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The good news about yesterday's game was that some of our batters finally started hitting. Donaldson getting his first 2 home runs, Russell Martin getting his first home run and 2 hits. Encarnacion getting a couple of hits. How you can get 5 home runs and lose a game is beyond me.
Some of it is it is the insistence of not having relievers go more than an inning. I would think Osuna could go 2 or 3 innings if needed. If you run out 5 relievers, one of them isn't going to have it that day. Yesterday it was Cecil. Of the things I was worried about, coming into the season, Brett Cecil wasn't one of them. He's been so study since going into the bullpen.
Drew Hutchison wasn't one of my worries either, but he really needs to get us more than 4.2 innings each start. In his last start I though it looked like he was going through a dead arm thing. Two bad starts in a row worries me.
We are facing a lefty today, so Danny Valencia and Steve Tolleson are in the lineup. Tolleson starting at shortstop is going to be interesting. I'm hoping we can get out to an early lead and Gibby puts Goins in at some point. Donaldson DHes. Nice to see Gibby give him a rest from the field. I'd like him to do the same for Jose Bautista soon, and he likely will after Michael Saunders gets activated.
R.A. Dickey makes his third start of the season...he's pitched pretty well, but we've lost both of his starts. Mostly because we haven't scored for him. He has a 2.19 in his 12.1 innings. He's allowed just 7 hits, but 8 walks, with 10 strikeouts. The walks are enough to drive anyone crazy.
It would be ok by me if we scored a few runs for him.
Alex Wood is making his third start as well. He is 1-0 with a 3.86 ERA. In 11.2 innings he's allowed 112 hits, 6 walks with 11 strikeouts. We do have a lot of guys who can club lefties in the lineup. I'm hoping.
On the Braves side, our old friend Kelly Johnson plays RF for the Braves. They've also got a couple of my least favorite players in their lineup, A.J. Pierzynski and Jonny Gomes.
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