Braves quotes from Shelby Miller, Jace Peterson and Fredi Gonzalez after Sunday’s 4-1 loss to the Cubs.
**FREDI GONZALEZ
On Shelby Miller’s performance
“I thought he did a nice job. We didn’t make a play behind him in the second inning and it cost him two runs. But not only the runs. The normal fans out there, the normal people don’t realize it’s an extra 10 or 12 pitches that he’s got to throw to get out of that inning. Instead of going six innings he could have probably gone seven, or maybe worked a little bit less than he did.
“But I thought he gave us a good opportunity to win the game. Shoot, I thought our bullpen this entire series was pretty good. They covered a lot of innings. We had two short starts on Friday and Saturday. They covered almost an entire game innings-wise, almost nine innings. And then today they gave us a good chance to win a game. We didn’t score. We scored one run in two games and our offense is not clicking right now.”
On Jake Arrieta’s performance
“We knew going in, when (hitting coach Kevin) Seitzer and (assistant hitting coach Jose Castro) come in and say, ‘Hey we’ve been watching film on this guy and we’ve been facing a lot of good pitching lately, but this guy might be better than some of the (top) guys we’ve faced.’ And sure enough today, and especially with the 5 o’clock start with some shadows out there, we didn’t take good hacks at him early in the game. We had some stuff happen late in the game, but he had a great pitch on (Joey) Terdoslavich to get himself out of that jam (in the seventh).”
On Arrieta’s performance compared to Jon Lester’s Saturday
“They’re both pretty good. That’s a pretty good rotation they run out there and I think those guys are tough pitchers.”
On Arrieta cruising after two-walk first inning
“Those guys came back. We got the first two guys on and those guys come back, and the left-handed hitters had a tough time picking the ball up off him. That’s why he got (A.J.) Pierzynski out in the situation, I think, there to end the inning. But he’s tough. He was really, really tough.”
On taking positives from bullpen’s performance
“Absolutely. These last three games, absolutely. I mean, you go out there and you’ve got to cover a lot of innings because your starters are short. I think we gave up four runs out of the bullpen, if I’m not mistaken, in three games. And covered a lot of innings, it wasn’t like it was just two innings. It might be 11 or 12 innings if I’m not mistaken. … And they did a nice job.”
**SHELBY MILLER
On pitching well despite the two unearned runs in second inning, and facing tough pitcher in Jake Arrieta
“Yeah, absolutely. Kind of got ourselves in a little bit of a jam there, and made a bad pitch and ended up giving two runs. Other than that and other the homer, I felt good. Been a while since I’ve thrown off the mound in a game against hitters, so to get back out there feels great. Obviously unfortunate that we lost, but I feel like we played a good game. Physically I felt good, that’s nice, and all around we played good, just didn’t come out on top. Obviously Jake threw a great game, a tough guy to get some hits off of. Stings that we lost the series, but we’ll look forward to the Dodgers getting here and hopefully we’ll win some games there.”
Were the couple of big hits you gave up a matter of location, pitch selection?
“Honestly I haven’t even gone back and looked at it yet. I’m assuming the one to Soler (homer) kind of ran back over the middle, trying to go away. And then the one where I gave up the (two-run) hit, that wasn’t that hard of a hit ball. I’m assuming it wasn’t that bad of a pitch. But at the end of the day, just didn’t come out on top.”
Didn’t get a win, but you seem less frustrated than in Colorado
“Yeah, I didn’t give up five runs. It’s a good bounce-back from a rough start in Denver. To come back and feel good – I still didn’t feel like my pitches were as sharp as they could have been, but it’s the first game back in the second half, and you build off of it.”
**JACE PETERSON
On the throwing error that led to two unearned runs in second inning
“I just didn’t the play. It’s a play I need to make and I didn’t make it. In my opinion, it kind of cost us the game. I make that play, it saves us two runs and it’s a different ballgame. But I didn’t make the play.”
On Cubs’ Jake Arrieta’s performance
“He’s got good stuff. He threw well. He’s got a lot of different pitches and he threw well. But I think if I make that play, it’s a different ballgame.”
On Shelby Miller’s performance coming off rough outing at Colorado
“I thought Shelby threw great. Every time he goes out there we’ve got a chance to win. I thought he did everything he could have did, unfortunately I didn’t make a play behind him, and I think in this situation it cost us.”
