Brave fixes

Watched the first two innings Sunday, then Jim came over and we worked on the playhouse we're building until about dark. Will would come out with updates, and the game ended as we were cleaning up, so I missed the whole thing. I knew that with Farnsworth gone, then Reitsma, that anything could happen as the game wore on, and the home team had a big advantage. I could only imagine how many players were used up by both teams. Sounds like the Braves were in better shape than Houston. Didn’t realize until Monday that Clemens pitched the last three innings.

Mazzone probably has input on the pitching decisions...people forget that. It’s easy to second guess, but most times people leave out big facts from their ‘opinions’…like you said, they’re upset about no offense in the extra innings, when they were up five with five outs to go, or even that they should’ve let Hudson go the whole game, when he was already pitching on short rest.

I think a purist would look at the overall game, the entire series, the overall team (injuries/roster/budget/etc), the overall season, the overall MLB, and see how the Braves have been better off than a vast majority of teams. Replace Cox? With who…Pendleton, or anyone else, could fall flat on their face. Nothing’s perfect. The Yankees aren’t doing much better…is anyone?

Some say..."those in charge would see that this is a team on the brink, and they'd make the necessary moves to improve -- maybe picking up an ace set-up man and one more quality starter. But we're talking about the Braves here…They don't have unlimited funds…" Easy to forget all the ace / all-star pickups…Kolb, Farnsworth, Hudson this year, and Hampton & Reitsma before that.

And..."Maybe we Braves fans won't know what we had until it's gone. But at this point, I think a majority of us are willing to take that chance and find out." Accurate, but a majority?

I don’t think there are easy answers. I’d like to study/compare the Braves to all the other teams. Below you tossed out 12 ideas, and those aren’t the only questions that need to be addressed for next year. Sports changes so much from year to year…think of all the changes just with this season. Smoltz start, Hudson’s injury/slow start, Brower, Thompson, Hampton…just the good things that happened with the pitchers, in the face of all the bad things.

Francoeur's Guerrero impression is starting to drive me crazy. He gets a pass here in 2005, I keep telling myself. Before his triple, after going after the first pitch two of the previous times up, he takes the first pitch…a strike down the middle. Then he swings at the next pitch, a ball in the dirt.

I had always thought that the continuous turnover of players over the years had some sort of effect in the way they got to the Series much more in the early part of this run. People forget how close they were in 91 and 96. Chipper and Andruw have upped their level of play.

Painted a bunch Monday and Tuesday…Anna did too. This week I’m trying to work a little and paint in the afternoon, so I’m behind on all my Braves post-mortems and little-league stats, and the rest of my little world I’ve created. You think the Braves have problems…Will doesn’t wear the Hawks stuff I got him. Imagine that!