Party at the Ted!

Cole Hamels decided to crash the party planned at the Ted.

There was a birthday party for my friend and roommate Nat planned for Sunday April 10 at Turner Field. As Braves fans, we reluctantly invited the Phillies team, knowing that they have recently decided to be good, in part, I think, to hide the fact that they were the first professional team to reach 10,000 losses. Regardless, we wanted to see some baseball, and there has to be two teams playing each other for that to happen.



Here's me and my girlfriend, Amy, at the pre-party.

Little did we know that Cole Hamels had another plan. Hamels showed up dealing that fine April day, where temperatures almost reached 90 degrees. He pitched seven shutout innings only allowing four hits. He struck out eight and only walked one batter. It was hard to watch. But you have to give credit to a pitcher who is dealing like that. The Braves lost 3-0, but I got a free Tumbler cup thanks to a giveaway during the game. Holla section 402!
(On a side note, there are no bad seats at Turner Field, even being at the top all the levels we saw an amazing game.)

Anyway, I got to thinking about how when the Braves meet good pitchers (and it hurts me to call Hamels that, he's only had one good year, plus one solid playoff run) they do it in style.

On April 13, yes, just three days later, they faced the Marlins' Josh Johnson. Johnson took a no-hitter into the 8th inning, before Freddie Freeman doubled off of him. The Marlins took him out (Freeman wouldn't score) and his line looked like this: 7.1 innings, 1 hit, 3 walks, 9 K's. Chipper homered in the ninth to avoid another shutout, but it was still a 5-1 loss, and the Braves only had 2 hits.

Surprisingly, that wasn't the first time this year that the Braves have been two-hit. They faced the winless Brewers on April 5 and met an in the zone Yovani Gallardo. Gallardo threw a 2-hit shutout against the Braves, walking two and striking out two. He also scored a run, the only run in the 1-0 game.

A lot of times in baseball you will hear of a team's offense not "clicking" or going through a "drought."
I sometimes think that the Braves have an on-off switch somewhere that they occasionally forget to switch on.

Here are a few historic feats, of which the Braves contributed to the wrong side:

Randy Johnson's perfect game. The 6'10" lefty was by no means a bad pitcher, winning 5 Cy Young Awards and winning over 300 games (303). And on May 18, 2004, he dominated the Atlanta hitters en route to baseball's 17th perfect game. The 2-0 game saw competing complete games, with Mike Hampton going 9 innings and giving up only two runs on eight hits while striking out five. However, Johnson fanned 13 to leave with a line of 9.0 innings, 0 hits, 0 runs, 0 walks, and 13 Ks.

Ubaldo Jimenez threw the first no-hitter in Rockies' history...against the Braves. On April 17, 2010, Jimenez pitched a gem and left with a 4-0 win and a no-no. He walked six, but seemed to always be in control. He ended the night with a line of 9.0 innings, 0 hits, 0 runs, 6 walks, and 7 K's.

As I review these dates, it seems to me that the Braves just take a while to warm their bats up. And by June all the cobwebs are out, but even so, that is two month's worth of potential games where there is little to no hitting going on. Hopefully, the Braves can get comfortable at the plate and give some more run support for their pitchers and get back to winning.

And for those of you who worried about the ruined party, we fixed that with a trip to The Vortex Bar & Grill in Atlanta, Georgia. I ate away my sorrow by attacking their Double Bypass Burger.

DOUBLE BYPASS BURGER
Twice as big as the Coronary Bypass! Topped with
two fried eggs, six slices of American cheese, and
eight slices of bacon, all served between the two
grilled cheese sandwiches that we use in place of

the regular hamburger buns.  14.95



I like fries on my burger



Here's the final product and it was delicious

Mark

all images are mine, except the Randy Johnson one, which I google searched