Fish Wrap - Marlins 1, Braves 2

The game started a little late thanks to a 1 hour 10 minute rain delay, but it didn't effect the starting pitchers.  When the sky quit giving Georgia some much-needed moisture and "play ball" was uttered by the umpire, the game turned into a pitcher's duel.  Both starters--Alex Sanabia for the Marlins and Tommy Hanson for the Braves--brought their "A" stuff.

But before we get to that, it is worth mentioning that the Marlins employed the croquet defense in the first inning.  With two outs and Martin Prado on first, the Marlins went into the shift for Brian McCann's at bat.  You know the one where Dan Uggla moves into shallow right field and the shortstop moves over to cover second.  Well, it was a sight to behold.  McCann hit a sharp ground ball that went between Gaby Sanchez's legs and continued out to shallow right where it went between Danny's legs for two errors on one batted ball.  Hopefully we will never do that again, but it was a first for most viewing the game.

Back to the game.  Both starters were shutting out the opposing team until Sanabia was the first to blink.  In the fourth, McCann hit a home run to right that cleared the wall by a good 8 inches to give the Braves the lead.  1-0 Braves.

The score would hold until the eighth when with one out Mike Stanton singled to left and stole second.  Brad Davis hit a double that fell barely inside the left field line to score Stanton and tie the game. 1-1 Marlins.

Then the game became a battle of bullpens.  The Marlins pen put the excitement back into the scoreless inning by putting all sorts of runners on base but always finding a way to escape.  However, you can only play with fire so long before you finally get burned.  And the Fish did.

In the eleventh, Jose Veras walked Nate McLouth to open the inning.  Alex Gonzalez did the sacrifice bunt thing to move him to second.  Rick Ankiel walked to put runners on first and second.  Then Veras continued to show that pinpoint control and air mailed a pitch to the screen letting both runners move up a base.  So with two outs and runners on second and third it was Omar Infante's turn at the plate.  With a full count, Infante singled to left to drive home the winning run.  It was the Braves 25th walk-off of the season.

It was a good game to watch, but it had a very crappy result.  There is always Tuesday.