This Team Is Bad. Game Thread.

I don’t know what to do any more. I think I’m in the fourth stage of grief (1. Denial 2. Anger 3. Bargaining 4. Depression 5. Acceptance) over the 2014 Braves, otherwise known as the “Buddy Carlyle phase.”

Here is a short list of things that you have my personal permission to do tonight, other than watch the Braves:
1. Stare off into space aimlessly
2. Rearrange the books on your shelf into alphabetical order by title
3. Re-watch the first three seasons of Homicide: Life on the Street
4. Shave the zest of a lemon, then put it into a bowl on your kitchen counter, then say, “The hell with it,” and pour yourself a glass of Bulleit
5. Rearrange the books you already rearranged so that they’re alphabetical by author
6. Listen to the new Bob Mould album, which is good but is only about a half hour long, six times in a row
7. Go to the Vortex and order a beer and the cheese dip. Eat it slowly. Then order the cheesy crab dumplings and another beer. Then maybe another one.
8. Rearrange the other stuff that’s on your bookshelves so that it makes some kind of sense around all of the books that you rearranged.
9. Swear. Profusely.

Of course, if you get done early, you can always tune back in!

95 thoughts on “This Team Is Bad. Game Thread.”

  1. I prefer to arrange my books by the third letter in the author’s last name. It makes it awkward trying to find a place for books like Sex by Madonna, but you deal with it.

  3. Just heard one of those Bob Mould songs on UGA radio today. It was great. Then a great Pulp song. They were on a roll.

  4. For the way the Braves are playing, I’d need to hear Husker Du’s “Metal Circus,” all 19 glorious minutes of it, on a daylong loop.

    Headed down to Atlantic City with a lotta fast music to accompany me. Should get there in time for the game. Surprise me, fellas.

  5. I choose denial. The winter’s long enough.

    Edit: And beer and cheese dip. I choose denial, beer, and cheese dip.

  7. Please don’t everyone jump on my ass, but I strongly prefer Homicide: Life on the Streets to The Wire, and yeah I’ve seen every season of The Wire (except the last).

  13. Maybe it’s time to find a less depressing hobby, like watching the cost of living go up or something.

  14. Where is your unthinking fan belief? Your irrational hope for the stupidly lucky? Your certainty that slumps are not indicative of talent, which will mysteriously return as mysteriously as it vanished, if only we channel the shade of Pete van Wieren? I’m beginning to think that maybe it *was* over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor.

  15. Had to share this: Last night, my wonderful wife threw me a beach bonfire birthday party and I had 2 completely unexpected surprises:
    1. My best friend brewed a Smoked Irish Red beer, created homemade labels, and named the beer SIR (smoked Irish Red) Ryan. The beer is wonderful and could be the flagship beer to a B-corp Brewery in the next year or 2.
    2. It was a full moon last night and right as we were packing up, a friend who had run off to take a leak, called us over to an area close to the dunes where we were blessed with the presence of 90-100 baby sea turtles hatching and scampering to safety toward the water. Talk about an experience!

    They say the 21st birthday and the decade birthdays; 30, 40, 50, so on…, are the ones that are normally the most memorable, but I’m not sure I’ll ever have have one top last night!

  18. 14- That tends to really suffer when your team continues to employ guys like BJ Upton, who makes up for his lack of baseball ability by being a superstar whiner. The fun is gone.

  19. My most fantastical brush with nature was watching a raccoon amble through a Wal-Mart parking lot at 1am.

    And that one time I picked up a turtle off some train tracks and pointed it in the direction of the nearest stream.

  20. I don’t know if anyone else has said it here, but I like the “PETE” patches the guys are wearing. Now can we honor him with some good fundamental baseball?

  25. Garbage baseball. Load the bases and fail to score. Then go out and muff a double play ball.

    They have a just uncanny ability to come up small.

  32. Compare and contrast: Gerald Laird and Corky Miller. I say they’re a wash other than maybe personality, as Laird seems to be widely beloved by teammates. He’s a total black hole in the lineup though, in very Millerian fashion.

  35. JUPTON! Thank you. Now I can stop saying mean things about your brother for a few innings.

  37. And here, true to form, the team scores him a run, and Gumby’s going to give it right back.

  43. That was utterly predictable by Freddie. Not coming up big at all in key spots since the all star break. Rolling over and hitting weak grounders to 2nd base is no longer just Jason’s habit

  48. What I would like to know is how frequently the braves turn golden scoring opportunities into scores. For example, how frequently is a runner scored from 2nd with none out and from third with none or 1 out, and how does that compare to other teams.

  49. Maybe I should put it this way–I think the braves are the most atrocious, choketastic offensive club in baseball and I want my bias confirmed or debunked once and for all

  53. I think I would have preferred Wood to strike out and walk back to the dugout and go pitch. It concerns me is out running the bases before going back out to pitch

  55. Fredi likes to let pitchers hit for themselves in close games after they’ve already thrown 100 pitches. Lets see how it works out this time. In his defense, our bullpen is an atrocity

  56. @55 good point regarding the bullpen.

    Not the guy I want to see hit with 2 outs and a man on 2nd

  60. Alex is a great pitcher. Too bad his offense can’t score more than 2 runs or else be wouldn’t be 2 games under .500

  61. @32

    Except for the fact that Laird is currently hitting about 150 points higher than Corky did in his one season. And that’s without even looking at the rest of the stats. Laird is better by such an obvious margin that I hope you were joking.

  62. We won’t win every game where we take a 1 run lead to the bottom of the 7th, but that’s the way to bet.

  64. Wood coming back out for the 8th. Fredi really doesn’t trust the bullpen right now, and doesn’t trust Walden on three consecutive days.

  65. This loss is on Fredi if they blow this. That plus a young pitcher with over 120 pitches and our current elbow situation….

  72. I dunno. Is there any evidence to support the notion that one high pitch count start–and not an extreme, 140+ pitch start, at that–leads to injuries? I mean, yes, be careful with your young guys, but let’s not pretend there’s more certainty here than there is.

  74. 73- Keep in mind that that ERA isn’t adjusted for quality of opposition. Against this team, it’d be much lower.

  75. Yeah, I’m with Anon. The issue there was the fact that he was wobbling a bit and was in danger of getting us in a jam and losing the game. There’s no evidence whatsoever that points to him having any greater risk of injury after that.

  77. 72 – No. I’ll have to find the study, but one concluded there was no significant relationship between pitch counts and injuries.

  78. All the good habits that Gattis was showing prior to injury have all but disappeared. He looks off balance and is swinging at everything.

  81. If I were a Nats fan, I’d be steaming right now. Check out Blevins’ splits for the year…
    LHB: .390 OPS
    RHB: .849 OPS

    This guy has a 5.05 ERA for the Nats this year. Can you say misuse?

  87. Dodgers coming in for a 4-game series and we will miss both Kershaw and Beckett. Kevin Correia (4.94 ERA), Dan Haren (4.57 ERA), R. Hernandez (3.83 ERA), and ending with Greinke (2.84 ERA). That’s about as good as it gets against the Dodgers.

  92. @48, I keep saying the Braves should put runners on second and third while they are taking batting practice… if for no other reason than to send a message: “this is where your batting needs the most work”.

  93. Well I go away for a week and this happens. It’s not like I didn’t expect it or anything….

  94. With the way Santana got burned last season, if the Braves make a competitive offer to Ervin in the offseason, one might think there’s a chance he takes it.

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