It Keeps Getting Worse for the Atlanta Braves

Too many times this year we've said it can't get much worse only for the Atlanta Braves to make it worse and that's what happened on Tuesday as the Atlanta Braves just got embarrassed again losing to the Milwaukee Brewers. We'll discuss everything in that game, what's happening with this offense. Once again they go silent. We'll discuss all that on today's episode of Locked On Braves so let's get into it. You are locked on Braves your daily Atlanta Braves podcast part of the Locked On Podcast Network your team every day. Hey welcome back to Locked On Braves part of Locked On Sports Atlanta where we cover your favorite Atlanta sports teams each and every day. I am your host Jake Mastroianni. You can follow me on social media at shortstopball. Check out the podcast there as well at Locked On underscore Braves. Make sure you subscribe on YouTube if you're new. Hit that thumbs up button. I could use a thumbs up right now. Make sure that you leave me a five-star review on Apple Spotify wherever you get your podcast and if you're an everyday make sure to let me know down in the comment section. Always enjoy hearing that from you and thanks so much for making Locked On Braves your first listen of each and every day. On today's podcast we're gonna briefly talk about that ugly performance on Tuesday night but we'll get into this offense and just how bad it's been in the strikeouts and what you know is causing this offense to be so bad this year outside of just the injuries. We'll go into more detail on that in today's episode and this episode is brought to you by PrizeFix the easiest and most exciting way to play daily fantasy sports. Go to prizefix.com slash locked on MLB and use code all lowercase locked on MLB for a first deposit match up to $100. Well let's get into this game on Tuesday was actually still going on as I'm recording here the Braves down 10 to nothing in the bottom of the ninth Luke Williams just threw a clean well clean scoreless I should say top of the ninth inning that's how things have gone for the Atlanta Braves and I hate the position player pitching especially when it's my team that does it I just think it's a mockery of the game but that is a a side discussion for another day but that's how bad things are going for the Atlanta Braves and you come off Sunday one of the one of the worst losses of the year but put it up there I mean there's a long list of losses this year that are just bad and look you can lose a game nobody's gonna go 162 and 0 but there's a difference between just losing and looking bad doing it and getting beat and just too often this year this team has just lost either looking really bad like the other team just completely outplayed them which has happened far too often or they've had plenty of games where they just didn't play the game the right way and got beat and it's just back-to-back games now and you get embarrassed by the Marlins on Sunday and you get shut out there and then you you have the off day which everybody says okay they just need a refresher they need a break Matt Olsen just swung at a ball that hit him in the in the knee what is going on with this team right now it is just it is embarrassing it is embarrassing to watch this team and again it's you get your off day and that's what everybody's pointing to that they've been grinding so hard and they have and I get that you know even in this long stretch of games after the all-star break so yeah you had some rain outs those aren't true off days because you don't know if you're going to play that game you still have to get up and prep for that and then they've had to play double headers and you know to to work around that so this team has been in a long grind and a long stretch of games and they needed that off day but you got to come out of that off day rejuvenated ready to go and get after it and then you absolutely just you lay another egg that was even worse than the egg that you laid previously and look the Brewers are a good team I'm not taking anything away from them but to get embarrassed 10 to nothing at home like that and again the pitching is what it is we'll get into Bryce Elder I mean but the offense too just not even showing up and I get it after you fall behind early so much so early I mean I understand but show a little bit of fight you know try to at least get back in the game put a couple of runs on the board and see what happens there was just no real fight and effort to come back by this offense and it's just again it's it feels like it's been this way all year long where we just say things can't get much worse this is one of the worst losses of the year and then it's like this Braves team is like well I'll show you here's another one to go and it is just so painful right now to watch this team we had a good little four or five game stretch that had everybody believe in they know the Phillies are playing poorly right now as well so it had everybody believing that they're going to get back in this division race and everything that's happened I'm not giving up but it's like I'm not going to be fooled either kind of what I talked about yesterday I'm not going to be fooled by a little four or five game run that this team goes on because you still have games like this and games on Sunday and games on Saturday you have just these stretches of really bad baseball where I just I cannot I cannot really become a true believer that of this team until I see them get out of that as Orlando Garcia swings at a slider a foot off the plate to strike out it's just it's hard for me as a Braves fan to stay optimistic and Jeffrey Humphries I know you're in every day every day you're out there you're wanting you're telling me to be optimistic it's just really difficult you know and if you're like me you got into the third fourth inning of this game and I turned it off it's just there's a I'm a baseball fan I'm a Braves fan first but I'm a baseball fan too and there are other teams out there that the Braves are going to fall 10 to nothing so they get shut out back-to-back games there's other good baseball teams out there and I would encourage you to find one that you enjoy and make sure that you watch them also because I love the sport of baseball I love to see it played well and this Braves team just isn't doing that for me on a nightly basis and we talked about it yesterday we talked about you know how much blame do you put on the coaching staff how how do you blame a coaching staff for losing 10 to nothing what differently could the coaching staff have done for them to not lose as poorly as they did on Tuesday I just I mean other than not starting Bryce Elder and again I want to talk about Bryce Elder because many people saying he stinks why is he still on this team I don't I don't necessarily agree with that as Ecuadorman says blame blame everyone uh Brogsley says not start Elder so let's get into that let's get into that discussion of it's like some of you forget what he did last week against the Brewers where he was brilliant against this same team I mean I don't know look I'm not gonna sit here and try to defend Bryce Elder like he is an all-star which he is not that was a great first half that he had last year he is a a fourth fifth starter most likely a fifth starter in a good rotation and you know this rotation he's a sixth starter you know he's not really supposed to be in this rotation but you know the Braves has some injuries they're trying to give guys extra days of rest and it's why you're getting a guy like Elder Clayton Adams says he's he's good one out of eight times that's not true and I feel like that's an exaggeration there he's but he's good 50 60 percent of the time and you know I still feel like even out of your fifth starter and again he's not even the he's a sixth starter you want a little bit more than that but but it's just wild to me the comments from people that I've seen that Bryce Elder is trash he doesn't belong on this team and it's like you forget what he did last week against this same team and look it is tough especially when you're not an overly dominant pitcher and you have to work on deception and keeping hitters off balance and you can maybe trick a lineup once but you have to face that same lineup again within the same week that's tough to do and look it worked for Colin Ray obviously he came out and had a much better game against the Braves this time around so he was able to improve on his last start not long ago against the Braves but for Bryce Elder the margin of error is just so thin for him he has to have great command he has to have all of his stuff working and if he doesn't this is going to happen this is what I talked about with Bryce Elder look I'm not trying to sit here and defend Bryce Elder but I do think he is okay to have in a starting big league starting rotation as a fifth starter or a guy that comes up and gives you spot starts when you have your regular starters on the injured list I think he's certainly okay to have in that role and I think he was the right decision for this now could you have just gone with Chris Sale to start this and you know not push guys back yeah you definitely could have done that you know you come off the the off day you come up the bad loss on Sunday put Chris Sale out there try to get things off on a good foot which by the way doesn't matter if you can't score runs but I do think you set Bryce Elder up to fail a little bit when you put him back out there to face the same team in two leagues and it's not a guy you know that has overpowering stuff to be able to dominate a lineup like that twice in the span of a week so I think that set him up to fail and the other part of this is what are your better options right now with Renaldo Lopez on the IL again Bryce Elder should not be in this rotation but he is because Lopez is on the IL Strider is out for the season and what are your what are your other options you're going to get the same inconsistencies from Alan Winans and Dylan Dodd Ian Anderson doesn't look quite ready yet AJ Smith Chalver and Hurston Waldrop haven't proven that they're ready for another opportunity yet maybe they should give Zach Logue a chance to at least be an opener see if he can give you good four or five innings so I still think Elder is the right call I think maybe this is with a tougher situation for him and maybe you should have just stuck with the rotation that you had and have him face a different team later in the week of course that would have been at Coors Field in Colorado and maybe that doesn't go well you also look at this game for Bryce Elder he's one pitch away from getting out of that first inning gives up the double to Contreras and then throws 91 middle middle I mean it does not get more middle middle than that pitch he threw to Willie Adamas and next thing you know it's three to nothing and then the lead off the second inning Hoskins hits a ball that goes off the third base bag for a double I mean that's just poor luck but it leads to an easy run you're down four nothing and with this offense that's game I mean game's over and that's when many of you probably just went ahead and changed the channel turned on the Olympics or like I said find another team that you really enjoy watching but games over at that point and again pitching pitching was bad no doubt but it didn't matter because your offense didn't score a single run and now they have not scored in 24 innings it just you cannot win games like that obviously you can't win if you don't score that's again no brainer for you but a 24 inning scoreless streak you get shut out and back to games again is that on the coaching staff I mean they're putting the best players out there that you have available those guys just aren't getting it done and it's not like they're facing Cy Young contenders I would almost feel more optimistic if they were facing Cy Young contenders they seem to do better against better teams against better pitching it's the it's the games like this and Colin Ray is having a decent season I'm not taking anything away from him but it's these games the games like they had against the Marlins where they just they can't rise up I don't I don't know it's just it's so frustrating this year watching them play against teams against game and again Brews are a good team I get that they're they're leading their division by a wide margin but it just can't can't get that same consistency game to game and it's just hard to watch I mean you got and I know this offense is depleted and it's part of it there's a lot of injuries a lot of big pieces missing but to go 24 innings without scoring a single run with some of the guys that you have in this lineup you still have a Marcello Zuna you still have a Matt Olson you still have an Austin Riley and you can't score a single run in 24 innings I just I cannot trust this offense I can't trust it and again we can we can look at the pitching all we want and it was bad it's been bad these last two games but it doesn't matter if your offense can't can't score and there's got to be one of these days where this offense bails out the pitching the pitching has bailed them out so much this year if the pitching goes away I mean this team has no shot but I do think the pitching will be better but let's get more into the offense next I want to dive deeper into the offense and just again you can't really compare 23 2023 to 2024 but that's what I'm going to do here for a lot of these numbers I'm going to throw at you but I'm going to you know bring up the strikeouts and just how drastic it is from last year to this year and we'll also talk about some of the other big things that are ailing this offense we'll discuss all that here prize fix is America's number one daily fantasy sports app with over 5 million active members prize fix is the easiest and most exciting way to play daily fantasy sports unlike other apps on prize fix it's just you against the numbers all you do is pick more or less on two to six player stat projections and watch the winnings roll in and now you can win up to a hundred times your money on prize fix with as little as four correct picks you can turn ten dollars into one thousand dollars and look you open up your prize fix app on Wednesday and I'm gonna go ahead and tell you you got a hitter fantasy score out there for a braves player take the under right now because you either you're gonna you're gonna win big or hopefully you're gonna reverse jinx the Braves into scoring a ton of runs so either way you're gonna win prize fix is available more than 30 states across the country including Georgia and Alabama download the prize fix app today use code locked on MLB for a first deposit match up to one hundred dollars that's code locked on MLB on prize fix for a deposit match up to one hundred dollars pick more pick less it's that easy thank you for making lockdown Braves your first listen today for your second listen enjoy locked on MLB podcast host Paul Sullivan aka Sully is here daily to provide national expertise with his trademark humor to help you get ready for the MLB playoffs here in the dog days of summer prepare for the fall classic with Sully who has it all covered every single day on locked on MLB available on YouTube or whenever you get your podcast part of the lockdown podcast network your team every day so let's talk more about this offense because that's fun right I mean this is an offense coming into the year and injuries obviously have to be talked about up front I mean you lose a guy like Acuna and I know he was having a down season you know you lost Albies for a while you've lost Michael Harris for a while Austin Riley's had you know a two-week absence Sean Murphy was out for two months it's there's been a lot of losses in this lineup and it's just I don't know how much of an excuse that you can use for that but but if you watch this Braves team I think what what really bothers me the most is the strikeouts and it's what made this offense so special last year the Braves were fifth last year in strikeout percentage fifth best strikeout percentage last year this year they are 25th they're 25th this year and strikeout percentage notable increases from last year to this year Acuna obviously 11.4 to 23.9 that was glaring even before the injury it was what made Acuna season so special so special last year is that he cut down that strikeout rate significantly it went back up to where it was pretty much for his career norm so now you got to look at it and see was 2023 the outlier for Ronald Acuna jr. Matt Olsen's gone from 23.2 percent to 28.4 percent and not great for Matt Olsen Michael Harris 18.7 percent to 21.2 percent and Ozuna even has gone up a couple percent percentage points from 22.6 to 24.3 but really the big increases are Acuna and Olsen and Acuna obviously not in the lineup anymore but then you add this year you add Adam Duvall who's had to play has had more playing time because of the injuries he has a 29.7 percent strikeout rate so nearly a 30 percent strikeout rate and Kelnick has a 29.3 percent strikeout rate so you've essentially added two guys to your lineup this year who have a 30 percent strikeout rate and then at the deadline what do you do and look I'm fine with the Soler trade I think he does bring over some attributes that this team needs but what it didn't need was another guy who strikes out 25 plus percent of the time he's striking out 26.5 percent of the time this year it's just it makes it really really frustrating to watch this offense when one there's no speed and a lot of that is part of the injuries without Acuna without Ozzie without Michael Harris those are your three guys who are generally going to run the most so now there's no speed element to this lineup it really is home run or bust I mean you look at the top of this lineup and Soler Riley Riley can be more of a complete hitter Ozuna has been more of a complete hitter but Olsen you know he's a three true outcomes type of player so there's a three true outcomes type of player and Duvall when he's in there with a three true outcomes type of player that was really more two outcomes either he hit a home run or he struck out it's just it's not it's not a lineup full of hitters that can do different things for you and when you have that it's going to lead to inconsistencies like this for this team where they just struggle to find ways to score runs because it's really only a one trick pony that you have where it's a lineup built to home run built to hit home runs and when that's not coming again I'm beating a dead horse here but when that's not there and not happening this team offense is really going to struggle and that's what we've seen a lot this year and again part of that due to the injuries but when they're not hitting these home runs it's just it's really hard to watch because it's just a ton of strikeouts and it feels like they've hit into a lot of double plays this year they hit into two more tonight but they're just they just have the 12th most double plays if you would have asked me that before I looked I would have said they're at least top five and most grounded into double plays but you go back to the top of that order in solaire riley ozuna olsen and then usually your catcher spot of either darnell or sean murphy that has to be the slowest top five in anybody's order and so it's a station a station ball club at the top of the order like I said if those you're not getting those home runs it's really hard to string a bunch of hits together and then any of those guys put the ball on the ground it's an easy double play there's just there's not much diversity if any in this lineup their batting average on balls in play this year is nearly 20 points lower again some of that due to just some regression guys had career years last year also due to the fact there's a lot of injuries so you're having to count on a lot of guys that you shouldn't you know it's it's also it's something I need more time to dive into and but with how drastically different the offense is from last year to this year you almost have to wonder are teams either defensively positioning the braves differently or are they pitching them differently the one thing that does stand out and we've talked about this pretty much all season and the numbers still pretty much remain there is that teams seem to be attacking the braves more with four seam fastballs which makes no sense because last year they saw four seamers 31.5 percent of the time and they led the league with a run value of 77.9 against those pitches the next closest to them in run value against four seamers last year was seattle at 54.3 it's more than 20 points less than where the braves were but this year they're seeing four seamers 34 percent of the time that's tied for the most in major league baseball and they're 22nd in baseball with a run value of negative 20.2 why from one year to the next can they all of a sudden not hit four seam fastballs it just doesn't it doesn't make sense you were the best by a wide margin and hitting four seam fastballs last year and now all of a sudden this lineup can't hit them and they're one of the worst in the bottom 10 against four seam fastballs this year i don't i don't get that it doesn't make sense and again i need to do more research and exactly what is going on and how pitchers are attacking them if they're attacking them differently are they positioning them differently because it just it does not even with all the injuries and even with expecting some regression for players it just doesn't make a lot of sense with some of these numbers that we're seeing from last year to this year and again i just i cannot i cannot understand how bad this offense can be 24 straight innings now without scoring a single run and i feel like this isn't the only time this year i feel like this is the second time this year that they've gone 20 plus innings without scoring a run i'll have to go back and look that up but i feel like there's another stretch been another stretch this year where they had a long scoreless streak it just can't happen and again pitching certainly should take a lot of blame for these last two losses but this offense is what is so maddening to me just how can you be so bad how can your approach be so bad and how can it be so drastically different from one year to the next i i just don't understand it makes no sense and here we are you know into august and we've been asking this same question now for three three or four months you know since the end of april what has happened what has changed what has changed in the game plan what has changed in the preparation for this team that there is just no consistency offensively from night tonight and a lot of baseball left to be played still i know that sounds crazy to say still a lot of baseball left to be played but as i continue to say we're at the point now where i'm not going to be fooled by a couple of good games i need to see a 10 15 game stretch of this offense just consistently having good bats every night being able to score three four runs a night i feel like i'm asking for much here and we just we haven't seen it but until that happens i'm not i just can't have faith in this offense to get it done and it's just again frustrating this whole season has been frustrating and i know as soon as i say that everybody's going to say well that was the same thing about 2021 well yeah i get it and i was there for 2021 as well and it was bad and i was saying the same things then this team was just so frustrating to watch but man it's really hard in the moment right now to watch this team and watch these past two games and have any sense of confidence in them specifically the offense i think the pitching will be fine but it's just really hard to have any confidence that this offense can put together you know a 10 15 game stretch of just performing to just a mediocre level and that's all we've really been asking for i'm not asking for them to be the 2023 offense i'm asking them to be a mid-tier offense if they did that with the pitching that this team normally gives you i mean they would be right there with the phillies they would be knocking on the door of the division but they just haven't been able to do that and it's just another terrible performance for this team on tuesday and things have got to change quickly and uh you know watching snickertot right now i'm interested to go back and hear his comments but we talked about it yesterday the one complaint i have is just where's the fire and we've seen it more in his post-game comments lately so again so i'm curious to see what he has to say here but kind of like what i said after the weekend it's just inexcusable you can't lose games like that to a marlins a depleted marlins team and sure you can lose to the brewers but to lose like that in the game be over by the second inning it's just you can't have that with the series just can't continually have games like this all right we will turn the page though as hopefully the braves are going to do as well and chris sale will be on the mound on wednesday going up against freddie peralta another tough matchup for this braves offense but chris sale hopefully to the rescue once again to end a losing streak for the atlanta braves we'll discuss that here next when you're at a ballpark what's your favorite cold treat to get whenever you're at the ballpark for me it's easy i love the sauce soft serve ice cream i get the 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first order of liquid iv when you go to liquid iv.com and use code mlb at checkout that's 20 off your first order when you shop better hydration today using promo code mlb let's wrap things up here previewing wednesday before we do that though the braves do have some good news michael harris is beginning a rehab assignment so hopefully he'll be ready to come off the injured list and the braves need him we didn't talk about jared kelnick i didn't go specifically into anybody offensively just because they all were bad although olsen did have two hits but also hit into a double play in a situation where he had runner on base but the braves need michael harris back kelnick just looks completely lost offensively and now defensively as well a couple of plays tonight i know tough break the ball that he ran against the wall that he caught it just popped out of his glove uh but he's you know had some miscues in the outfield here lately i don't know if playing center field every day he's just worn out you know the stress of needing to perform and do well whatever the case is the guy just he looks tired in my opinion um so it'd be great getting michael harris back obviously probably replacing rosario ultimately in the lineup and rosario's been pretty bad uh so looking forward to having michael harris back i know his numbers for him weren't good even before the injury but i still think you know he at least brings that other dynamic for this team somebody that can get on base run and help them score in different ways so good to see him back on a rehab assignment and closer to getting back with the or so it'll be chris sale versus freddie peralta on a wednesday raves just saw freddie peralta obviously and chris sale just saw the brewers brought a really good pitcher strikeout pitcher brave struggle with strikeouts as i pointed out earlier in the episode so gonna be a tough match up for an offense that again has not scored in 24 innings and now they get to face pretty pretty peralta so gonna be tough once again for this offense but they do have chris sale on the mound who's obviously been excellent for the atlanta braves all year long and they're gonna be looking to him again to try to end the losing streak i feel like that's all he's done over the past month or two is tried to pitch them out of a losing streak and look and some of those times he's pitched well again that game against the white socks that i'm never gonna let go pitched excellent gave up one run to at least robert on a good pitch down and in but good player made a good swing and they still lost so it doesn't guarantee anything but you at least feel somewhat confident that chris sale is going to keep you in the game and give this offense a chance to win and hopefully that is the case on wednesday i'll say it again hopefully the braves can get some momentum and get a streak going i just my confidence's level is very low that that's going to happen but that's what they'll try to do on wednesday flush another terrible loss chris sell out there to hopefully give you a chance to win a game but can this offense show up can we see them score run we'll see we'll find out on wednesday thank you for making lockdown braves your first listen today go check out locked on mlb podcast prepare for the fall classic with sully part of the blocked on podcast network your team every day subscribe to us on youtube if you're new hit that thumbs up button follow me on social media at shortstop ball at lockdown underscore braves thanks to protect br laro bond socal brave brown cow we got about 160 people in here with us live tonight uh steve or ramey as well aj evans really appreciate your comment on the last episode aj thank you for that ecwid doorman thanks for being in here as well monty 2k glean glenn arena literally thank you all for joining me here alive tonight but that will do it this episode of lockdown braves make sure that you rate review and subscribe to the lockdown braves podcast wherever you get your podcast and we will talk to you next time