The damage from last night's 17-inning affair was plenty. Infielder Omar Infante reaggravated his strained groin early in Sunday's contest (after recently straining my groin I can tell you what a pain it is - I used to make fun of players with strained groins, not anymore). Jeff Bennett injured his right shoulder in Saturday's game and Manny Acosta strained his hamstring trying to leg out a bunt in the wee innings of yesterday's marathon.

The Braves recalled Jeff Francoeur from double-A Mississippi, of course I was puzzled by that earlier... still am. The team also recalled infielder Brent Lillibridge and called up for the first time as a Brave, RHP Vladimir Nunez, who last pitched in the majors in 2004 with Colorado. Don't look for Nunez to be anything too spectacular, he's one of those barely marginal major league players.

Mike Hampton is out. John Smoltz is out. Chuck James is unaware there is a strike zone, Jorge Campillo has blister problems, and now Tom Glavine has strained his left elbow. Injuries seem to be the only thing the Braves can do with regularity these days.

With Glavine likely out and Campillo questionable for his start this Saturday, the Braves must turn to another pitcher to fill the starting gap and get some innings. Enter Charlie Morton. Though Morton suffered only his second loss of the season Sunday in 100 degree heat in Virginia, the up-and-coming right-hander seems more than ready for the big leagues.

In 13 games this year, Morton has a 2.05 ERA and a 0.99 WHIP in 79 innings pitched. Perhaps his most impressive stat is in the homerun column, where he hasn't surrendered a single long-ball all season. Before his loss Sunday, Morton had thrown a one-hit gem against Durham his previous start, striking out 13.

Morton is scheduled to start on Saturday for the Richmond Braves, but today's game notes strangely have Saturday's starting pitcher listed as "Charlie Morton/TBA." Perhaps that's a big giveaway into what the Braves may already have had planned for Morton.

In addition to needing a starting pitcher for Campillo and/or Glavine, the Braves may need to replace the seemingly over matched Manny Acosta in the bullpen. Since the end of May, Acosta's ERA has ballooned from 2.54 on May 30th to its current 4.41.

There aren't many options in the minors to replace him with, but if the team decides to activate Mike Gonzalez, then Acosta, and not Stockman, could be the odd man out of the bullpen.

We've played four games, and our bullpen has made 25 appearances! Including the oddity of Chris Resop who has 5 appearances in only four games after appearing twice in last night's game while playing left field for one batter. None of this is a good sign for a part of our team that is supposed to be a strength. Keep in mind that while some of these appearances are for one batter, they still have to warm up in the bullpen, then again on the mound -- that's a lot of back to back wear and tear this early in the season.

Add to all this the fact that we are carrying eight relievers (instead of the usual seven), and tonight we'll likely have nine relievers in the bullpen and the numbers above sort of boggle the mind. For comparison, the Atlanta starters have made three appearances (I'm not counting Bennett as a starter, even though he made a start) totaling 17.1 innings. It hurts that two out of the four games we've played are for extra innings, but that just further underscores the importance of the starters going deep into games this weekend (and the offense scoring plenty of early runs to put us ahead and keep us ahead).

Admirably, Royce Ring earns the "perfect award" for having appeared in three games to face one batter in each game and having struck out all three batters he's faced -- that's a good LOOGY.