Serious Heat!!!!
Braves fight through Dodgers, Deserts Best Pitching before losing
7-3 in Extra Innings
So here the Braves sit, almost at the halfway point in the 2009 season and have faced Saxon Andross (6.1 innings), Eric Turner (3 Innings), Solomon Bates (5 innings) AND Reggie Lawson, (3.2 innings). So excuse them if their stats are a little behind the rest of the league. Each of the four have fastballs averaging well into the mid 60's, decent off speed pitches and for the most part all are showing exceptional control. In short, the Braves have played 3 of their 5 games against four of the 5 best pitchers in the high desert, ( some one out there's thinking they're the best so I gotta say the 4 out of 5 thing. Legal dept. required it.) and all and all, the Braves probably have faired better than most all star squads will do against this same staff this summer. Saturday was no exception.
The Braves took the Dodgers and their three headed pitching machine into the seventh inning before succumbing to the pop of the mitt 1 second before starting their swings. 7 to 3 may have been the final, but it was a much closer contest than the final would suggest.
Early on, Johnny Huizar struggled with control, walking 6 in four innings. However the Braves led 2 to 1 going into the fourth inning when Eric Turner walked, advanced to Third and scored on a wild pitch bouncing off the backstop and rolling halfway back to the pitcher allowing Turner to score the tying run, evening the score at 2.
Huizar would work out of the fourth, and finish his day having worked four hitless innings, recording 7 strikeouts and yielding only two unearned runs. It may have been worse for Huizar if not for a first inning double play from Marquez touching third and throwing across to first doubling up Reggie Lawson. Then in the fourth, with runners at second and third and only one out, Brett Woods snagged a line drive off the bat of Colton Chavez and threw across to Marquez at third doubling up Corey Elder as he wandered a little too far off third.
With the score tied at two in the fifth, Brett Woods struck out the first batter then walked Spencer Jaangard. This would prove costly as Jaangard would come around and score on a Saxon Andross infield single.
In the bottom of the fifth, with two outs the Braves tied it up on four consecutive walks. A scoreless 6th inning forced the game into extra innings. A prior commitment forced the Braves into an uncomfortable defense with the loss of Jose Martinez after the sixth. Oscar Nangard led off with a single to center, Jeremiah Lorick then reached on a fielders choice, Andross hit a weak grounder off the end of the bat that spun out of Rivera's glove at third. This brought Lawson to the plate with two on and one out. Lawson lifted a flyball to center that dropped in front of Evan Fatino and then bounced past him, allowing both runs to score. Turner was intentionally walked, Elder hit a Sac fly to right field and Zach Barnes, in his first game of the season since suffering a broken thumb during spring training, lined a single to right driving in the fourth run of the inning. In the bottom half of the inning, Andross shut down the Braves with a strikeout, a fly out and a ground ball to first to earn the win. The Dodgers move to 4 and 1 and face the 3 and one Padres on Saturday. The Braves are at home Thursday night against the Yankees, hopefully an average speed pitcher doesn't throw their timing off, although the Padres had a tight game against the Yankees last week.
Something of note: The Braves scored 13 runs in one game against the Yankees and 17 runs against the Rockies last Thursday. A total of 30 runs in two games against the National league. In contrast, the Padres and Dodgers have combined to score 30 runs in their four games against the National League. Wonder how they'd do against themselves???
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