Braves Report

Coming off a bit of an embarrassing loss against the Phillies on Thursday, the Braves were able to rebound and take out the Nationals in their home opener in an extra-inning show. Although it wasn’t as clean a win as a Braves’ fan could hope, they certainly got the job done, despite a thunderstorm being thrown into the mix.

Lowe started this game and, based on the little I’ve seen from him, he’s demonstrating himself to be an excellent pitcher. Although his night was cut short by the rain, he managed in 3 innings: 4 hits, 1 run, 2 walks, and 6 strikeouts. Nice. Then the bullpen had to do its own thing. Buddy Carlyle relieved him once they pulled the tarp off the field, and he went 2 and 2/3rds and wasn’t particularly impressive, giving up 2 earned runs, walks, strikeouts, and allowing 4 hits. Moylan relieved him for one batter, and gave up an RBI double, keeping his ERA at the mass of a neutron star. O’Flaherty followed, gave up a single to Adam Dunn and the lead, but then got the next batter out. After that, Bennett and Soriano each worked an inning without incident. Gonzo came in the game in the 9th, and blew another lead that the Braves had regained. Finally, Campillo would eventually be charged with the win by pitching the 10th whilst only giving up a walk. Not a particularly great night from the bullpen, and I hope they can get their act a little bit together. I suppose we’ll see, as it is still early.

Now, last year, problems that persisted in the bullpen were compounded by the fact that this team had an anemic offense. Fortunately, that isn’t the case this year, and the bats were once again in “On” mode. Escobar (World’s Greatest Cuban – WGC) hit a three run shot to retake the lead early in the game. McCann would plate a run a few innings later with a sacrifice fly. While the bullpen was doing their thing, Francoeur was regaining the lead with an RBI single. Even though he’s only hitting .222 this season, things have really seemed to turn around for him. Finally, in the 10th inning, Kelly Johnson hit the walk-off single to score Jordan Schafer and then proceeded to be clobbered by his teammates. Nice job, Kelly. All told, WGC, KJ, McCann, and Schafer were responsible for 11 of the Braves’ hits, but, at the end of the day, they got the job done.

Braves win in 10, 6 – 5.

Next game: Saturday vs. the Nationals.

7:00 PM EST. Kawakami vs. Lannan. We’ll get to see Kawakami make his major league debut, I’m excited for it.

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