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Bobby Cox's lament
As I walked down the streets of Atlanta
I found the field where the Braves like to play
There sat Bobby Cox all slumped down in his dugout
his face was the shade of the red Georgia clay
I could see by his uni that he was a lifer
He waved me on over as I slowly walked by
and said, "come sit beside me and hear my sad story,
my team is in shambles and I'm fixin' to cry"
"Where once in the East we used to be dom'nant,
a dozen straight titles we salted away.
Octobers were ours as a matter of birthright
But soon it will be our elimination day"
"It took four aging starters to put nails in my coffin
six sore-armed relievers to blow every save.
Find that guy with the tom-tom and chief Nokahoma
and tell them to follow my corpse to the grave"
They'll beat that drum slowly, and play the fife lowly
The fans chop their arms as the hearse moves along
"Take me down to the outfield and lay a pennant o'er me
I once ruled the land but it's now all gone wrong"
I could see by his scorecard that he still had Chipper
He plays next to Yunel and named his kid Shea
Was hitting .400 'til his body betrayed him
and now each day's paper calls him 'day-to-day'
We look over to first base and don't see Teixeira
dealt away for Kotchman who played in LA
And then Kelly Johnson who feasts on Met pitching
but he's not hitting now and his first name sounds gay
Where once in the outfield they used to have Andruw,
he slammed every pitch and he caught every hit
But now it's just Kotsay and Francouer and Blanco
a bunch of old has-beens who've all turned to shit"
On the mound we'll see Jo-Jo and Jurrgens and Hampton
as Smoltz and Tom Glavine rest their old bones and drool
and Tim Hudson ponders his future in baseball
while Mike Hampton's driving his kids to their school
So let's beat the Braves slowly and lay them down lowly
Pin their backs to the ground as the ref counts to three
Reign o'er the East division and build up our cushion
drop them down the standings 'til they look up at D.C.
OK yeah, so I posted a version of that ditty about a month ago. But, seeing as how I originally conjured it up to be used in a goofy KTE, I'm inflicting on y'all again. And if you don't know what song is being parodied here well then I can't help you.
For a summary in non-musical form, we're 2-7 against these guys this year (2-1 here, 0-6 in their place) although we haven't seen them since May.
5 of those 9 games were either Smoltz or Hudson starts and both of them are out for the year. Jurrjens is the only starter we're facing this week who we've seen this season. He beat us in Atlanta on May 21, going 7 innings gving up 2 runs (1 earned) on 5 hits & 2 BBs as he faced Mike Pelfrey (4 IP, 6 ER, 8 hits, 3 BBs) before we traded him in for version 2.0
All games 7:00PM
* Tuesday - Jo-Jo Reyes (he is a man who thinks he is a pitcher) 3-3; 5.33 ERA in 15 starts
* Wednesday - Jair Jurrgens: 11-8; 3.15 - the 22 y/o from Curacao, Netherlands Antilles has been their best pitcher this year
* Thursday - Mike Hampton: Missed nearly 3 complete years. Has 5 starts since coming back and is 2-1 w/a 6.92 ERA over 26 innings
We counter with Perez, Pelfrey & Pedro
Offense:
Catcher McCann and Chipper (when he's healthy) have been their best players this year.
Kelly Johnson and Yunel Escobar (2B & SS) have calmed down from their early season hot streaks.
Jeff Francouer's (RF) plate discipline isn't getting any better 3 seasons into his career.
Casey Kotchmann (1B) has done little to make them forget the Teixeira eira, and Ruben Gotay has done little off the bench to make Omar regret cutting him loose.
Bullpen:
They've got a bunch of guys out there, several of whom I've even heard of.
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