AJ Smith-Shawver's command struggle may keep him of Braves playoff roster

0:00Coming up in the six o'clock hour guys, our conversation with Mike DeFabo, athletic writer for the Pittsburgh Steelers gave us some real insight into what we can expect on Sunday. Also, Ray Buchanan's here signing autographs. Big play, Ray Joe. Falcon Nation is out here and getting their Falcon flags. Come on down here. We're in that part of the South side. Jonesboro Road. And by the way, I know we got Grant coming up real quick. Get the best listeners. Is it what we say? It's a hot zip code for us. This is a great area with a ton of listeners and so cool hook it up with these guys. Who live and die for the Falcons? Yes, they do. They're out here, man. Come on through. Get your Falcon flag. Grant, let's let's talk about last night. Look, we could start with the pitching. Obviously with Smith Sharver. Tell me your thoughts there and you know, what wise said, look, he was trying to work himself out of trouble. But the four on runs on five hits, including the two on runs. Certainly put him behind the eight ball last night. Yeah, it did. And with the offense, not really able to do much on the other side. It just made it a difficult and longer night for him because every pitch,

1:01it just seems like there's just more and more responsibility. And that can obviously add a little bit to a pitcher's workload, if you will, or just at least mentally what you're trying to manage when you're out there. And I think the big thing for Smith Sharver is nobody's questioning the talent. The fastball, the velocity's back. It's the command and control. It's his secondaries I went through and kind of did a deep dive earlier today on his baseball sub-ont page. And his split finger has just not been as effective since he came back this year as it was a year ago. That was his premier strikeout pitch. And he's just not getting the same chase. He's not getting the same swing to misses. There's too many walks. There's too many hits. And as we saw last night, there can be too many home runs. And that's just not a good recipe right now. But it's I think important to remember, even though the brazer and the midst of a stretch drive, they are trying to figure out, there's AJ Smith Sharver, based on the arm talent and the upside. Have a role to play once they start to put together that pitching staff for October. The answer could be no. This may have been a bridge too far and in just too much too soon for a pitcher coming back after missing over a year of action and dealing with a major elbow surgery.

2:03I think health wise, he looks good. It's command as we've talked about. That's that final box and it's a difficult one to check for guys coming back from Tommy John. And Grant, just since there was really nothing to talk about last night offensively for the Braves, would you say if it's a best worst-case scenario and it is a best of three and you're taking on the diamond backs if that's the matchup, is it going to be sale and then Mally and then a bullpen start? I think it could be sale and then Mally and then Holmes if that's kind of where it goes, it goes all three. You know, I mean, ideally you'd love to not have to burn your best guys and that three-game wild card. I can't stress enough how much you'd like to have the pitching staff rested and ready to go on its own schedule rather than having to snap right into action. And then of course, when you get to the division series, if you can advance to the wild card, you don't have those guys available to you that you'd want in games one and two. It kind of puts you behind the eight ball, which is basically how Major League Baseball designed it. But me and that as a may, I do think that Grant Holmes has pitched his way into consideration to make a postseason start for the Braves because if you start

3:05to break down the other candidates, the Braves, the elders off the board with a knee surgery, I think that in a very ambitious to say he could be back in three to four weeks. We'll see how that all plays out. We're in all the Lopez coming off of injury. AJ Smith-Schauver has been ineffective. And Martin Perez, I guess is the other guy that you could look at. But you know, he's more of a soft tossing finesse pitcher and those are not typically the guys who are getting the postseason start. You like that swing and miss, but they could stack this a number of different ways to cover those endings to your point about the bullpen start and just having more guys cover what you would expect out of a starter in a normal regular season game. More on the Falcons coming up guys as they were on the field today getting ready for the Steelers on Sunday. As we broadcast live from Napa Auto Parts off at Jonesboro Road, Grant, what about this offense man? One run and in the last 18 innings, how concerned are you? Are you or is just a little stretch here? Yeah, it's been an extension of a trend that has been kind of troubling the Braves for a while now. I would say it definitely tracks back to early August especially. I mean, I know we had the June Swoon where the home runs disappeared and the Braves really weren't scoring. I don't know that

4:08it's reached quite that point, although we recently would tell us that it hasn't been very much fun over these last few games, but I do think there's just so much more talent there and I asked Walt Weiss before the game today about, you know, this is a team that gets a lot of its damage done early in counts, but it wears the balance between trying to work counts and you know, really take some pitches and get yourself maybe into a different arrangement with a pitcher than just being so ultra aggressive and he said, look the guys they are, who they are, and ideally you'd love to see some of that and maybe situational awareness is kind of the big key there, but ultimately it's easy to say hey just walk more, but you can also start working yourself back in a direction where all right, well you missed all the best pitches you could have swung at in this at bat and even if you do walk, which is ultimately I guess a good thing, but not the desired outcome from your big sluggers, you know, have you kind of worked yourself out of the opportunity to be who you are and have the maximum effect on the game. I don't know how long answer to say I don't really know other than the

5:10tell you obviously and the same things that you are, I'm just not sure what the way is out of it other than for guys to just kind of get their swing back on time and on playing the same way we saw Ronald the Cuny Jr. I noticed some good things from medals and here lately I think the Drake Baldwin has been striking the ball pretty well lately too, so you just got to get a few guys going and if you do that, this is a Braze offense that will look a lot more like an optimal version of itself rather than the one that's really, really fighting to score runs right now. Talk with our man Grant McCauley about the Braves and by the way, Grant said he has that a news flash, Tampa Bay is really good. Yes, and they've got guys that can rake, they got home run power, they got, they got pitching the whole Shurbank. The other thing about the Braves and you just touched on where they are with the hitting, it is what it is. Are you going to see Aussie Albies here next year? I know we still got the postseason to get through, but I mean this is a year where it's a contract year for Aussie and he was so strong but he's been so just no other way to put it, Grant, just cold with the plate the last two months. Yeah, you're not wrong and it's the decision clearly that the Braves are going to have to make heading into the winter. It's one of many. I think that they're going to

6:12have to figure out the pitching staff obviously is going to be a whole nother work in progress as you try to rebuild that behind Chris sale. So I would say second base is going to be a very interesting discussion. You know, Aussie is universally loved here. There's no question about that. He said moments with this club and he has been, you know, everything you can ask him to be as a teammate and as a person and in the community and all the different things. He just checks all those boxes. It is a performance driven league though. So, seeing Aussie get back involved in the middle of everything that's going right for the Braves offensively would certainly make that an easier decision and I'm fascinated to see like what kind of deal is out there for him because it's been a solid, maybe not spectacular year for him, but he does have a track record of being a second baseman who can hit and there those are in short supplies. So they'll be interested how exactly those conversations go and when they pick up intensity. I'm fascinated to see how it plays out, especially given that everybody's going to have to stop and watch what goes on with the labor situation for Major League Baseball. Yeah, it's going to be interesting. Tonight let's talk

7:15about tonight, Grant and what you expect again. It starts with pitching, but look if we don't hit, it doesn't matter, right? I mean, we've got to get some runs. Yeah, I mean, you want to keep the game close and give yourself that chance when you're at home. The Braves have shown they can come up with some runs late and have a rally and I don't think that the Tampa bullpen is nearly as good as the Braves is. Their closer is pretty solid Baker, but you know, outside of that, I think that they've been kind of searching to find the right pieces to get that group put together. So if it becomes a battle of the bullpen, I think that things kind of shift towards the Braves, but being able to score some runs early would certainly take the pressure off and Ronaldo Lopez coming off of what three minor league rehab starts and looking to get back in this rotation and to the conversation we just had earlier about pitching plans for the post season. He's got to make an impression so he can figure out where exactly he could factor into that. So it's kind of a big start for Ronaldo Lopez. In addition to the Braves wanting to get back in the series and have a chance to win two out of three, it's I think it may be a little bit more than just the average start for Ronaldo at this point in the year.

8:16Good stuff, Grant. Appreciate you as always, man. We'll see what happens tonight. We will chat tomorrow. Grant McCauley follow him guys on all the Braves stuff and of course MLB. Thanks again. We're down here on the Southside Jonesboro Road guys, Napa Auto parts Falcon fans getting their Falcon flags. Brave you can't insign in all the grabs. Mike, Fredy the Falcon is here and the Falcon cheerleaders as well. Yeah, man. So come on by now. It's funny. Fredy always stops by our broadcast position and it's like Fredy here. What'd be funny? Fredy goes, so what do you think guys? We're going to go 10 and 10 and 7 this year. Mass cuts can't speak. So under mass cuts, stops by the radio, broadcast position. It's really nowhere you can really go. It's true. He's always standing here. It's the head signals. Hey, man, do you want to talk to the Falcon fans out there too? Of course we can, man. As we get ready for this Wednesday, I told you earlier in the show and I'm going to tell you the story when we come back and you got to hear a sound bite from Bijan Robinson. It kind explains what I'm going to tell you next. It's Duke's and Bill.