Braves reliever breaks hand punching door

Braves reliever Jeff Bennett broke a bone in his non-pitching hand when he punched a door near the dugout out of frustration during Wednesday night’s loss against the New York Yankees.

The right-hander, who has struggled for much of the season, was placed on the 15-day disabled list and left-hander Boone Logan was recalled from Class AAA Gwinnett to take his roster spot.

Bennett will have surgery to insert a pin in the break in his fifth metacarpal below the base of the pinky finger.

“I’m ashamed of myself,” he said after seeing the Braves’ hand specialist Thursday. “This is a professional sport; you handle yourself in a professional manner. I didn’t do that. … I’m just hopeful that [manager] Bobby [Cox] and [general manager] Frank [Wren] will give me another chance.

“A lot of things boiled up, and I didn’t handle the release of those very well.”

Bennett is 0-3 with a 5.25 ERA in his past 11 games, allowing 12 hits (two homers), seven runs and nine walks in 12 innings in that span. For the season, he has a .316 opponents’ average and .415 opponents’ on-base percentage, including .295/.468 with runners in scoring position.

“It comes out of frustration, spur of the moment,” Cox said. “It’s not the first time somebody broke a hand or a toe out of frustration. It’s good that he cares; it’s not good if you break something.”

Bennett has allowed seven of 18 inherited runners to score, including two on Alex Rodriguez’s tie-breaking, two-out single in the sixth inning Wednesday, which gave the Yankees a 3-1 lead.

He entered with bases loaded and got ahead in the count 0-and-2 against Rodriguez before throwing a fastball that was driven to center field.

Bennett said he punched a door after the inning, and was in such a state of anger, he couldn’t remember doing it until he saw the dent.

The bone was broken all the way through, and a bump rose beneath the skin. Bennett said he pushed the bone back into place, didn’t tell anyone what happened, and went back out and pitched the seventh.

He gave up a homer to Nick Swisher in the seventh but made it through the inning. About 30 minutes later, Bennett finally told a team trainer what he had done. He said he waited because he was afraid and embarrassed.

Bennett said he hoped to be back in a few weeks, but Cox said 4-6 weeks was more likely. If it had been his throwing hand, he would be out much longer.

Cox said rookie Kris Medlen and Manny Acosta could pick up the slack.

Kawakami better

A day after being hit near the neck by a line drive, Braves pitcher Kenshin Kawakami was doing better and hoped to make his next start.

Cox said with the off-day in the schedule Monday, the Braves could skip Kawakami’s turn if necessary. Tuesday would be his regular turn to start, but Cox said a decision wouldn’t be made until at least another day or two.

He had a large area of dark bruising at the right base of his neck, where he was struck by a liner off the bat of the Yankees’ Joba Chamberlain on the last out of the third inning. Kawakami pitched three perfect innings.

“My neck feels better today than I expected it would,” he said in a prepared statement, “so it’s moving in the right direction. I will keep doing treatment for the next few days and try to protect it as much as possible, with the hope that I will still be able to make my next start.”