The theme for the Braves coming into their eighth Spring Training game of the season was to just avoid any more injuries as Atlanta is dealing with a slough of them currently. The Braves opponent for Saturday’s matinee affair were the re-building Detroit Tigers as the two team met in Lakeland, FL for their second face off of the spring.
For the Tigers it was Jordan Zimmerman, formerly of the Braves division rival Nationals, getting the nod on the mound to go up against Max Fried.
There was action right away in the first inning with the Braves getting a quick run off of Zimmerman thanks to a Johan Camargo double to left-center field which scored Ender Inciarte, but that was all Atlanta could muster.
Detroit responded quickly with two runs of their own though off the bats of Nick Castellanos and Miguel Cabrera (who is having a torrid spring) to put the Braves in an early hole. Things only got worse from there.
You’ll recall that the Braves main goal of the day was to just escape with their team intact and un-injured, but the bad luck of this spring continued today for Atlanta as Fried was forced from the game with two outs in the bottom of the second inning due to a cut which developed on his left pinky finger.
Atlanta continuously struggled outside of their first frame luck on the offensive side of the ball against Zimmerman, who completed three innings with four strikeouts. The struggles continued against Shane Greene, Blaine Hardy, Buck Farmer and Matt Hall who all completed scoreless innings taking the game into the seventh inning stretch.
For the Tigers it was a walk in the park on offense as they watched Brandon Dixon and Cabrera knock two, two-run, home runs over the fences in the third and sixth innings respectively. Pete Kozma added another blow in the sixth inning with an RBI double that put Detroit ahead 7-to-1. Atlanta pitchers Chad Sobotka, Jacob Webb and Kyle Muller all gave up runs in the loss to Detroit.
The Braves were able to get some runs back in the top of the eighth inning after Crisitan Pache entered the game with a pinch-hit double. Then, after a walk to Drew Lugbauer (Slugbauer to some of you), Garrett Schwartz went big fly to right field for a three-run blast taking the deficit down to 7-4.
Atlanta was unable to scratch anymore runs across from there and took the loss to bring their Spring Training record (which is meaningless really) to an even .500 at 4-4.
If you’d like to look for some bright spots, William Contreras (the Braves future at catcher) went 2-for-2 on the day along with Inciarte who went 2-for-3 at the plate. The day was soured though by news of Fried being forced to leave the game with injury. As you may very well know the Braves are having some of the worst luck I’ve ever seen this spring with injuries.
The Braves will hope for better luck tomorrow when they face the Marlins in Kissimmee, FL. Stay tuned.
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