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Braves Take On Marlins
Written by Colin on April 14, 2009 – 12:58 pm9th Innning: Blaine “couldn’t throw a strike the other night” Boyer in for the Braves. Somehow didn’t give up a run. Last chance for the Bravos. Worried about Chipper’s hand – he seems to have tweaked it again. Nothing doing for the Braves. Fish win 5-1 – they improve to 6-1 on the year and take over first place in the NL East.
8th Inning: Jeff Bennett pitching. Garret Anderson error (dropped foul ball?) led to a baserunner. Went downhill from there. 4 hits and a walk in 1/3 of an inning led to a 5-1 Marlins lead. O’Flaherty in to pitch – instant double play to stop the pain. 5-1 Fish. Schafer led off with a single but of course nobody could put anything together to advance him.
7th Inning: Moylan on to pitch. 3 up, 3 down. Great defense by Kelly Johnson. Francoeur singled but was chopped down in a beautiful double play by the Fish.
6th Inning: Vazquez retires the side to end his outing. 12 strikeouts for Vazquez – solid stuff. Prado doubles in his pinch-hit appearance. Escobar got on base, Chipper sacrificed them to second and third to set it up for McCann. McCann ripped one to first – it was bobbled but McCann was forced out.
5th Inning: Marlins up and down. Braves strand a runner. Norton was in the on-deck circle so we’ll probably see Vazquez for another inning max.
4th Inning: Nothing doing for the Marlins. Kelly Johnson homerun makes it 3-1. Next three batters retired. 3-1 Marlins.
3rd Inning: Marlins knock in two on an Uggla single. A Vazquez wild pitch brought in another run. 3-0 Marlins. Volstad retired the side in order. He’s got a ridiculous breaking ball, by the way.
2nd Inning: Marlins had two on with two out, but unable to do anything. McCann laid down a bunt and just about beat it out (looked like he was safe on the replay) – Bobby came out to argue briefly but stays in the game. Garret Anderson and Jeff Francoeur flew out to end the 2nd. Volstad’s looking good.
1st Inning: Vazquez struck out two and got Hanley Ramirez to fly out to right. Wind is blowing left to right tonight – may be a factor on fly balls hit to right field. Bottom of the first Braves went 1, 2, 3.
When Javier Vazquez takes the mound for the Braves against the Florida Marlins’ Chris Volstad tonight, the Braves hope to walk away with another series win and an early season lead in the NL East. The Marlins are like the Braves – off to a 5-1 start. They have been cruising behind their young pitching staff – the oldest of the bunch of 26 – and Volstad is only 22.
The Braves have been riding behind solid starting pitching and a great offensive start – even if the bullpen has been shaky in an outing or two. The Braves lead the league with a .300 team batting average and a .540 slugging percentage. They’ve spread the offense out among their lineup and are very solid through and through. Javier is looking for his first win of the season as his start was spoiled by a bullpen meltdown that can only be descirbed in two ways (pick one: apocalyptic OR last season-ish). Hopefully the Braves can continue their hot start and roll their way to a 7-2 or 8-1 start – we’ll have to crack the pitching of the fish in order to do so.
What do you see happening tonight? What about the rest of the series? Anyone making it out to the park?
Tags: Florida Marlins
Posted in Game Threads, Series Previews | 2 Comments »
By Colin Ake on Apr 14, 2009 | Reply
Two strikeouts already for Vazquez. Should have been three – third strike to Ramirez was called a ball but it was on the black.
By Colin Ake on Apr 15, 2009 | Reply
Vazquez struck out 12 tonight. Great outing save the third inning.