ESPN.com - MLB - Recap - Pirates at Braves - 09/03/2002

The Braves lost 3-0 to the Pirates and Salomon Torres, of all people. If you'd forgotten Torres, I can't blame you, but he was the prospect who was supposed to be the pitching savior for the Giants back in the '93 stretch run and whose career fell apart when he collapsed in the final game of the season allowing the Braves to win the Last Pennant Race without a playoff. He'd spent three years retired from the game, and generally his story is such you'd expect him to be in the Braves' bullpen. Instead, he shut out the Braves. Tom Glavine pitched well enough to win but got no run support and gave up two homers in the sixth and another run in the seventh, which were more than enough.

The Braves only threatened twice, in the second and the ninth. Both time the Pirates got double plays to get out of it. In the second, the umpires got an assist when the second base umpire, playing well inside the bag, was too slow and stupid to get out of the way of a sharply hit ball off the bat of Matt Franco with Andruw standing on second, no one out. Andruw would have scored easily if the ball had gotten to the outfield. Franco was credited with a hit, but Andruw had to stay at second, which made no sense. He would have made it to third even if the ball had been fielded, and it could not have been. Since the next batter flew out to left, then Andruw would have scored. But no such luck. Vinny, naturally, hit into a double play, one of four the Braves hit into.

The last four spots in the order (DeRosa, Vinny, Blanco, Glavine) were hitless, though Marcus Giles did get a hit pinch-hitting in the ninth. The Braves only had six baserunners all night, and three of them were Matt Franco (two hits and a walk). Sure is a good thing he doesn't play too often, huh?

There's a new Vinny-abusing poll on the left. Have fun.