping, you know, stock up the basis for the guys at the top of the order. Again, yeah, I'm really impressed, and like you said, it was good to see Matt get off. You know, the kind of the one thing people have been waiting for is just a Kunya Olson Riley trio to start looking like a Cunya Olson Riley. I thought Acunya had really good at bats to night, he had like a one hundred and eight min hour line out, then a single, he had a walk. Obviously, Matt had a really good night Homer and double. Austin Rally had a double at one point, so again, you know, it's been a good start four and two. But the one thing everybody's been waiting for is the stars of the team to look like stars, because at some point Marieso Dubon and you know, Dom Smith probably aren't gonna hit like this forever. You're gonna need your stars to be stars. So to see everybody have a good night and have good at bats and have something to hang their hat on for tomorrow and going forward, that's almost as that's almost more important to me than the win itself. The win is good, obviously, but getting all of your stars looking like stars again is gonna help much pass much further than just tonight.

00:05:01
Speaker 1: It really will. And I mean we talked about the early offense, but really the fifth inning was wild. Like I looked it up. I could tell one time last year the Brave scored eight runs in an inning. Funny enough, it was the bizarre game where Atlanta scored eight and then the Red scored eight in the bottom half of the inning. Of course, I've kind of like tried to erase all of last season from my memory, but from what a quick Google search and I did not deep dive on this. Maybe they scored eight runs in another game, but in an inning that is. But the Braves sent twelve batters to the plate in the fifth inning to blow the game wide open. Eight runs scored, and I mean, there's a lot you can talk about. The offense got going when Ronald Acuna Junior drew a basis loaded walk, and then maybe the play of the game was Drake Baldwin hustling down the first base line to avoid a double play. Drake was originally called out at first base, but on a review he just barely beat the throw. But I'll be honest, even when Drake hit that ball right to Nolan Aroonatto at third base, it was like, oh man, this is gonna be a double play. At least the Braves got one run, but Baldwin was really hustling down the line beats out the double play, and after that moment on the Braves scored six more runs. It was really a turning point, and credit to Drake for fighting and really hustling to not only get a run for himself but just kind of keep the line moving.

00:06:25
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Ozzie started that whole inning with a really good at battle walk that he actually challenged the last pitch on to get on base to start the whole thing. Aeronaudo made an error. I think it was Dubond that hit a ball to Aeronato that probably could have been at least one, maybe two if he fielded it clean, that he didn't get any Ronnie had the really good at bat with the bas's loaded walk, and then yeah, Drake, I thought he hit that ball hard enough. I didn't think Drake had a chance to beat that out. Drake's gotten I mean, Drake's not fast by any stretch, but he's left handed, so that does help get down the line a little bit. But yeah, I mean, hustling is his ass off to get down there. And then like you said, they get the overturn, which scores a run, and then Matt comes up and ropes a double down the line, Austin comes up and hits a double down the line, and it's just, you know, everybody just ate after that. So yeah, really really big at bats, really really good hustle from Drake, and you know they had already I think they're already up four to one at that point, five to one at that point, but just to add on and make it a laugher, make it where guys can start.

00:07:28
Speaker 1: Coming out of the game.

00:07:29
Speaker 2: Ronaldo I think, came out of the game like one inning later. Like it just makes blowouts. Off days are the best thing for your team in terms of getting people rest, but blowouts are like the next best thing for the bullpen. They got to get Ronald off his feet out of that big outfield, like scoring sixteen seventeen runs, whatever they're gona end up with. That's I mean, that's all. It's not an off day, but it's as close to an off day as you're gonna get, especially when you got thirteen in a row to start the season.

00:07:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, it really is. It's valuable. You said it perfectly. It's valuable to kind of have these easy, no drama, no stress wins. You didn't have to tax the bullpen again, which has been a pretty nice theme early in the year. Sometimes you're three weeks into the year and you're like, oh my god, this bullpen could really use a couple of days. We haven't really had to use the bullpen all that much, which is great. And yeah, it's just a good game. Like from the first inning, Matt Olson set the tone and then Dom Smith hit the big homer, and then I mean that fifth inning was special and happy birthday to Austin Riley, who had a two run double down the line. That was good to see. Michael Harris also almost homered off the left field wall and opposite field shot almost homer. I mean, it was just again, man, just fun. Like you can count on probably two hands the number of just fun baseball games that we had like this a year ago. And the team's playing good baseball. They're five and two. It's always good to get a win out West. I don't care who you're playing. Going out West is always a challenge, especially when you didn't have a day off, and really just a nice continuation of a good first week of the year.

00:09:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, and they're gonna be four and oh in the Chris Sale Renaldo Lopez games after today, and that's Matt. I mean, you have to win those games right now, you just do. You don't know what you're gonna get after that. You know, Grant's pretty solid in the three spot, but four or five you have no clue. You have no clue what you're gonna get. So four and oh Chris Sale, Renaldo Lopez starts to start the year. I mean, that's what the doctor ordered. And Strider will be back soon. We're gonna talk about him closer to the show. Probably gonna see somebody different in the five spot. This turned to the rotation. But winning when your best two guys run the mound just makes everything a lot easier. And they're four to oh and with Lopez at Sale on the mound so far.

00:09:41
Speaker 1: So let's talk about Ronaldo Lopez a little bit more. I thought he pitched and threw the ball pretty well on Thursday night and the velocity continue to be good. But before we do that, let's take a moment to hear a quick word from our partners.

00:09:53
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00:10:15
Speaker 1: Want to learn more, visit Fastenal dot Com for Industrial Supplies and Innovative Solutions. That's f A S T E n A L dot Com. All right, Steve. Then a couple just other quick notes on the offense, which really had a good night. Mauricio Dubon just crushed a baseball. He barreled it over the center field wall at Chase Field, which again, really, I mean, there's no cheapies in Chase Field. That's a big ballpark. And I mean, I have been so impressed with Mauricio Dubon. I don't necessarily expect him to hit a whole lot of homers, but I mean the fact that he did it against a ariety too, which is historically he has not hit right handed pitching as well as lefties. Dubon has been really impressive this first week.

00:11:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've already got people in our mentions clamoring for a blue box extension for Mauricio Dubon one week end of the season. Part of it is just we've watched awful, awful levels of offense from shortstop over the past two and a half years, and literally any sign of life from a shortstop on this team, it just seems like a breath of fresh air that we haven't had in so long. I mean, just the fact that the dude can hit a ball four hundred feet is an improvement over what we've had. And you're right, he crushed that ball and it looked like he kind of one handed it and that thing went like fo ten to four hundred and fifteen feet something like that to left center field and Chase Field, which is a pop. So he's been great and he's gonna play a big role. Even when Kim comes back, He's gonna play a role because he can play in the outfield. He can easily be the other side of the platoon for Yastrensky and Left, which I think they'll do a lot. And listen, Kim coming back, there's no guarantee that Kim's just gonna roll right into the team and be, you know, are really productive player. We have no idea we're gonna get from Kim, so and we have no idea if he's gonna stay healthy either or if he's gonna come back in the timeline they think he's gonna come back. So I think Dubon's gonna have a really good year. I think that was one of my predictions is I think Debon is gonna end up being the best infielder of the three that the Braves have by the end of the year. He is a pending free agent at the end of the year, and I don't expect him to hit this well. I think there will be a drop off at some point, but I mean him and Tom Smith, with the guys in the middle of the lineup having slow starts, him and Tom Smith have been unbelievable. You know, Drake Baldwin's been one, but you could make the argument the next two best hitters after Drake has been Dom Smith and Riso Dubon, And that's just a testament to those guys, and the Braves have needed it quite honestly, they really.

00:12:47
Speaker 1: Have, and it's great to see just like those unexpected contributors. I think that was really like the constant theme of the Braves winning the East all those years in a row was, yeah, you have your stars, but every season, guys would come out of the woodworks to have really good, impactful seasons or even if not a full season, but would give you two really good months where it would kind of pick everybody else up. And you will absolutely take what you have gotten from those kind of unexpected contributors so far, just again wrapping up the offense. Or hey, Matteo got a pinshit appearance in the ninth inning and actually hit a two run homer off of James McCann. The Diamondbacks really waved the white flag and sent a catcher to the mound in the ninth. The Braves also kind of paded on there in the ninth. Seventeen to two was the final score on this Thursday night. Hey, you know what everybody eats and those RBI, those homers, those runs scored, they all count the same, and really just a fun night. Seventeen runs, man, I mean, we deserve this after all of the just bad baseball we watched a year ago. We really do deserve nights like this. And again just another little baby step in the right direction for this team.

00:13:58
Speaker 2: Yeah. So now I'm on, like, are they gonna get like one hit tomorrow? Because this is what happened last year? Right anytime now that they didn't then I don't think that at any point they had a game this could last year. But anytime they had any sort of success last year offensively, the next day they would get shut out for eight innings and have one hit. So now eyes turned toward tomorrow. Can you keep stacking them? You know, obviously the pitching for you is gonna get worse as the season, as the series goes on, because you got Grant Holmes and you got Bryce Elder and then you got whoever you're gonna do fifth, So you're gonna need some more runs. I do want to see the offense kind of stack it up. I haven't actually looked who's the Who is it Soroka or is that Saturday Saturday Night? It's Rodriguez, It's Edwardo.

00:14:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, lefty, so.

00:14:46
Speaker 2: He's a tough lefty. So the Braves will have their right handed crew in. Obviously, do you know Dom Smith will sit. I'm guessing Jonah him is gonna DH again. That hasn't gone great at least offensively. He has done pretty well defensively. But yeah, I do want to see the offense follow it up. Now they had the great game, don't do the thing we did all year last year, where you know, you have this, you know, exciting game or good offensive game, and then after that the next three games is like a giant wet fart. So don't do that. Just go out and have a nice game, you know, continue it, maybe even get on a little offensive role, which we haven't seen in like three years. You know, where you stack like three or four of these in a row and just destroy a team for four games with your offense. That would be I mean, there's no rule against it. You can you can do that. So that would be fun to see.

00:15:34
Speaker 1: Yes, it really would. And let's talk about Ronaldo Lopez for a minute. In start number two, I know, I was really keen to see what his velocity look like. And good news if folks didn't stay up and are now getting the recap of the game. His fastball sat mid nineties. I think I saw ninety six at one point. Seems to be healthy and seems to be passed whatever that mechanical problem was that really dropped his velocity ten days ago at this point, So that was really good to see Ronaldo with the game firmly in hand. He only threw seventy nine pitches on Thursday night, which I'm cool with. There's no need to push him when the game was virtually over midway through, but five innings, four hits, one run. The only run came up on a solo homer that Ronaldo allowed one walk and three strikeouts. What did you make of Ronaldo tonight? What did you think of him? Overall? The results are good, but I don't know where are you at with Ronaldo right now.

00:16:33
Speaker 2: So it's funny because if you just look at the radar gun, the stuff looks back like he's he's sitting ninety four ninety five. He can bump it up to ninety six. The slider's velocity is back to where it used to be eighty four eighty five, and that one start in spring training we were stowing eighty six eighty seven on our fastballs and nobody knew what was happening. It looks like that stuff has come back, at least from a volata see standpoint. You know, if you dive even deeper than that, if you look at like the stuff, you know there's all sorts of metrics out there that greade pitch quality and movement and stuff like that. His pitches actually aren't grading out great in terms of like the quality of them, which has me a little bit worried. But I know, I'll be honest with you, I've tried. I've tracked that stuff for the last few years, and I don't know. I still to this day, don't know what to make of all of that stuff and how to quantify it and what it means in terms of, you know, predictive performance. His stuff is not grading out great, but he's given up what two runs and two starts, so I mean, it's tough to argue with. And the velocity looks good, but the movement's quite not what it used to be. The depth of like the slider specifically, is not quite what it used to be, So I don't know, you know, is is it a bit of a time bomb. I have no idea. I have liked what I've seen, but I'm not I'm not smart enough to watch a pitch can tell you like what it's supposed to grade out as I don't know if you have an opinion on the stuff plus and all that stuff where you know you've seen it. His pitches aren't grading out great, but the results have been fantastic. And as velocity looks good, he looks healthy. He's talking about after the game how he feels great. So I don't know what to make it right. Honestly, I'm probably just gonna ride, enjoy the ride right as long as it's working. I'm good. As soon as he hit some bumps in the road, we're probably going to talk about that stuff a little more. But right now it's working, so I you know, it is what it is.

00:18:30
Speaker 1: You know, it's pretty similar to what we saw with Ronaldo two years ago when he was so effective, like he's kind of the king of just throwing his fastball in the zone. But famously nobody could really hit his fastball in twenty twenty four, and there's been more of that this year, like tonight. I mean, Jordan Lawler got him for a solo homer on a fastball he left in the zone. But in the five innings, I think the expected batting average against Ronaldo tonight was like one sixty Fives weren't squaring much up. They weren't hitting him hard. His command was fine. There was a couple of a bats where he lost the zone for a minute, but then he started humming strikes again and got back and it was pretty easy, pretty easy five innings. You know, Diamondbacks lineup, it's okay, this isn't the Dodgers or the Yankees by any meetings, but it's also not a bad lineup, So I think it's encouraging so far, I'm not ready to just proclaim that Ronaldo Lopez is back and we can just bank on a you know, sub three era the West of the Way to be kept in obvious probably, but there is I would like to see a little more swing and miss. He's only had six whiffs on Thursday night. Six whiffs on seventy one pitches. Not not the best, but let's not be crazy here. He gave up one run over five innings and through two starts has looked pretty good in both of them.

00:19:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Sean and I talked about that with I think it was the elder start that we we did a show after, and like it has been a theme a lot of the Braves pictures that it's been a lot of contact based outs, which do worry me. I do I because there's just so much fluctuation in terms of level of performance when you're when you're depending on outs from contact, and it has been a lot of weak contact to defend the Braves, and they're pitching like it's not just guys aren't hitting rockets everywhere that the Braves are making unbelievable plays on it is a lot of weak contact. It's a lot of you know, dribblers. It's a lot of pop ups, so it's not stuff that you think is You know, you're getting lucky in terms of getting the outs, but eventually that contact is gonna turn and it is probably gonna be harder contact. So you do want to try to miss a few more bats than the Braves starters are currently missing. But they've given up like they're averaging like one run a game. They're giving up, so I don't know how much, you know, I'm not gonna sit here and spend too much time dogging them because they're not missing bats, because they're not giving somebody runs. They do probably need to miss bats more bats going forward, But yeah, I mean, and Ronaldo's kind of the poster chot for that right now, Like, yeah, under the hood might not be like perfect, but you give up one run a start, I'm not going to spend too much time dogging you for it.

00:21:11
Speaker 1: Through the first seven games of the year, the Braves have the lowest ERA in the National League and the second lowest e RA in the majors, I believe, behind the Yankees. Just what we all need to take it, Yeah, right, right, never in doubt with this rotation, right never ever in doubt. And to be to be clear, we're joking on that. I mean, we got to see it for more than a week.

00:21:34
Speaker 2: I think we're still we're in small sample sized theater right now.

00:21:37
Speaker 1: But yeah, for sure. But hey, you take the wins and you can get them, and they don't count, they don't, they don't count any less. So that's right, Yes, that that is absolutely right. A win on April second counts all the same as a win on September thirtieth. All right, Steven, we are going to take one more quick break when we come back. We're going to get some I think, pretty encouraging news on the injury front for a couple of key players. We'll also take a quick look ahead to the upcoming three games out in Arizona. First, another quick word from our partners.

00:22:10
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Speaker 1: You'll be watching. Oh definitely, I can't wait. I actually want to try and get to a game.

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00:23:00
Speaker 1: Stephen a couple of I think mostly encouraging injury news and notes here. Spencer Strider is scheduled to throw a bullpen on Friday at Chase Field. According to the group of Beat reporters with the team, we'll see what the next step is. We'll see how Spencer feels after he throws that bullpen. It seems like he's been throwing pretty regularly over the last week, and if folks missed it, it seems like the oblique injury was pretty minor all things considered. But MLB dot COM's Mark Bowman does believe that no matter what happens with the bullpen on Friday, he believes that Spencer Strider is going to need at least one rehab start before he sees a mound with the braves. That sounds about right to me. And ultimately we just want to get Spencer to one hundred percent and hopefully get him back on path for the season. We were all optimistic he was going to have.

00:23:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's probably missed a little too much time to just pick right back up where he was going to be at the end of spring. It's kind of obviously it's any injuries poorly time. But he was like right at the end of like his build up for the season, And Alex talked about that a little bit about how you can't just after a certain amount of time, you can't just pick back up. You have to go backwards a little bit. So I think that's what he's gonna have to do. I do have a working theory that one of the reasons did he er Fintes is not on the rotation right now is because the idea that Spitzer Strider is going to come back pretty soon, and when Streider's in there, you know Elder is gonna Elder is going to continue to get starts as the vist starter. Strider would obviously move into either the second, third or fourth and so that's your rotation. And I think if Strider was going to be out longer, I think Didier would be in there. They just don't want to jerk him around from Gwinnett to Atlanta like they've done in the past. And I think to the detriment of some of their pictures where they've been a little too free and in moving them up and down, I think Kyle Wright got jerked around at a little too much for my liking.

00:24:56
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you remember it was the poster child for it. He said, drive it snutt.

00:25:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so I think they've just decided they don't want to do that to Didyar and because Spencer is coming back so soon, and so yeah, that's what we're waiting for. And it's you know, he's throwing a bullpen, which is fantastic. These oblique this oblique stuff can like it can be like a two month thing if it's bad enough. So the fact that he's already throwing it's great news. We'll see. What terrifies me about obliques is like you're like one awkward move from doing it again. I mean, you know, we've seen it's it's a pretty common injury. And I can't imagine trying to throw a baseball with a hurd obleak. It just seems like torture. So but it seems like it's pretty minor and he's on the way back, and that's obviously going to be massive that the rotation will take all the depth they can get at this point.

00:25:42
Speaker 1: And Sean Murphy caught three innings in a simulated game with Rome yesterday. On Wednesday, it sounds like Sean Murphy will officially begin a rehab assignment here soon they did. There was some talk today that Murphy will really need to build up. He'll need to catch nine innings, He'll need to catch back to back days. So we're still a little ways out from Murphy being back with Atlanta. But I believe he will have three full weeks whenever they officially begin the rehab assignment to Basically, he has three weeks to be activated to the big league roster, so I would guess, I don't know, mid April kind of feels like a reasonable timeline for Murphy. You know, I am curious to see what ultimately happens with Jonaheim. Like I think, defensively, the Braves feel okay with him behind the plate, but he's probably just not going to give you a whole lot offensively. I'm curious to see if Atlanta is going to carry three catchers or if they will say goodbye to him or maybe try to sneak him through waivers and get him to Gwenette, although I'm guessing Hi would probably be claimed. But regardless, probably a decision for another day. But it seems like Sean Murphy is on the right path and should be back sooner rather than later.

00:26:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a big one, just having another high level catcher on the ross, having another hitter against left handed pitching. Sean Murphy has destroyed left handed pitching in his career. It also be, you know, theoretically the first time we've seen a healthy Sean Murphy from what he said, like years, So I'm curious to see what that looks like. I do think they should carry three catchers. I would have to look at the roster to see exactly who it is. Probably I guess Matteo or Farmer, probably farmer.

00:27:25
Speaker 1: Probably probably farmer, and then you say goodbye to Mateo when Hassan Kim comes back.

00:27:29
Speaker 2: It would be my guest I like having if you're gonna use the catchers as DH's the way it looks like the Braves are gonna do with Drake, you know, they they really don't want to take Drake out of the lineup at any point, so he's gonna DH a bunch. I think Murphy's gonna DH a bunch. When you do that, it's probably best to go ahead and carry a third catcher, especially since that last bench spot gets used so little. But you know, I could probably be talked in the other word as well, but I do I would probably lean that way, but yeah, just having the option and listen, we are there. Wasn't that long long ago we were talking about Murphy and Kim being back like middle of May, so middle of April. I mean, we're you know, we actually got to get there. But we're like three four weeks ahead of schedule right now, so really good news. Just more depth in the rotation, more depth in the lineup. Team has already gotten off to a good start, but just give me more depth because we know more injuries are coming, we know more bad performances are coming from somewhere. Just give me more and more depth and I'll you know, it's just you can't have too much.

00:28:30
Speaker 1: And I think especially against left handed pitching. Yeah, the lineup is going to look so much better with Sean Murphy's name in there, like against righties, man, like the way that Mikeystremsky's hitting and the way that Babe Ruth himself Dominic Smith is hitting, like against righty's. This lineup has been really good, but every time, like it's gonna be the case on Friday Night against Eduardo Rodriguez. Against lefties, you see this lineup and you kind of make a little bit of a face like, ooh, and that's that's kind of stinky, even if the team has done a decent job overall. I think when you get Murphy in there, and when you get Hasan Kim, who we haven't heard a real update on now in maybe ten days or so, but I mean at this point, probably no news is good news on Kim. But once you get Kim back, then you have Dubon and you can use Dubon all over the field, which was really just the appeal of him at the very beginning of the offseason. It feels like again another probably another month, like in a month if you tell me, assuming the Braves can avoid injuries, elsewhere, and I'm gonna knock on every piece of wood around me, but it feels like here, relatively soon we should be able to see just kind of this lineup at full strength and what it could ultimately be.

00:29:37
Speaker 2: Yeah, and Kim's another one that's destroyed left handed pitching in his career. It's not quite the same agains righties, but him, Murphy, and Dubon have all hit left handed pitching extremely well for their career. So you know, if you can, if you can get all three, you know, you could play Dubon and left field against lefties when Yeas sits. You could have Murphy DH if Baldwin's catching, or have Baldwin DH if Murphy's catching. Yeah, just ads, I mean, you know, Mike probably moves to the bottom of the order. Even Ozzie could probably move to the bottom of the order. Who hits lefties better anyway, Like, yeah, it's just it's way more deep. It's just it's just a much deeper team. And you gotta avoid injuries on the way there, of course. But yeah, and these timelines have just moved up a lot more than I thought I thought we'd be like middle of May. I thought I thought there's a chance we might be like Memorial Day before, we saw some of these guys, and it seems like we're gonna get them, maybe before May even gets here. So keep everybody else healthy, of course, but yeah, more depth. It looks like it's coming.

00:30:39
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the rest of the series. With the Diamondbacks we mentioned on Friday night, it's gonna be Grant Holmes making a second start of the year against lefty Edward or Rodriguez. And a quick housekeeping note, that game is the Apple TV exclusive. So I saw a couple of people. If someone asked me today, hey, I have Brave's Vision while I be able to watch the game on Friday night. Unfortunately, the answer is no, you have to have Apple TV. And I will say this is hashtag, not an ad, not a sponsor. But Apple TV has some really good content. So if you are out of your free trials, might be worth checking out for ten bucks for the month. I don't know, but that is an exclusive Apple game. Saturday night is Bryce Elder against Michael Soroka. That is a big Fox National exclusive. And then Sunday we're back on Braves Vision. At this moment, still TBD. It seems like Martin Perez is probably the front runner to make that start, although depending on how the next two games go, that could change, and he will square off against Brandon Fought for the Diamondbacks. She's probably Arizona's best pitcher at this point. Hey, you won tonight. You already have one win. Try to get another one on Friday night. At worst, you're splitting the series. And if you can take three out of four or a heck, I mean even a sweep would be amazing to keep this rolling. But a really good start tonight and some interesting, pretty even pitching matchups the rest of the weekend.

00:32:05
Speaker 2: Yeah, you had that show with CJ a couple of weeks ago, and he laid it I thought he laid it out very well. The Braves have a ton of national TV games early, specifically, like there's a reason when the Brave's Vision stuff was coming out, all the marketing was one hundred and forty plus games is because the other twenty two and I think there's a limit on how many can be, but there's like eight there could be like eighteen national games or something like that. And the Braves have a bunch early and they've already had two. I know they already other Fox. They've got Apple TV, they got another Fox. So yeah, that's anytime. That's you know, Brave's vision is only for the local games. Any of the national games, you just have to go to wherever the national game is. But yeah, it's you know, the Braves have come to Arizona a few times over the years and really gotten right as an offense. And it's like back to back years. It happened right at the end of May, where the offense was kind of struggling. They'd come to Arizona, they'd just get right, that have a great series, and then they take off. And I don't know what it is about this place, but the Braves usually do pretty well here. So the pitching matchups, you know, Grant Homes, I guess Edgewater Agreez is probably a push, maybe a little bit on Arizona's side. I think the Braves are just better. They have a deeper lineup against lefties is not quite as good. You know, Tomorrow is probably a coin flip game for me. I would love to see at least one more. I think you gotta split the series now that you especially now that you won the first one. One more you know that's I think the minimum two more to win the series would be fantastic. Then you go to LA and I guess I'm not great Angels team and have a pretty good chance to do the same. And then you got a potentially a winning West Coast road trip, which are worth their weight in gold. So yeah, just keep stacking wins. I would love to see the offense come out tomorrow and just like and just stamp it again. One more back to back of just monster performances. But we'll see. It's gonna be another late night, but I think we'll be here. I don't know if we'll do another podcast before Sunday, but obviously on the Sunday show we'll recap the whole weekend.

00:34:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's keep it going. I think you made a great point early in the show that we saw this offense wake up very intermittently last year, but it was always followed up. You said it perfectly. They'd score nine runs one night and then they would be flirting with a no hitter in the seventh inning the next night. Yeah, so much for that that you know that the nine innings was fun while it lasted. So let's keep this offense going. The Braves in Chase Field. It's been a good it's been a good house. Maybe they feel my my angst. You know what, we're gonna all the credit people can like start a gofund me. I'll sit right behind the plate and cheer the boys on because clearly they care about the well being of this podcast host at one a m. Eastern time. As we wrap up this episode of the show, Steven Any closing thoughts before we get out of here.

00:35:03
Speaker 2: No big game in a couple of days for you. Final four is on Saturday. Obviously. I don't know if you, Brad ever came up with a bet, but we need a bet. We need, we need something public, we need. I mean, I'm I can't wait that's gonna be. There's a lot of people who think that's gonna be the national championship game. I really do kind of wish they reseeded the final four. I know that's been a big talking point this year. But yeah, big game on Saturday for you guys, for the Braves, you know, more West Coast games. Unfortunately, it's going to be late nights. But there's a good win. Really good starts of the road trip. I love starting a road trip with a win, it just makes everything so much They at the rais gun. If the Rays have lost tonight, this would have been a miserable. I don't even know if we would have done a show tonight, but starting a road trip with a win always feels fantastic and just keep it.

00:35:48
Speaker 1: Going, especially when you win.

00:35:51
Speaker 2: Seventeen yeah to two easy wins.

00:35:55
Speaker 1: Love it all right, folks. That is going to do it for this edition of the Hammer Territory Podcast. As always, a very sincere thank you for checking out the show. We'll be back with more. Maybe we'll get in one more show in this week if there is news or a reason to do a show, but otherwise, Brad and I are planning to be back deep on Sunday night, hopefully another series victory for the Atlanta Braves. Until that, we will see everybody next time.