The Braves have enjoyed ~30 hours in first place. Time to put away the party gear, send the DeeJay home, and throw out the trash – the real work is about to begin.
You’d have to admit it: the Atlanta Braves were not getting a lot of respect from commentators, other teams, and even a lot of fans when this season started. Heck – I’m on record as guessing a 77 win season. But here we are: 8 games over .500 with a plethora of premium performance points popping up from all over the lineup.
There’s an unfortunate side-effect of winning that’s about to spring up: now that they’ve gotten here, the Braves aren’t going to sneak up on anybody again.
Go get ’em boys.
Nationals getting their acts together?
The Braves aren’t the only team in the division riding a 5-game win streak. Unfortunately, it’s the Nats that have duplicated their feat – and they just finished their version of the annual nasty West Coast Road Trip before that.
After beating the Mets 2 of 3 at Citi Field (still think the Mets are a good team?), Washington dropped 2 of 3 to each of the Dodgers, the Giants, and the Diamondbacks (the latter being back home after flying cross-country for the second time in a week). That’s not a fun trio.
However, since then – and while moving Bryce Harper to the #1 position in the order – they swept the Pirates over 4 games.
The Nats have finally reached .500 at 16-16 and are 4 back of the Braves.
Oh, and they still aren’t fully healed up yet. So yeah – they’ll be back… and probably sooner than later. It’s this club that will (still) be the challenge in the East – not the Mets and not the Phillies.
Not a good look when Hample is better than you
Before tonight’s game in Atlanta, there’s gonna be a small ceremony of sorts (no – this is nothing about Star Wars’ night or the cool Ozzie Calrissian bobblehead). Before I get to that, let’s talk a minute about Zack Hample.
This is “that guy” who has made it his life’s mission to acquire as many MLB game baseballs as possible – whether from workouts, batting practice, in game, … whatever.
He is “that guy” who found a way to crash into the Ft. Bragg game between the Braves and Marlins and then also got away with one of the special baseballs used for the game.
His passion (obsession) for gathering baseballs has turned him into a spectacle – a baseball side show at times. Heck, he has his own videographer to record him getting baseballs for his youtube channel. It has also made him a bit hated by many. Whether you love him, hate him, or otherwise couldn’t care less, that’s the facts about Zack.
So why do I bring him up here? Stay with me… He was in Cincinnati a few nights ago – Tuesday, May 1st – and collected twenty-four more baseballs that night (he’s good at what he does).
Among the balls: 3 home run balls caught during the game (no, he’s very good at what he does). One of those homers was the first career home run hit by Reds player Alex Blandino.
That means “negotiations”.
Reds writer C. Trent Rosecrans, writing about Zack’s day in The Athletic (subscription required), found out what he wanted:
"“I want Alex Blandino to have this ball. I’m asking for two things, which I think are very reasonable,” he recalls later in the inning. “No. 1, I want to hand him the baseball myself, get a photo, say ‘congrats’ and shake his hand. I’d also love to have a bat from him that he signs.”"
That’s actually pretty reasonable. The only counter-stipulation the Reds required was “still photos only and no video”.
So that guy who caught Ronald Acuña’s first home run (ironically also in Cincinnati)? Get this demand (from Rosencrans):
"The guy who caught the Braves’ Ronald Acuña’s first home run last week at Great American asked for signed balls, bats and jerseys for him and his friend. He also wanted his season tickets at SunTrust Park upgraded. He will apparently get all but the upgrade and hand the ball over to Acuna in a pregame ceremony when the Braves return home."
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I will give the Braves credit for going along with this, but I’m also gonna throw a “Come on, man!” to that guy – who will remain nameless here – for going too far.
I don’t have a lot of data points to know definitively what’s reasonable or customary in these circumstances, but I would personally draw the line before jerseys… and the “him and his friend” part is also right out.
About the furthest I might go would be a couple of baseballs with one of those being signed by the entire starting lineup that day plus a set of tickets for a non-premium home game for the family. Those would be nice gestures that wouldn’t be a big cost for anyone to fulfill.
I get it: there’s a contrast here – sure: Acuña is almost certainly going to be a bigger ‘thing’ that Blandino. But you don’t want to be “that guy” who makes Zack Hample look good.
GIANTS SERIES (updated):
- FRI 7:35PM CHRIS STRATTON and MIKE FOLTYNEWICZ
- SAT 7:10PM TY BLACH and BRANDON McCARTHY
- SUN 12:35PM ANDREW SUAREZ and MIKE SOROKA