We got treated to a good ol’ spring slugfest on Tuesday afternoon but the Blue Jays were the team that did most of the slugging, which means that it wasn’t exactly a lovely day for the Braves and their pitching staff.
It was a particularly rough day for Scott Kazmir and two of the following three relievers who came in after Kazmir left the game in the fourth inning. It all started innocently enough for Kazmir as he only gave up a sacrifice fly in the first inning and got through the next two innings unscathed — even mowing down the Blue Jays in 1-2-3 order in the second inning.
Indeed, it was the fourth inning where things went sideways for Kazmir. Kazmir immediately ran into trouble after the first three Blue Jays he faced in that frame all reached base (via single, walk, and hit-by-pitch). A sacrifice fly, a single and an error from Ozzie Albies later, the Blue Jays had scored three runs in the fourth for a 4-1 lead and had ran Kazmir from the game.
Things could have been worse as the sacrifice fly from Luke Maile could have easily been a home run if not for Ronald Acuna Jr. snatching the ball and preventing it from going over the fence for a grand slam. Instead, Acuna’s snag kept the scoreline decent (for the time being) and Acuna even completely reversed the scenario in the bottom half of the inning by launching a solo home run to lead things off.
This is your daily reminder that spring training stats don’t mean much, but this is also another reminder that the day when Acuna finally gets called up will truly be a glorious day.
Ronald Acuña started his Spring Training out with an 0-for-7. Since then, he's batting .539 (14-for-26) following his home run today. #Braves
— Grant McAuley (@grantmcauley) March 13, 2018
Speaking of glorious, Freddie Freeman followed up Acuna’s shot from the fourth inning with a deep dinger of his own in the fifth inning that bounced off of the scoreboard in center field at Lake Buena Vista.
A sighting at #BravesST! pic.twitter.com/1pMfraC5UK
— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) March 13, 2018
That made it 6-3 Blue Jays at that point in the game and while the Braves would add three more runs, they would also fall victim to a maelstrom of offense from Toronto. The Jays proceeded to put seven more runs on the board for the rest of the afternoon as they feasted upon Anyelo Gomez, Josh Graham and David Peterson. Rex Brothers made an appearance and gave up a hit, but the run he surrendered was unearned. Other than that, it was a pretty rough day for Atlanta when it came to pitching.
Scott Kazmir’s performance on the day probably wasn’t going to be enough to severely hurt his chances of making it into the rotation, but it certainly didn’t help him. The spot for the final spot is wide open and being on the starting end of a slugfest like this one won’t help his case going forward.