\u201cIt is not about following after someone else did it, or doing what someone else did, but just going beyond that. People who have accomplished great things were the ones who thought \u2018No, I can do it,\u2019 when others said it was impossible, and they created something new.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 Shohei Ohtani,<\/p>\n
Los Angeles Dodgers<\/p>\n
two-way player<\/p>\n
This past Tuesday evening, I enjoyed the opportunity to head to Atlanta with my son and two of my grandsons. My son, Brent, and his two sons, Caleb and Josiah, and I loaded up the car, left our peaceful setting in Lincoln County and headed for Interstate 20.<\/p>\n
The drive was pretty routine until we hit the outskirts of I-20 at Conyers. Suddenly, the peace we left behind gave way to the clatter and clamor that alerted us we had reached the edges of what is anything but peaceful: the city of Atlanta.<\/p>\n
Follow my thoughts as I saw nothing but cars, cars and more cars on this six-lane \u2014 and sometimes wider \u2014 road in what my mind called Georgia\u2019s version of the Indianapolis 500. Did I mention an overload of 18-wheelers? Tractor-trailers carry goods that all of us need for our daily lives. We need them.<\/p>\n
Gone are the days, like \u201cGone With the Wind,\u201d when traffic was much lighter, and you could make that trip fairly quickly to sit close to the field at the former Braves venue, Fulton County Stadium. I recall going to that ballpark, not far from the Georgia State Capitol, pulling up, handing the attendant a $10 bill and maneuvering as close as a half-block walk to the gates.<\/p>\n
After catching sight of the Braves\u2019 current home, Truist Park, the fun really began.<\/p>\n
Grateful my son was driving, I was pleased with how well he guided us through several \u201cSpaghetti Junctions\u201d among thousands of cars and safely got us to our $80 parking deck.<\/p>\n
Mind you, we were not close to the stadium yet. After making at least a three-block walk to the park, navigating steps and crossing a highway or two, we finally made it to our seats.<\/p>\n
Why did we make this effort to see the Dodgers and Braves? I kept telling myself it would be worth the hassle to see unique two-way player Shohei Ohtani and his back-to-back World Series champion, first-place Los Angeles Dodgers. Ohtani pitches and serves as the designated hitter when he isn\u2019t on the mound. It is hard to exaggerate his talent.<\/p>\n
The Braves got off to a great start, picking up three runs in the first inning off Dodgers pitcher Tyler Glasnow. Drake Baldwin, Matt Olson, Mauricio Dub\u00f3n and Michael Harris II all collected hits, while Ozzie Albies\u2019 sacrifice fly capped the early lead.<\/p>\n
The Dodgers quickly answered, tying the game by the fourth inning thanks to the bottom of the order. Right fielder Kyle Tucker is having a rough year, and his $60 million annual salary has produced small offensive dividends for the West Coast Nine.<\/p>\n
Braves hurler Bryce Elder pitched six innings, allowing eight hits, no walks and three earned runs with five strikeouts, but he did not receive credit for the victory. He held the Dodgers\u2019 top four hitters to just three hits. Dylan Dodd relieved Elder, faced one batter, threw two pitches and earned the win.<\/p>\n
This highlights a frequent inequity in baseball statistics: Elder pitched his heart out and received no official decision. I do not know how to solve this dilemma, but there ought to be a way to balance the scales for starting pitchers.<\/p>\n
How can the Braves remain in first place when Austin Riley, Ronald Acu\u00f1a Jr., Sean Murphy and Mike Yastrzemski are all batting under .250? The pitching staff has been solid, with Elder, Chris Sale, Grant Holmes and Reynaldo L\u00f3pez all throwing well. Dub\u00f3n, a model of versatility playing both the infield and outfield while contributing at the plate, must be a bright spot for Braves manager Walt Weiss.<\/p>\n
In the eighth inning, Olson led off with a double. Dub\u00f3n\u2019s bat broke on a groundout to first, allowing Olson to advance to third. With two outs, Albies hit a line-drive single to center, bringing Olson across home plate to score what turned out to be the winning run, sending the crowd into a frenzy.<\/p>\n
Ohtani led off the ninth for the Dodgers with a triple. Freddie Freeman struck out, Mookie Betts popped out, Max Muncy walked and Tommy Edman made the final out to seal the victory for Atlanta. Raisel Iglesias pitched a scoreless ninth to enable the tenacious Braves to remain in first place.<\/p>\n
All in all, the trip with my family was exciting and well worth the effort.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt is not about following after someone else did it, or doing what someone else did, but just…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":774036,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2290],"tags":[191,46,5,2323,2314,2317,2313,4720,2413,8150,57,19,2310,2304,2318,2308,2319,15000,468,1039],"class_list":["post-792104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-baseball","tag-atlanta","tag-atlanta-braves","tag-baseball","tag-baseball-events","tag-baseball-finals","tag-baseball-games","tag-baseball-playoffs-and-champions","tag-bryce-elder","tag-champion-seasons-in-major-league-baseball","tag-georgia-u-s-state","tag-los-angeles-dodgers","tag-major-league-baseball","tag-major-league-baseball-competitions","tag-major-league-baseball-postseason","tag-major-league-baseball-seasons","tag-major-league-baseball-teams","tag-major-league-baseball-teams-seasons","tag-mauricio-dubn","tag-shohei-ohtani","tag-world-series"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/117183232267090141","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/792104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=792104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/792104\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=792104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=792104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=792104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}