After their recent rash of injuries, the Braves signed utility infielder Tyler Greene to a minor league contract and assigned him to Triple-A Gwinnett.
Greene, who turned 30 on Saturday, had a career-best season in 2012 with St. Louis and Houston, batting .230 with 36 extra-base hits (11 home runs) and 12 stolen bases in 116 games and 305 at-bats.
He began the 2013 season in the White Sox organization and hit .222 with one homer and a .263 OBP in 54 at-bats in the majors before being released while playing for Triple-A Charlotte.
Greene has a .224 career average and .289 OBP with 17 homers and 28 stolen bases in 288 major league games in parts of five seasons spent mostly with the Cardinals, who made him the 30th overall pick of the 2005 draft. He has played in 125 games at second base, 115 at shortstop, 22 at third base. He’s also played 14 games in the outfield, including 10 in right field.
When utility infielder Tyler Pastornicky tore a knee ligament Wednesday in a collision with right fielder Jason Heyward, the Braves added infielder Phil Gosselin to the 40-man roster and brought him up from Gwinnett.
After entering games as a late-innings substitute Friday and Saturday, Gosselin made his first major league start Sunday at second base and got his first two hits, a bunt single in the first inning and a single in the third.
Strasburg vs. Braves: When Stephen Strasburg was ejected in the second inning Saturday after throwing three consecutive wild pitches against Andrelton Simmons, the last two sailing behind him, it continued an oddly erratic history for the Nationals ace against the Braves.
He threw seven consecutive balls to start the second inning, walking Jordan Schafer on four, then allowing Schafer to round the bases on all the wild pitches to Simmons, which were as many wild pitches (three) as Strasburg had thrown previously all season.
Strasburg is now 1-2 with 5.79 ERA in six starts at Turner Field, where he’s allowed 24 hits, 15 earned runs and 15 walks with 28 strikeouts in 23-1/3 innings. Has lasted three innings or fewer in three of those past four starts, and pitched more than five innings just twice at Turner Field.
Strasburg is 1-2 with a 3.72 ERA in his past eight starts against the Braves, and lasted more than six innings in just one of those games. Overall against the Braves, he’s 3-4 with a 3.68 ERA in 12 starts, including 0-1 with a 2.68 ERA in five this season.
Etc. The Braves' 8-7, 15-inning loss Saturday snapped a string of 13 consecutive games against the Nationals in which Atlanta pitchers allowed three or fewer runs, matching the longest such streak by any major league team against one opponent in the past 20 years. The other 13-game streak was also by Braves pitchers, against the Mets in 2010….
Jason Heyward homered twice Saturday to continue his recent torrid stretch of hitting. In his past 19 games before Sunday, he had a .390 average (30-for-77) with six doubles, five homers, 15 RBIs, 23 runs, a .447 OBP and .662 slugging percentage. As a leadoff hitter this season, Heyward had a .366 average (30-for-82) with six doubles, five homers and a .429 OBP.
In his past 61 games before Sunday, Heyward hit .310 with 27 extra-base hits (11 homers), a .382 OBP and .519 slugging percentage.
The Braves played 15 innings and scored seven earned runs without benefit of a hit with a runner in scoring position (0-for-7)….
Braves hitters struck out 20 times Saturday, including five by Justin Upton (0-for-6, hit by pitch) and three by Jordan Schafer (0-for-5, two walks). Besides Upton, the other four batters in the top five of the Braves’ order – Heyward, Freddie Freeman, Brian McCann, Chris Johnson — were 9-for-28 with four home runs, six RBIs, five runs and no walks….
Before his 0-for on Saturday, Upton hit .413 with six doubles, seven homers, 15 RBIs and an .841 slugging percentage in his past 16 games. Against the Nats this season, he had a .322 average (19-for-59) with four homers, nine walks, 20 strikeouts, a .420 OBP and .559 slugging percentage before Sunday.
