Sometimes it's better to be lucky than smart.

But I'll take it. My Braves fan wife is annoyed. :D

I had no problem with it.

Starting the inning with Hawk was the right decision. Carpenter just hasn't looked right and he needed to battle a little to get through the 6th. Get him out there with a lead and a low pitch count. We need Carp pitching to form and if you can get him an easy start and a chance for the W, you do it.

Hawksworth ran into some bad luck, made a bad throw, it just wasn't his night so you go to the LOOGY.

Reyes came in and got his single lefty. Reyes isn't great against righties and Boggs has hard enough stuff that had he just thrown strikes, Glaus and his slider speed bat weren't going to hit him. Dan and Al were saying they should just walk Glaus and have Reyes face Heyward, but that's walking the lead run into scoring position; never smart. Besides, anytime you can do the opposite of what Al says to do, you do it.

Once Boggs ****ed up and walked Glaus, Heyward came to the plate with the bases loaded and the game on the line. There's no way you leave Boggs in to face Heyward with the stakes that high. You go to your best lefty to lock down that out.

That's exactly what Miller did.

What would you have done differently? I'll blister LaRussa's ass as quickly as anyone, but he was managing to win that game and did exactly what I'd have done, pitcher for pitcher, AB for AB.

yeah sucks for you guys and it doesn't have to be that way.

All of our roster is trades or draft players. We did sign Holliday to a big money contract but he came via trade. It could happen for you guys with better drafting and development. It seems your players never develop correctly, maybe you rush your prospects?

But you guys as fans defintely deserve a winning team. :clap:

Hey, in hindsight it was fine. But one run crosses and we're maybe going into another extra inning game with no bullpen. I really don't want to see Mather pitching again, do you?

We need Miles for long relief so that we don't have to go to Mather again.

Yeah, but that's that 'managing to win tomorrow' crap that LaRussa too often gets into. How 'bout you just put your guys in the best position to keep that run from scoring and not worry about it? That's exactly what he did.

Over-managing would've been to leave Reyes out there to walk the bases loaded so he can face Heyward (with Reyes' notoriously spotty command and Heyward's excellent plate discipline). Over-managing would've been putting your team in a worse position in real-time in order to plan against the contingency of an extra inning game. Franklin wasn't available, had it gone extras we were probably boned anyway. He knew we had a short bullpen and knew that we needed to win this thing in regulation. He managed with a sense of urgency I rarely see from LaRussa in a regular season game and I loved it.

All LaRussa can do is put his guys in the best position to win the game and that's exactly what he did. No hindsight to it - had it gone to extras, I'd have defended his use there as well.

The best way to manage extra innings is to stay out of them. The moves he made were expressly designed to do just that.

Like I said - what would you have done?

Now we got Franklin and McCllean tommorrow to help out Garcia. :clap:

And everyone that threw in the 7th will be available tomorrow as well. Hawk barely broke a sweat, Boggs only faced a single batter.

LaRussa approached this game aggressively and in a manner that actually set us up even better for tomorrow.

I have no idea how anyone can complain about how he handled that 7th inning. It's a gut reaction to see him go to the parade of 1000 relievers and assume he's just overmanaging, but he didn't do that at all in this instance.

He really did a great job tonight, IMO.

Jason Motte looks like he could be offspring from the "Bushwhackers" from the all-star wrestleing era !!!

I only got to see the last 3 innings last night. Motte looked dazed and confused like he usually does. His constant girations on the mound after each pitch makes him look goofy as hell (see above post). But he did get the job done, barely. TLR and Duncam must see something in him other than a mid 90's fast ball. That must be enough.

Yadi comes through with another clutch hit. A few more of those and he'll start being called that. Holiday is starting to get me upset.

Our strating pitching is really something special fellas. The addition of a healthy Brad Penny with Waino and Carpenter is lights out. Add a crafty lefty Garcia to the mix and wev'e got 4 starters. Lohse is still trying to get dialed in - he should be our 5th starter at this point. We've seen enough of our starting pitching to unserstand what we have and don't have.

Is Brendan Ryan another 10 k's away from being sent down to get his swing back ?

It worked out but I woudl have sent Carp out to at least start the 7th. He couldn't have done much worse than Hawksworth.

I do NOT prescribe to the one pitcher, one out method in close games. I understand the lefty-righty matchup thing, but still, in a tight game he shouldn't burn through the bullpen like that. I'm sorry if I'm raining on your I HEART LARUSSA parade, but I thought he managed like a fool last night and we were lucky to get the win.

I agree. I think the Braves are going to be a good team this year. Its just a rough patch right now.