Braves quotes after 9-6 loss to Rays on Wednesday at Tropicana Field.
**FREDI GONZALEZ
On the game getting away in the seventh inning
“You know what, a lot of young inexperienced guys pitching at the end of the game. Sometimes you don’t’ make a play and give them an opportunity to get back in the game and sometimes the inexperience shows. Other than that, I thought (Matt) Wisler pitched OK. We were a little worried about his pitch count. I think every inning there was somebody on base and that was a lot of pitches. You go to the bullpen and we couldn’t get the ball into the ninth inning to (Arodys) Vizcaino. And we are sitting here going, Give the ball to Vizcaino and he’s another young, inexperienced guy. It’s a box of chocolate sometimes when you go down there when you have that many inexperienced guys in the bullpen. But we fought, we battled. We had a three-run there and we just couldn’t hold them off.”
On everything happening at once in the seventh
“Again, maybe if we make that play in left-center field… . There is two guys that haven’t played with each other. Two centerfielders, two Gold Glove centerfielders that have played three games (together). You can expect some miscommunication there. That ball drops, all of a sudden (Matt) Marksberry, it speeds up on him. Remember this guy started in A-ball four months ago. Some of those things you expect to happen but you don’t want it to happen three runs up and a chance to win the game.”
On Pedro Ciriaco's four RBIs
He gets to play every once in a while and he always comes up big. He gave us some great at-bats, even the last at-bat he struck out against (Brad) Boxberger that was a good at-bat. He fouled off some pitches and he’s got a chance to leave the ballbark with two men on. He’s a nice player to have in a National League game.
On Ciriaco’s play in the field
(Adonis) Garcia made a great stop on that ball and (Ciriaco) was head’s up to get that out.
On Garcia’s play at third base
“He’s about as good as it gets over there. He’s got nice range, his arm is above average. The guy has got a nice clock. We saw him knock the ball down, throws across the diamond. He doesn’t panic. He’s really, really accurate over there.”
On if he talks to Marksberry to boost his confidence
“I think he will be all right. But I will get him and put your arm around a young man and tell him, You are doing the best that you can. At least he threw the ball over the plate. You hate to bring guys in and you walk two, three guys. He threw the ball over the plate. Some of the stuff you see, we can fix. But I think the biggest thing is you keep running him out there.”
**MATT WISLER
On his start
“It was definitely and improvement on the last two. I’ve got a lot to learn. I’ve got to be more efficient. I only got five innings and it’s a different ballgame if I go six or seven. I’ve got to get ahead of guys earlier, execute some pitches early in the count and get some easy outs. That’s what I struggled with most of the time. I was falling behind and made a lot of pitches. I felt better tonight. Hopefully moving forward I can get through some more innings.”
On if he takes positives from the start
“There’s positives to take but I’ve also got to look at that I need to improve on. I need to get deeper in the game, that’s step No. 1. Get some quick outs and make some better pitchers early and allow me to go deeper.”
On his fastballs being up in the zone
“I was missing up in the zone a little bit, like the one to (Logan) Forsythe he that one to the wall. A couple other ones went right to the wall. Those are bad pitches, up in the zone. I got lucky they hit them to the wall today.”
On seeing Marksberry have a tough outing
“We’re all young here. We are all going to go through those times. I just had two terrible outings. I know how he feels. He’s a good pitcher. He will bounce back.”
**CAMERON MAYBIN
On the ball that bounced between him and Michael Bourn for a double
“I think it’s just one of those things where not quite being used to each other. That’s a ball I can probably get, he can probably get. It’s one of those things we have to talk about and work out and know what the other one needs to do for him to take it or vice versa. It’s an unfortunate situation. We’ve got to work out the communication especially with him not being used to left and try to make that doesn’t happen too much more this year.”
