Things are not going well: Atlanta Braves fall to 0-8

Nationals Go Without the Ill Strasburg, Win Anyway Over Braves

“The trouble is, we are in a losing streak at the wrong time. If we were losing like this in the middle of the season, nobody would notice. But we are losing at the beginning of the season, and this sets up the possibility of losing all 162 games.” – Casey Stengel

Well, this was a day, wasn’t it?

It began with one of the offensive centerpieces of a long-term rebuild leaving a hotel in handcuffs, appearing in court, accused of domestic assault. It ended with another defeat at the hands of a hated rival that has never seemed further away in the standings.

I think Mad Men’s Pete Campbell said it best when he said: “Not great, Bob!”

You’re no more interested in reading a defense of Olivera than I am in writing one, so let’s cover that quickly. The MLB brass, to its credit, is not the NFL in terms of player conduct. If you’re involved in domestic violence, you sit until it’s sorted out. End of story. If it’s all true, I personally never want to see him in an Atlanta uniform again; it’s bad enough these guys suck, but they can’t also be terrible people too.

There also was a ballgame. It was a loss again. For kicks, the offense didn’t even make it a game long enough for the bullpen to blow it tonight, which was nice. The Braves best chance may have come in the second inning, when A.J. Pierzynski (reached on fielder’s choice), Erick Aybar (bunt single) and Jace Peterson loaded the bases with two away.

Unfortunately, Matt Wisler was the next man up and watching him bat is nearly as terrifying as watching a ground ball roll toward Aybar. Since Wisler is paid to throw baseballs and not hit them, he grounded out to short and ended the inning.

Wisler was pretty sharp for the evening, only throwing a hanger to Jayson Werth in the fourth inning was truly egregious—Stephen Drew muscled an outer-half fastball out of the park, but that happens. You can live with that pitch. A good team could work with the three earned runs Wisler allowed over six innings, only truly struggling in one frame. A bad team allows no margin of error for its pitchers.

You be the judge on where the Braves are.

They sort of threatened again in the fifth, but true to form they were unable to get out of their own way. Peterson ran into an out at third base. Mallex Smith walked, stole second and advanced to third on a wild pitch, but the Struggling Freddie Freeman (official moniker for the moment) struck out to end the threat with Smith and Nick Markakis in scoring position.

If you’re looking for a bright spot, it’s either Pierzynski getting another couple of base knocks today and inching closer to the 2,000-hit club—one day soon, I’ll probably try to go long and speculate on his Hall of Fame chances—or Chris Withrow and Hunter Cervenka silencing the Nationals bats over the final three innings. Cervenka in particular was great, striking out Bryce Harper to end the eighth inning.

If you’re scoring at home, the only good parts of this game were provided by a 39-year old catcher, a reliever who was pitching in Sugar Land last year and Chris Withrow.

(NOT GREAT BOB!)

This team is a mess. The calls are already out there for Fredi Gonzalez to lose his job and it would be hard to argue with it if that were the ultimate decision. Fredi is probably a bad manager; his decision-making is certainly questionable, and his explanations are sometimes baffling. That said, he has very few batters who would make the 25-man on most real baseball teams; it’s easy to blame him for everything, but it’s hard to deny he’s coaching with a higher degree of difficulty than practically any other manager.

(But for real, he should probably go. He can’t make this season any better, but he’s in the process of making it worse. That’s a bad sign.)

Oh, another bright spot: Stephen Strasburg was scratched from the start. A healthy Strasburg could’ve tossed a no-hitter against this hapless bunch. He may still if he starts Thursday.

Anyway, that was Game Eight of 2016. It looked a lot like Games 1-7. If you’re a masochist, they’re doing this again tomorrow at 4:05 p.m. (ET).