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Talking Chop

Heyward and McLouth Collide as the Braves Fall to the Diamondbacks 2-1

The collision between Jason Heyward and Nate McLouth proved to be the difference in tonight's 2-1 loss.

The collision between Jason Heyward and Nate McLouth proved to be the difference in tonight's 2-1 loss.

In a 1-0 game in the bottom of the 8th, Jason Heyward and Nate McLouth collided on a Gerardo Parra gapper. Nate McLouth was obviously injured and Jason Heyward could not get to the ball in time to keep Parra from scoring on an inside the park home run. With one runner already on, the home run pushed the tying and go ahead runs across to give the Diamdonbacks a 2-1 lead. Chad Qualls entered in the 9th and was able to hold the Braves for his 12th save of the season. Qualls walked Yunel Escobar, who was able to steal second with 1 out, before the Diamondbacks closer struck out Brooks Conrad and induced a ground ball out from Martin Prado to finish the game. McLouth is said to have headaches and he will be evaluated throughout the night. 

Braves starter Kenshin Kawakami had his best start of the season, going 6 innings and striking out 8 while allowing 8 base runners. The Braves have continued to find ways to lose games in which Kawakami throws the ball well, and to be frank, it is getting rather frustrating. Kenshin's 0-8 record is in no way indicative of how effective he has been, and it is very unfortunate that the Braves seldom score runs when he is on the mound. Regardless of Kawakami getting the win or loss, the Braves need to take advantage of solid pitching outings like tonight's and put more runs on the board. 

Neither team could score for 7 innings as Ian Kennedy matched Kawakami pitch-for-pitch. The Braves opened up the scoring late as the Diamondbacks went to their bullpen for the first time with Aaron Heilman in the top half of the 8th. Heilman allowed a leadoff double to Jason Heyward and Brian McCann drove him in. McCann seems to be seeing the ball well as he went 2-3 with a walk and pushed his OBP to .391. Despite giving up the Braves' lone run, Heilman came away with the win, moving his record to 2-1. 

McCann's big hit and Kenshin's great start got spoiled as Peter Moylan was unable to make it 124 straight appearances without allowing a homer. Moylan has been very shaky as of late and it appears the loss of Saito is hurting the team more than hoped. Even though the ball Parra hit was a rope, it was a catchable ball and this was a very winnable game. In contrast to muscling through last night's game and coming out on top, the Braves were unable to capitalize tonight and caught a very tough break which dropped their lead in the N.L. East to 1.5 games. 

The Braves will try and even up the series tomorrow as Tommy Hanson (6-3, 3.71 ERA) faces off against the newly acquired Dontrelle Willis (2-2, 4.38 ERA) at 3:40pm EST.

0 recs  |  124 comments

Comments

This is

just a really sad game to lose. We really should have won it, and just some extremely bad luck got in the way of us winning it tonight. I’ve done my fair share of bashing McLouth, but here’s to him avoiding injury or any long term damage.

Pretty good game to attend

You know what sucks though? I told my buddy in the 3rd inning that Heyward was so much bigger than McLouth and he’d probably kill him if they ever collided.

8th inning happens…I was at a loss for words.

Hopefully Tommy gets us the series split tomorrow.

Moylan has been very shaky as of late

Someone’s going to call you “redeculous” now, Ben.

TalkingChop

we put the Dick in Redeculous

There’s a difference between saying he’s shaky and saying “OMG Moylan suckz!”

Exactly. He’s likely exhausted, like the rest of the team with this redickulous schedule of 20 straight games with no days off and on the road for over half of them.

He’s been a great arm for us, but he’s been used to death. With that in mind, I feel more confident when our lead is larger than 1 run and Bobby brings him in.

Then again, our offense isn’t giving a lot of room for error in the past few games for any of our pitchers.

If he's tired, why not let Kimbrel go?...

why do they keep calling the kid up if Bobby isn’t willing to use him with some degree of regularity?

I’m hoping we see more of him.

And Martinez has done pretty well too, the few times we’ve gotten to see him pitch.

That’s what I was hoping for when he was called up. He’s young, but he has probably the best overall stuff out of the bullpen aside from Wagner. I stated that when Saito was injured I did not see it affecting the team that much due to Kimbrel being just as solid of a reliever. Kimbrel’s walk rate was impressive in the minors this season considering his control problems at the top level and in the past. With time, I think he could be a very useful pitcher this year. I would have liked to see him get in the eighth yesterday as well, definitely.

We do lose a lot if we only have Moylan to fill in for Saito, but if Kimbrel is used properly the loss can be mitigated.

At least MLB Network, I believe Sean Casey, said that KK is the best 0-8 starter in the league. Now if only they can find those dang hex bags.

Meant to include that they were really pulling for him to win.

This loss sucks worse than any on that 9-game losing streak.

Nate McLouth on Heyward being 70lbs heavier

“Yeah, I’m not going to win that one.”

Will mclouth

go to the d/l, i can only dream?

wow

crazy way to lose a game. What im upset about is that Heyward has a hurt leg, ice on his shoulder, and a hurt thumb and Bobby says he will still play tomorrow . . . . truly crazy to me. I see nothing wrong with giving him a day off. He is in his first year playing a full pro season so give him some days off. Blanco can play CF and Cabrera can play RF.

Also if McLouth goes on the DL who do we call up? Young?

I'm kinda scared to see the lineup tomorrow if that happened

C – Ross
1B – Glaus or Hinske
2B – Prado
3B – Chipper or Infante
SS – Esco
LF- Hinske or Infante
CF – Blanco
RF – Melky

I’d head to the stadium, take Tommy out for a beer and drop him off at the airport tomorrow night.

not TOO bad

Prado
Blanco
Chip
Glaus
Hinske
Esco
Cabrera
Ross

Apparently

Bobby thinks JHey is a setup man.

I don't know if it is that bad.

Heyward has been playing through the thumb issue and there really isn’t anything that can be done about it. As for the leg, what I read was it was just a bruise; that shouldn’t be an injury risk. Finally, the ice on the shoulder may well be nothing; I haven’t heard it tied to any injury.

Basically, given that we have sat players out of precaution (including Heyward) when necessary, I am not overly concerned if he plays tomorrow—-he may well be perfectly fine, and they should know.

Caution: grouchy old (school) lady rant:

He’s twenty years old. He plays a game three hours a day. He’s big and strong. One baseball player was known to have played in 2,632 games without a “day off”. He can probably handle 15 or 20 without one.

"Walk it off, big guy."

nice assessment

well when you have an insane schedule like the Braves have, you may have to play banged up a little. If he gets a day off, lets gice to him in the series finale, so he can be ready for the Twins.

Heyward is in the lineup...

..that DOB has listed for today. It may just have been a bruise. If that. Normal humans don’t injury Heyward; Heyward injures normal humans.

Thank you...

I knew you would like it.

Caught a tough break?

The team had several chances to win tonight. I wouldn’t call a blown opportunity in the 8th or 9th a tough break. They just didn’t play up to their ability as verified by the crash of Heyward and McClouth, that was scary, but very UNmajor league. I’m glad nobody was hurt badly. It is a total shame that KK still doesn’t have a win, 0fer9 and pitching very good. I really feel bad for him. How many bases loaded situations do we get and still not get 1 run home? Well Melky can take Nate’s spot, he’s done ok there and is hitting pretty good for him. Anytime Melky hits above .250 it’s a bonus. I’m kind of upset cause we should have won this game. I guess I shouldn’t blow off steam here, but what the Hell.

0fer9 and pitching very good.

He didn’t get the loss last night.

That wasn't an unmajor league situation...

if you watched it. The ball was hit perfectly where both of them had to be in a full sprint to try to get to it and neither could communicate. It was in a do or die situation where neither of them were completely sure they could get to it, so neither could call it. It happens. UNmajor league would’ve been both of them letting the ball go between them and neither making an effort.

You really have to feel bad for Kawakami to still be winless after 2+ months into the season. Of course they listed off the opposing pitchers he has faced again during last night’s broadcast and I just can’t believe that our #5 starter is going up against basically the other team’s #1 all the time. No wonder Lowe has 8 wins, he seems to go up against the opposing teams 4th or 5th starter all the time….crazy.

I also hope McLouth is not seriously injured, but a 15 day stint on the DL might do him, and the Braves some good. I think it’s about time for Clevlen to come off the DL (not that he should stay with the big club) but I could see platooning Melky and Blanco in CF for a while, or giving Matt Young a shot.

Knowing the Braves though, they’ll probably call up Schafer…which I don’t think would be the right thing to do at this time unless they’re going to start him everyday.

I think it is time for diaz to come off the DL and stay with the big club. The Braves need him against lefties

I don’t think he’s available yet, I’m hearing at least 2 more weeks, maybe All Star break before he can come back.

O man that’s a longgggg time

Sorry

I read “I think it is time” to mean you thought it is time now.

O yeah, nope i just meant we could really use him now

wow, i almost forgot about diaz

he and JJ have been on the DL for what feels like forever, hopefully the allstar break gives the team a chance to regroup and heal

Nate is dead to me

that is all

you don't take things too seriously, do you?

i mean, come on now…dead to you?

I believe his corpse could do a better job at the plate

Tell us how you feel about owing him $7 M next year (not to mention the remaining portion of $5 M this year).

Nate has now taken Escobar (I won’t call him fucknuts anymore) off the hook as the bane of my existence. He has been beyond useless.

So we don’t pick up the option year?

the option is for 2012

私は本当にあなたたちを憎みます
I feel bad for McLouth

He can’t hit, he even fail to bunt a runner over. Defensively he was involved in a play that lost the game. He’s literally adding nothing positive to the team when he plays.

While that may be true...

The collision was really heywards fault. McOut was calling it and probably woulda made the grab had he not seen a mac truck flying towards him from his peripherals.

That said, good riddance, I hope he’s not injured that badly, and hopefully the knock will cause him to turn the season around and start hittnig.

The replay clearly showed that McLouth wasn’t calling for it and he said he didn’t call it after the game.

McLouth after the game:

Looked like you had a bead on the ball? "I think both of us did. It’s just one of those ones where neither of us could call it, unfortunately. It would have been pretty much a diving play for me and a diving play for him. It’s just, unfortunately, one of those ones you can’t call. If it falls between you then you look like an idiot, but then if you both make the extra effort for it sometimes that’s what happens. It’s pretty much unavoidable, I think."

how would it have been a diving play when it clearly hit the heel of his glove while he was standing up?

Jim Edmonds would have dove

Jim Edmonds would dive for a routine flyball at his kids little league batting practice.

OMG to funny & true. Always hated his showing off.
alright found it

Now it makes since…Someone took McLoose’s Mojo….
1. He never takes a shot at home to try and throw out runners at the plate.
2. Won’t step up an call a ball knowing CF has the right to catch first
3. Swings for the fenses and tries to pull everything (that one I added, not quite part of the argument)

He wasn’t calling for the ball, or Heyward off the ball on the replay. As the CF, isn’t he supposed to have first dibs on that ball and Heyward has to keep coming until the CF waves him off? At least, that’s what I’ve always thought.

Either way, I’m disappointed they gave a inside the park HR against Moylan when IMO that there should have been a triple and an error on the play. I know that’s not the rule, just my opinion.

yea the centerfield has first dibs on balls like that. It was Heyward fault and like you said it should have been a triple with an error

It wasn't Heyward's fault.

The CF has priority in that situation, but it’s his job to call the RF off of the ball. McLouth didn’t call Heyward off, so Heyward kept coming.

I suggest you ask all the voices in your head to take turns speaking. And one of you at least watch the replay.

Does Heyward get some kind of bonus for taking McLouth out?

If the Braves had any idea’s of sending Nate to AAA to work on his swing, now they have an opportunity to do it. I hope neither has lingering effects from the collision. The upper cut swing / falling backwards needs some work, I hope he gets the chance to go work on it. Hinske, Cabrera, Heyward, Blanco can handle things for a while

I agree 100% with you. Nate just isn’t getting out of his funk. But Bobby will keep playing him.

McLouth, is it all about the money?

Bobby will carry guys forever, McLouth and Chavez are the 2010 version of (insert names because their has been so many.) Blanco was hitting well in the minors before he got called up and should be given a chance to play, could not do any worse than McLouth, and Chavez is just terrible.

RISP

I still would have batted KK 8th over McLouth

HEYWARD DOING ALL HE CAN TO HELP THE TEAM!

Even Heyward knew how bad McLouth is. I guess Chipper just gave him the nod to TAKE HIM OUT.

……the ball was hit directly between the 2 of them. After their close call earlier, you could feel that a collision was inevitable.

If the Braves had capitalized on the RISP, it wouldn’t have even mattered.

If the Braves had capitalized on the RISP, it wouldn’t have even mattered.

This shit right here!

There was another close call earlier in the night. One would have thought they would have had a little convo about that and been a bit more aware of each other late in the game like that.

And, RISP – more bases loaded fail. Heck, we had 3 the other night and failed to blow it wide open. We’ve got to do better getting runs across with less than 2 outs and bags full.

Your first comment...

didn’t watch the replay, but did Nate call that one too? Maybe Nate has a problem communicating out there.

Nate came up several times in KEY situations and, shocker, failed

Give Nate a couple days off and let Melky/Blanco platoon CF

regardless of what people say about Blanco, he would be better to have up in those situations than McLouth

It's not like Blanco can do worse right now
"Don" Chipper?
Heyward Taking Him Out and Chippers Request!

Haaaaaaa! I thought the same thing, but did not have the gust to say it. Thanks.

Too bad McLouth’s bat couldn’t collide with the ball a little better.

How about

this team not stranding 500 guys a game on base. Then fluke, untimely plays like this don’t cost a winless pitcher and the team a game against a bad team. The play was unfortunate, but not the true reason the Braves lost.

well, not 500, but an average of 8 per game (which doesn’t seem terrible, but I don’t have a real frame of reference). But the last four games of 11-12-14-9 magnifies the frustration.

Magnifies greatly!

A few base knocks in opportune times and we would have taken 3/4 from LA and been 3-0 in this series!

I don't understand...

Why it was Moylan in there and not Venters. I understand he is a lefty and Reynolds and Young are righties, but he has been nasty to both sides of the plate this year.

Venters v RH – .214 BA
Moylan v RH – .254 BA

And once Geo Parra came up, why was Moylan still out there anyways? He has been downright pathetic against lefties this year.

Moylan v LH – .360 BA/10 BBs

I just don’t understand why it was Moylan and not Venters in the bottom of the 8th….

4.1 IP in the past 4 days, maybe?

That “inside-the-park homerun” has got to be one of the most blatant examples of a hometown call that I have ever seen.

Home town scoring, rather

pretty good example of the flaws of ERA.

But what else would it be?...

Can you call it anything else without calling an error? And if not, who gets the error; McLouth for getting run over?

The ball clearly bounced off Nate’s glove hand (his wrist, actually, but who’s counting?). It would have been an error anyway, even if he hadn’t been blocked at the line… er… taken out by Heyward. He overran the ball.

And you guys who are talking about our failures with RISP? McLouth’s 0-for-3 with 6 LOB is a large part of that — especially his swinging strikeout with the bases loaded and one out in the 2nd.

Bobby has been more than patient with him. It’s time to bench him. I’m not a big Melky fan, but I think he’s the next best option.

On the ball bouncing though...

it bounced toward his body, and he conceivably could have bobbled it before getting a firm grip and making the catch if not for the collision. Again, there is no way of knowing if McLouth would have actually made the catch if he didn’t get hit by that truck.

Are you saying they position players by size?

Huh?

I don’t understand the question, or how I could be considered as saying that? I’m saying how can you give an error to McLouth on a play where you don’t know for certain if he would have dropped the ball without being run over.

The ball bounced off Nate’s glove hand. The ball was not caught, it rolled to the wall, and two runs scored on the play.

Rule 10.12 states: The official scorer shall charge an error against any fielder whose misplay (fumble, muff or wild throw) prolongs the time at bat of a batter, prolongs the presence on the bases of a runner or permits a runner to advance one or more bases.

If Nate had caught the ball cleanly in his glove, and it had popped loose when he got leveled by the right-field-linebacker, I’d agree with you, Sanchez. Replays showed that that didn’t happen, though. He fumbled the ball. In my mind, it should have been scored an error.

It rolled to the wall after bouncing off his chest...

it’s not like it richocheted immediately, and again, no one can say if he would have made the catch after bobbling it.

And like you said, with the collision, even if he got it clean instead of bouncing off his wrist, he may have still not held on, so it’s hard to say definitively that his “misplay” prolonged the play.

Do you think it would have been scored a hit or an error in Atlanta?

It doesn’t matter what the rule states…a MLB official scorer will never credit an error when there is a collision like that.

Nate has been given more than a fair chance to prove himself and for the advancement of the team, he should be replaced. Saying he had a much better swing at a ball does not bring in the guy standing on thrid base. This is a busines and people pay to see the Braves win when it is in their control, not to see Nate make a good cut at a ball.

McLouth

I hope he’s okay…would you really miss his BA of 188 or his inability to throw toward homeplate from centerfield. One down and Moyland to go.

Who is Moyland?

If you mean Peter, that’s pretty dumb. People said this last years when he struggled from TJ surgery no less. The guy cannot be perfect all the tim w/ Bobby running him into the ground.

DFA PeMo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I hope you're joking.
my exclamation points show how incredibly angry and serious I am
The one thing I don't understand...

is why Bobby chose to go with McLouth over Cabrera. I’m not familiar with the current splits vs. righties and lefties, but I have to assume that either way, Melky is hitting better than Nate. To me, it would make sense to put the guy who just went 3-4 the previous day back into the lineup over a guy who just isn’t getting it done, but I’m not Bobby Cox, so whatever.

As Mr. Burns has been known to say, “It’s called playing the percentages. It’s what good managers do to win ballgames.”

Exactly what percentages would those be?
I looked up their splits:

Melky is batting .268 versus right handers, while Nate’s batting .189. Melky is batting .193 versus left handers, while Nate is batting .146.

So once again, while playing the percentages may be the thing to do in most cases, it clearly isn’t here, as Melky has the higher average regardless of the situation. On top of that, I just don’t understand how you bench a guy after he goes 3 for 4 the day before. Then again, Bobby did the same thing with Hinske a few weeks ago. It just doesn’t make sense.

Excuse me,

playing the percentages WOULD be the thing to do here…I misworded that. The problem is that Bobby wasn’t doing that.

Sorry, forgot to use sarcasm font.

I think it’s ridiculous, too. I’ve been a Nate apologist for a while now, and even I think he needs to have been benched weeks ago.

Sorry I didn't catch it.

Either way, it’s fine, because I wanted a reason to look up their splits anyway. I’m just glad when I looked them up, I was right in thinking that Melky was hitting better in both situations. I’m notoriously an apologist for every Braves player, but this is something that just doesn’t make sense. Bobby Cox is certainly a better manager than I am, but how can you justify these kinds of decisions? At some point, the whole “McLouth will get it going, you just have to have faith in him” thing just doesn’t work anymore. He’s not getting it going, regardless of how much any of us wish he were.

What really ticked me off is that the umps didn’t call time and Parra kept running. I mean, c’mon, when A-Rod hit that guy in the head with a line drive he stopped at second then ran out and kneeled at the mound. The umps did not do anything, Parra didn’t do anything and this was not a fair win for the D-Backs.

where was the ball when he stopped? If a ball is rolling around the outfield there is NO way anyone is going to stop in a 1 run ballgame. I wouldn’t, its not Parras fault our outfielders can’t communicate.

True…but i’m still angry. >:( couldn’t the umps have done something?

No, not in this case. The ball is live and although a player or players are injured the runner has every right to attempt to score. The umpires can’t stop the game on a fair ball due to an injury on the field.

But wasn’t Joe West umping? And Joe West can do anything he wants!
/sarcasm

I can't even summon up thoughts on this game.

What a terrible, strange way to lose.

ah, well....

Life is full of terrible strangeness, and as we all know, baseball is life.

At this point, I would not fault KK for ritualistically slaughtering the entire Braves clubhouse.
 

I would be hella pissed off!
it's quite unbelievable

how there’s one Braves team 4/5 days (usually)………………..and then another team on that one day.

think if we had even gotten KK 4 wins. we would be 4 games up right now.

This.

I saw a stat today where Kawakami has the fourth lowest run support of any pitcher in the National League. Lowe and Hudson, on the other hand, are both in the top ten.

The team is racist...

Terence Moore was right!

This is a tough game to lose. KK pitched great again and we strand a ton of runners. Not to mention the collision and Moylan still struggling. If we could win today, we would split the series even though it feels we have done a lot worse

It occurs to me; the authors of this particular blog are attempting to perpetrate an enormous fraud on all of us.
 
Human beings cannot collide with a supernova and survive. So, no, Nate McLouth did NOT collide with Heyward. It’s against the laws of physics.

but what happens when a Massive Black Hole collides into a Supernova?

Disaster for everyone

I think it becomes a champagne supernova in the sky.

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