Game 121: Dodgers 5, Braves 0
August 19, 2012 at 5:27 pm by David Lee under Atlanta Braves
Source: FanGraphs
Game MVP: Chad Billingsley, 73 game score
Least Valuable Dodger: Mark Ellis, -.162
Most Valuable Brave: Mike Minor, 65 game score
Least Valuable Brave: Martin Prado, -.109
Big plays:
3rd – (LAD) Mark Ellis grounded into inning-ending double play with bases loaded, -.169
5th – (LAD) Luis Cruz solo homer for a 1-0 Dodgers lead, .169
Chad Billingsley pitched seven shutout innings for the Dodgers, giving up just three hits with two walks and four strikeouts. The Braves left runners on the corners in the third and a runner on third in the sixth. Otherwise, the offense couldn’t put anything together for a second straight game, as Billingsley had an equal number of ground balls and fly balls allowed while inducing just three line drives.
Mike Minor was equally impressive over seven innings, with the lone mistake being a home run to Luis Cruz. Minor did give up a few more line drives, but he pitched out of trouble in the second and fifth, and flashed a pretty solid changeup.
The series loss was the first for the Braves since July 17-19 against the Giants, a span of eight series. They’ll need to regain their offense in the upcoming series against the Nationals.
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Frediot pulled Minor when Uribe was announced. Uribe’s a righty but he has a reverse split .155 wOBA vs LHP and .283 wOBA vs RHP
Career: .245 wOBA vs. LHP, .248 vs. RHP. More generally, virtually no hitter has a true talent reverse platoon split (http://www.insidethebook.com/ee/index.php/site/comments/did_cox_make_the_right_decisions_in_game_3/#4)
Preach it
Fredi went Fredi calling Durbin to pitch when the team trailed by 1. Ruined a really good outing by Minor which is a shame. Need a series win or sweep against the nationals to put pressure on them
If the Braves drop 2 of 3 in this next series, the division is over.
Whereas if they take two of three, they’re still at least 5-1 underdogs. I’m thinking they’re going to have to settle for the wild card this year.
9 teams have either made it or won the World Series as the Wild Card. That’s enough to remain optimistic.
Except, we don’t even get to be the Wild Card unless we win a one-game playoff…
That was prior to the new wild card rule though.
Whole different story this year
I said it last year: People better start taking the Nats seriously. They’ve owned the Braves for the last few years, and they won the season series against the Phillies last year, a team that won over 100 games. They’re going to be around for a while.
So, in a 1 run game we go with Durbin? No one else is complaining about this?
I thought Durbin was unlucky. Got squeezed by the ump in walking Uribe, then of course the next ground ball gets through becasue the infield playing in for the double play, then Heyward loses the next ball in the sun/clouds. Durbin made good pitches to each hitter he faced. It happens.
I agree it was a bad move. But it would probably be more apparent if the Braves could put up even a single run. I don’t think the run he gave up “deflated” the offense at all.
I knew something like this would happen; it should have been obvious to anyone with an IQ above 80. MLB was willing to tolerate a massive unfairness in order to gin up a replay of last year. It certainly makes the division races more important but it does so by screwing certain teams. This year it’s the Braves; next year it will probably be someone else. Even if you have two teams with similar records, having their whole season hinge on one game is ridiculous. But they don’t want to extend the playoffs any farther because they want to end before November. They should shorten the season and start the playoffs in late September with at least a 2/3 WC playoff if they insist on that, but the team owners would never agree to giving up games. In my opinion, if you are going to do this, seed the teams entirely on record without regard to division champions so if you win a weak division with a poor record you don’t get an advantage over a better second-place team. MLB won’t do that either because they are addicted to the idea that divisions mean something. I suspect this all revolves around the Yankees and Red Sox. MLB would love to have a hot pennant race between those teams one year like 1978,