Posted September 24, 200519 yr Bullpen wastes chance to gain ground By Joe Capozzi Palm Beach Post Staff Writer Saturday, September 24, 2005 ATLANTA ? The Atlanta Braves are closing in on a 14th straight division title, but the one pitcher they don't want to face in the playoffs is Marlins right-hander Josh Beckett. Thanks to another meltdown by Florida's bullpen, the Braves probably won't have to worry about Beckett in October. With Beckett out of the game and Florida leading 3-0, the Braves rallied for four runs in the eighth inning against Antonio Alfonseca and Todd Jones, stunning the Marlins with a 4-3 victory that pushed Florida closer to elimination. "Josh pitched a great game. You hate to see that go down the tubes,'' manager Jack McKeon said after Beckett ran his scoreless innings streak against Atlanta to 19 innings. The Marlins blew a chance to gain ground in the wild-card race because the first-place Astros lost. Instead, the Marlins remain four games back with eight to play. Carlos Delgado drove in all of Florida's runs with an RBI single in the first inning and a two-run home run in the third. It looked like all that Beckett would need. With tightness in his right shoulder, he outpitched John Smoltz for seven innings, yielding five hits and striking out six. Beckett has not allowed a run to the Braves in 19 innings over three starts this season, going 2-0 with a 0.00 ERA after posting an 0-3 record and 7.27 ERA in three starts against Atlanta in 2004. The Braves haven't scored against him since Sept. 18, 2004. "Everybody's going to look back and see how many earned runs I gave up to the Atlanta Braves in 2005,'' Beckett said. "It's all for naught if we don't make the playoffs.'' Beckett allowed the Braves to threaten just twice. Brian McCann led off the fifth inning with a double to center field. He was bunted to third, but Beckett got Rafael Furcal to bounce out to first base and Marcus Giles to ground out to third. Jeff Francoeur led off the seventh with a single and tagged up to advance to second on Ryan Langerhans' fly out to center field. Beckett got McCann to fly out to second then struck out pinch?hitter Todd Hollandsworth. Beckett also got some help on defense. Mike Lowell, making his first career start at second base, turned a double play in the first inning; Juan Pierre ran down two fly balls at the warning track; and Miguel Cabrera made a lunging stop of Andruw Jones' hard ground out in the sixth inning. But Beckett had thrown 112 pitches after seven innings and the Marlins couldn't take a chance on aggravating his right shoulder. Right-hander Antonio Alfonseca came on to pitch the eighth and gave up a double to Furcal. Marcus Giles followed with an RBI single to left. McKeon didn't waste any time with his beleaguered bullpen. He pulled Alfonseca and brought in closer Todd Jones, who has been outstanding for most of the year. But Jones gave up a single to Chipper Jones, advancing Giles to third. Andruw Jones then drew a walk to load the bases, and after a strikeout Francoeur beat out a fielder's choice on a close relay throw to first, scoring Giles on Atlanta's second out. Langerhans hit a hard grounder up the middle that was gloved by Luis Castillo, who's throw to first pulled Delgado off the bag, allowing Chipper Jones to score the tying run and advancing Francoeur to third. Francoeur then scored on McCann's single. "I can't fault Jonesey,'' McKeon said. "That's the guy you've got to go to if you want to win the ballgame.'' Alfonseca sat at his locker after the game, wiping tears from his eyes. "I welcome those situations,'' said Jones. "That's the way it goes. If you want to be the closer you're going to be in there when the game is on the line. The game was on the line tonight in the eighth inning. It's tough when it doesn't work out.'' Alfonseca really took the loss hard. Jones seemed to hold up alright. It must have been a very somber mood in the clubhouse afterwards. I'm sure most of them realized this was their last gasp.Link
September 24, 200519 yr Yup. It's over. We can't blame it COMPLETELY on the bullpen. The OFFENSE needs to score runs. If the offense score a bit more runs, the bullpen wouldn't have so much pressure day in and day out. Of course, the bullpen HAS SUCKED, but this offense is a joke also.
September 24, 200519 yr Delgado drove in all 3 runs tonight RBI single in first 2-run HR in third (I think?)
September 24, 200519 yr Id give them a chance for playoff contention..................... in little league. :lol
September 24, 200519 yr Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that.
September 24, 200519 yr More of the same - the offense not delivering except for Delgado, mental mistakes, the pen not shutting the door. Middle relief is key for a team that only gives you 2 or 3 runs per night for the most part. But that's a lot of pressure for any pen.
September 24, 200519 yr I can't imagine where this team would be without Delgado. On another note, how many times has the bullpen blown one of Josh's games? I can think of at least three right now... it could be something like 4 or 5. Pathetic.
September 24, 200519 yr Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that. I'd like to re-sign him for next year, perhaps with a contract structured like this year's was.
September 24, 200519 yr Author Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that. I'd like to re-sign him for next year, perhaps with a contract structured like this year's was. Alfonseca is signed for 2006.
September 24, 200519 yr Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that. I agree with you....hate to hear that the game brought him to tears.
September 24, 200519 yr Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that. I'd like to re-sign him for next year, perhaps with a contract structured like this year's was. Alfonseca is signed for 2006. The team has an option for 2006 which would have been automatically triggered if Alfonseca pitched enough innings this year. He didn't, but the club still has the option. I think they'll exercise it.
September 24, 200519 yr Alfonseca is in the category of Players I Like More Everyday. He's always into the game, is one of our best options to come marching out of the pen to put out a fire, and takes losses as hard as he parties for wins. Plus, he got tossed from a bullpen. How crazy is that. I agree with you....hate to hear that the game brought him to tears. I regret that it made him cry, but I love the fact that he cares that much about a regular season game where we were mentally eliminated a few days earlier. I wish we had 24 other people with these kind of emotions.
September 24, 200519 yr Author The team has an option for 2006 which would have been automatically triggered if Alfonseca pitched enough innings this year. He didn't, but the club still has the option. I think they'll exercise it. Alfonseca's salary this year was also based on innings. He had the league minimum $316K as a base with incentives up to an additional $1.7M based on innings pitched. I'm not sure where he ended up on that scale, but it couldn't be very high as he has only thrown 25.1 innings.
September 24, 200519 yr I regret that it made him cry, but I love the fact that he cares that much about a regular season game where we were mentally eliminated a few days earlier. I wish we had 24 other people with these kind of emotions. I think we have more than just Alfie that show emotion. Big Tex and Dontrelle both show a great deal of emotion. So does Mikey. It was good to see him finally smiling yesterday.
September 24, 200519 yr Everyone on that team wants to win. Just because they don't express it like Dontrelle, Willis, Castillo, Seca and Jwnz do doesn't mean they don't care. I guarantee 85% of the players on that bench take these losses personally. Not many people can stand the fact that they are made fools of day in and day out like this team has.
September 24, 200519 yr Yup. It's over. We can't blame it COMPLETELY on the bullpen. The OFFENSE needs to score runs. If the offense score a bit more runs, the bullpen wouldn't have so much pressure day in and day out. Of course, the bullpen HAS SUCKED, but this offense is a joke also. In all honosty, you really can blame last game on the bullpen... a 3-0 lead going into the 8th absolutely should be enough for a win. That was a pathetic 8th inning by the bullpen... On a plus side I can stop caring about the games and just enjoy watching them now.
September 24, 200519 yr Everyone on that team wants to win. Just because they don't express it like Dontrelle, Willis, Castillo, Seca and Jwnz do doesn't mean they don't care. I guarantee 85% of the players on that bench take these losses personally. Not many people can stand the fact that they are made fools of day in and day out like this team has. :thumbup
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