#19 Final Series of the Season, Charlie, Manoah, Matty O and Cracker Jack

[00:00:02] Final home stand of the season. I can't tell if this year went fast or if it went slow. [00:00:08] Beginning of this year when the team started 0 and 7 out on the west coast seems like a really, really long time ago, but at the same time, it's hard to believe that it is the final three games of the season. If you saw my social media post that I woke up today, I'm looking at the standings, I'm like, man, in the National League, you probably could have gotten into the postseason with 84 wins, 85 for sure. The way things are, playing out at 84 probably would have gotten you there, might have tied you and the Braves with the New York Mets, which of course we had the season series, so we would have the tiebreaker. That would have been fun. But either way didn't happen. No crying over spilled milk, as we always say, but a little bit tough to look at. And I did see a couple of people saying, well, I'd rather not make it instead of making it and get bounced in the first round. I could not disagree with that more. You always want to be in. You never know what's going to happen, especially the way the team is playing right now, even though it's still not at full strength on the starting pitching side, and be tough to do without a guy like Spencer Schwallenbach. But at the same time you want to be in every single year. You never know what could happen. So that was my kind of thought this morning. We did get some news for the Atlanta Braves claiming Alec Mandoa from the Toronto Blue Jays. It was a couple years ago that he was an all star and a really good pitcher and ran into a couple, a couple of different issues for him, physically being one of them, and lack of performance and everything else. But the Braves felt like this was a guy that was worth taking a chance on. We're not going to see him at the big league level. They'll go to the minor leagues where he was optioned and perhaps a project here and a young project. Right. He's not that old. He's still in his 20s. And that's the other part of this, is that we've seen multiple guys now this year in their 20s, like the guy who's throwing tonight and Joey Wentz who certainly wants to finish strong. Guys that still have a lot of baseball in front of them, still have the prime of their careers in front of them that the Braves have kind of been working on. So we'll see what Manoa hard to say for sure he's never been a big strikeout. Guy was a good pitcher, great personality, a lot of fun if you remember that All Star Game from a couple of years ago. But seems to me that he's a guy absolutely worth taking a chance on. We also got the news yesterday on the off day that Charlie Morton will be making the start on Sunday. I kind of speculated about it during our last broadcast. And then we got the news that the Braves had announced the rotation that Sale would actually start on Sunday. Some folks wondering, was Chris Sale behind this to give Charlie that last opportunity? Maybe. Who knows? And what it's going to look like? I don't know. Is it, you know, is it one inning? Is it an inning and change so we can come out mid inning? I have to imagine that it would be a mid inning exit for Charlie. Either way, it's going to be a really cool moment. So if you appreciate Charlie Morton and why wouldn't you if you're a Brave fan? There's a lot of different things that we can get into. What he did in the World Series, what a great person he was and to this fan base and to this team and everybody else, we can go up and down the line with Charlie Morton. So he will be making that start on Sunday. I think it's absolutely one that is worth coming out and seeing and thanking Charlie one last time for the great work and the great career and the great person that he was in a Brave uniform. So that works out really good. I'm excited about that for Charlie and probably Chris Sale, I would guess, of course gave the nod in order to make that happen. [00:03:19] Interesting now. Right? So it's the last series. [00:03:23] Not a lot going on obviously from a win loss standpoint. [00:03:27] But there are a couple of things that are worth keeping an eye on. Drake Baldwin is obviously one of the biggest ones. A nice strong weekend to finish. I'll get into his National League Rookie of the Year candidacy once we get through all these games, maybe on Sunday morning, but probably not until that one is complete. So we can have some real final numbers on him. He's got a chance at 20 home runs and 80 RBIs. He would be just the fifth Braves rookie to do that since the team's been here in 1966. Chipper Jones was the last to do it in 1995. I know we'll twist a lot of different numbers around, but for me that one is. That's kind of special. 2080 season, only five guys in 66 in abrasion and form. [00:04:04] I think that's probably worth noting. So let's hope that he gets there. I believe it's just a home run and an RBI or two away for making that happen. I am going to make my hard push for him and I kind of loosely mentioned this on social media, but the more I dig in to Drake, the stronger I feel about him deserving to be nationally Rookie of the Year. But I'll detail that a little bit more and some of you guys have commented on some things regarding Kate Horton, who is the odds on favorite right now and some reasons why maybe that shouldn't be the case. And you're definitely on the right track as far as kind of where I'm going with my argument. So we'll talk about that. [00:04:40] Dylan lee is what, one or two? I think one appearance away from 200, Ricell's two away from 600. These are just kind of some of the round numbered things that we'll be focusing on the rest of the way, but it should be a good weekend and probably the most important thing we almost had a near catastrophe in the booth on Thursday. No, we're off Thursday. On Wednesday when we found out that we were at a Cracker Jacks, there was no more left. The Braves bring us a box of Cracker Jackers. I don't know how many bags are in there, 20 or 30 or so, I'm not really sure. But they brought us a. They bring us a box every day and Val, who is our stage manager mentioned to us on Wednesday that this was the last box and the group that brings them up to us from catering said there were no more left and Brandon and I were like, all right, so we gotta ration this box. So we threw like half of it out on Wednesday, which was dumb because half is not rationing out properly for three remaining games. But that's what we did. And then we got the news today that more Cracker Jack came in. So we'll be full bore Cracker Jack distribution during the seventh inning stretch, which is always a lot of fun. There's always a lot of guilt that comes along with it as well. A lot of kids kind of gather like right in front of the booth and I like tossing them, I like get them into the upper deck, I like throwing them far. [00:05:53] But we'll have some fun with it. But I know you guys were unaware of this because it was behind the scenes, but it was a huge deal. We almost ran out of Cracker Jack, but we did not. So the Braves came to the rescue and we'll make sure we Have a lot of fun. So, anyway, last series against the Pirates, again, not a ton to play for, but there are some personal things going on with a couple of guys that we'll keep an eye on and hope we get to where we'd like to go for them. Last start for Joey Wentz. Important for him, certainly in this one. We're not going to see Paul Skeens, by the way, on the other side for the Pittsburgh Pirates. That would have been kind of a treat, I guess, but he has been really good. Oh, the other thing. [00:06:26] And he's going to win the Cy Young. The other thing that I was thinking about. So Matt Olson's going to play in 162 games. I'm pretty sure that's going to happen again. It'll be the fifth time for Matt Olson that he has done that, which ties him, I believe, for the sixth most ever in Major League Baseball to play in 162 games that many times. [00:06:43] Obviously, Cal Ripken, Pete Rose is on that list. Miguel Tejada was an interesting one that was on that list. But you know, think about some of the plays that he made this year in times where we thought maybe he might have been banged up, probably could have used a day off, didn't take the day off. I know he's been struggling at least a little bit after winning nationally player of the Week and. And he's in like an over pretty lengthy one right now. I can't remember what it's up to. I got it in my notes. But either way, he's really impressive, man. The fact that he is still out there every single day, you start to put that in some historical perspective. And nobody's catching Cal Ripken Jr. But Matt Olson has absolutely made his mark as an ironman here throughout his career. So we'll talk about it as well, though, during the game. All right, I think that's it. It's traffic. I left late today because there's a rainstorm in the area, which I'm hoping we're not going to get any by us, but I did not want to leave my dog alone for too long. She does not do well. She's a big one, and when it comes to storms and lightning, she struggles. So anyway, let's hope this traffic clears up. Let's have a great weekend and we'll finish strong, as always. I appreciate you guys.