#6 Rough Trip. Moving forward

[00:00:02] Well, that trip did not go according to plan. Tough to lose two series, one against Tampa, then the other one, of course, against the Toronto Blue Jays. I think the Blue Jays won. Maybe the most disappointing, just because you had the first win. You got Spencer Schwellenbach. You have Spencer Strider going in Games 2 and 3. And unfortunately, the Braves could not win either one of those. There was good opportunities, certainly. I think the disappointment is that the offense seemed like it was starting to get going a little bit and then got really quiet. I know the strikeouts today were. [00:00:32] It was a tough one. There's no two ways about it. They were pitched really well. Chris Bassett was solid. That bullpen was surprisingly good in Toronto. That was kind of my first look at them firsthand. I don't think I realized how deep they were, but that bullpen is in really good shape. 19 strikeouts. That ties a franchise high in a single game. But you put it behind you. I think with Shuelli, his start was looking really good until he got into a little bit of trouble in that fifth inning. He had that run of five straight hitters that got on. That ended the difference in the world. Spencer's Triner, though, that was the story for today. I thought he looked pretty good. The velocity sat around 95 miles an hour. He ran to a little bit of an issue here and there where his slider location to the glove side got away from him just a little bit. But he was able to make adjustments and get it back. I think that was probably the big thing that was worth kind of noting and I think a real positive takeaway there for Spencer Strider. But he looked good. He looked good. I know it's tough to take the loss, but I thought overall that was a really successful first outing for him. He went back out for another inning, gave up the home run and a walk, and, you know, maybe didn't leave on the best note, but I think overall it was a really good day for him. Encouraging. Good to see him back in a brace uniform and taking starts for sure. So that was the good news. A lot of talk about umpire stuff. I know I brought it up. We knew going in, Bill Miller was going to have a really big zone. It's just kind of how he is. And we'll see what the umpire scorecard looks like tomorrow. It did feel like that kind of went more in the Blue Jays favor than it did for the Braves, but I don't know. I'm not looking and watching that necessarily with the most objective lens when that's happening, so. So I could be wrong. Who the heck knows? Either way, it's more disappointing to have the 2 and 4 record on the six game road trip. We talk about trying to win series and unfortunately the Braves could not pull that off. I will say this, I think it's really encouraging listening to some of the guys afterwards, like they were legitimately frustrated in the way that you'd like to hear. I mean, there's a lot of fight in this team. Matt Olson in particular, very disappointed and was vocal about that today. I thought that was really good. And then Spencer Strider, I mean, there's something about playing from behind, I think that, you know, this team is not used to for the most part because there's a lot of good players here who've had a lot of success. This is the place that most of them have not been in before. [00:02:44] How they react becomes really important. And we talk about clubhouse culture all the time on the broadcast. We're talking about this team and the players that they bring in that's about to get tested. I mean, there's no two ways about it, but I do think they have the right personnel in place. Of course, ultimately what you got to do is you go out and perform with consistency. But I've been on some bad teams and I say this all the time, losing can bring out the absolute worst in players and in people. And that's why you want to be surrounded by good people. So if any team can pull this off and get this thing going in the right direction, I do believe they have the right people in place. And again, I thought I heard the right things that you would want to hear after what turned out to be a rough road trip for the Braves. So there's some encouragement there for sure. At least for me there is because there's good players. [00:03:30] So anyway, it was not ideal. Headed home, off day tomorrow. [00:03:36] Everybody gets that day off to relax. And then the home stand starts. Minnesota and St. Louis, opportunity is still here. The Twins are not very good. The Cardinals are a little bit better than I think people probably anticipated being. But still, those are. Those are beatable teams for sure. So you got to take care of business. But this team's got the right people, at least in uniform right now, that care about winning. Frustrated with the struggles. And I think, I think you get it turned around. No broadcast for us on Friday. That'll be an Apple TV game. And Paul Byrd is scheduled to be sidelined this weekend, so that'll be a lot of fun. But that won't start until Saturday for us. So Brandon and I get a couple of days off and we'll be watching like you are on the Apple broadcast. And so we look forward to that. Look forward to getting back to work. Let's make it a good home stand. They need a streak. Nobody likes hearing it. You don't like getting this far behind, but you got to streak a little bit and it's not the same comparison. I was thinking about this today. When I was on this team in 2004, there were some real struggles early on. They were in that really nice run of winning the division and then we had the Randy Johnson perfect game. I was here when that happened. It felt like a real low and I went back and looked to see where the Braves were. Where we were at the time in the standings. We're only a couple of games under.500. I think it was like three or four maybe at the time. So it wasn't nearly as big of a mountain that you had to climb, but that felt like a pretty big low and it continued for a little while and ultimately this team and that team got to turn around and won a division. This will be a little bit more of a challenge, but it's the same situation where you have good players, good leadership and that's what it takes, right? I don't think that you look at this team and like, man, how are they going to do this? Do they have good enough players to do it? I think they have good enough players to do it. I know they have good enough players to do it. So it'll happen. But positive was the Drake Baldwin homer. We finally got to see it. What a nice kind of cathartic moment for us as fans to be able to watch that, to see a smile from him. Right. He's been a pretty serious guy and I think probably trying to tuck that in a little bit because it wasn't looking like they were going to be able to win that game. The Sean Murphy moment with him in the dugout was really cool. But we know the wins are what we're here for. But those are really nice moments and happy for Drake Baldwin. He's had good at bats and good to see that he has had the opportunity where they worked with the DH with him and Murph and we'll see how long that continues. Got to get Marcelo Zuna back. Good news, no damage there, just some inflammation that he is dealing with with his hip. So I'm going to drive home, I'm going to go get attacked by my 100 pound bull mastiff who's going to be very happy to see me walk through the door. And we will see you guys on Saturday.