While the Atlanta Braves are shooting for their third consecutive victory (follow live), the starting pitchers continue their futility in terms of working deep into games. When Jair Jurrjens failed to record an out in the sixth inning Friday night and was pulled with a stat line of five innings pitched, it was the seventh time in seven games a Braves starter failed to record an out in the sixth. In fact, according to Talking Chop (using Baseball-Reference.com's play index), this matches the 1995 White Sox for the major-league record for games to start a season without a pitcher throwing more than five innings. And the '95 Sox aren't even a fair comparison, since a strike drastically shortened spring training and pitchers weren't nearly as stretched out that season.
With as much malign as the Braves' offense receives, the starting pitchers have to be better in the efficiency and performance departments. The biggest concern is overworking the bullpen early, especially considering the back-end duo of Craig Kimbrel and Jonny Venters ran out of gas late last season.
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