Braves quotes after their 8-4 victory over the Nationals on Monday at Turner Field.
**FREDI GONZALEZ
On the game
I thought ‘Stultsy’ (Eric Stults) pitched a great baseball game today. That’s what he can do for us. A good pitching performance usually ends up getting rewarded. Today we swung the bats, (13) hits and did a good job with people on third base. That’s a team that doesn’t lay down and you’ve got to keep on adding runs when you get the opportunity and that’s what we did today. A.J. (Pierzynski) keeps swinging the bat well.
On Rafael Martin hitting Andrelton Simmons with a pitch
I don’t even want to get into it. I thought Simmons, he just slid a little late into third base, that’s all. We all know and have seen him play and sometimes he can slide a little crazy. There was nothing malicious about it. I’m surprised, really, with how they reacted. But maybe I shouldn’t be surprised.
On if Jace Peterson injured his hand early in the game
No, he hasn’t said anything to me and the trainer just came in and he said no injuries.
On Freddie Freeman’s ejection
I really couldn’t tell you what happened. John Hirschbeck, the third-base umpire, he’s a pretty respectful guy and in major league baseball a long time. Something must have got him fired up to throw Freeman out of the game. He knows who Freeman is. I couldn’t tell because I had my back turned because I was worried about Simmons sliding into third base and thought he had hurt himself. I couldn’t tell exactly what all transpired.
On if Stults is building up his stamina
I see a guy, you look at the back of his baseball card, he’s cranked up pretty close to 200 innings the last couple years with a lot of quality starts. That’s good for him to go out there and give you a chance to win every single day.
On the four errors by the Nationals
It was a sloppy game both ways. We made two. We come out of the road trip making a bunch of errors. We feel good about ourselves because we won the game but we made a couple sloppy errors that cost us some runs. They made four errors they we advantage of. I’m glad we won the game but we need to clean that up. If we want to continue to be successful we have to do the little things right.
**ANDRELTON SIMMONS
On the game
A good night for the team. Any time the team wins is a good night for me. I’m happy we played good baseball today.
On his reaction after Rafael Martin hit him with a pitch
I kind of expected it coming. It didn’t bother me that much. I’m just glad things didn’t get out of hand and we kept playing baseball and we ended up winning the game.
On Jonny Gomes coming out of the dugout after the play
I like that he has my back. That’s good to know your teammates are behind you no matter what. I love the support.
On why he expected to be thrown at
I kind of knew they were looking at me kind of bad after the slide. I had it in my mind it might happen.
On the play that upset the Nationals
I was just going hard and trying to go right for the bag. It’s bad that somebody got hurt, hopefully it’s not that bad, but I was just trying to play hard.
On if this adds to the rivalry with the Nationals
It’s always a big series when you are playing against your division. They have a good team. Hopefully it ends right there. We try to go hard every time we play against teams in our division.
**ERIC STULTS
On if he feels like he’s building up his stamina
I think so. The last two outings I’ve been able to get close to that 100 pitch range. That’s your goal as a starter is to go as deep as you can and keep your team in the game. Tonight offensively we did a good job (against) a pretty good pitcher on the other side. We kind of beat him up a little bit. That made it a little bit easier on my side. I could go out and throw strikes and try to be as efficient as I could.
On difference for him in last two starts
Honestly, I don’t know. The first two starts, the Miami one was probably the bad one of the two. For me it’s just trying to throw strikes and keep guys off balance. That’s something I feel like I’ve been able to do a little bit better is keep guys off balance and in between pitches where in the first two starts they were jumping on some fastballs because I was throwing a lot of fastballs. That was the biggest change was to get them out front and then speed them up when they are looking soft.
**FREDDIE FREEMAN
On his ejection in the fifth inning
I felt the call wasn’t right. I was just walking down to first base. I didn’t say ‘you’re bad,’ I said ‘that’s bad’ a few times and then he started pointing at me. I looked in the dugout and I heard him say, Shut your effing mouth. So that’s when I kind of looked at him and just told him to wave off, told him I’m good, and when I raised my hand that’s when he kicked me out. There’s not a lot of fans in the stadium tonight, a Monday night, there’s some kids in the stands and that’s just not nice what he said.
On if it is unusual for an umpire to have that kind of back-and-forth
It’s just something I’ve never been a part of. I didn’t say you’re bad, I didn’t personalize anything. I just said that’s bad a few times. I don’t think I’ve ever heard an umpire say something to a player like that before but it happened tonight and I got kicked out.
On being frustrated about being kicked out
Yeah, but once I got kicked out some good things started happening. Kelly (Johnson) has been swinging the bat great. Jace (Peterson) got a couple more hits tonight. We had the squeeze play. We did the fundamentals and got the job done tonight. It was a great pitching outing by Eric Stults tonight also.
On feeling better at the plate
I’ve been feeling good the past two games. I started feeling better in the second game in Philadelphia, even thought I went ‘o-fer’ in that game I started to feel more comfortable in the box. Things are starting to change around.
