Russ's Sports Review

It was a fairly good week for area sports overall. The Braves were great as they probably shut down the National League East Championship. The Bulldogs ran over Murray State as expected. Then there were the Falcons. What can you say? They were awful in every way as they were whipped by the Vikings.
Let’s start with the Braves. I will be the first to admit that this team wasn’t as good as they were to become. They did get so much better at the trade deadline as they got bullpen help from Shane Greene and Mark Melancon. It took a little while to get Greene going. He has been great as of late in the eighth inning role. Melancon is finally healthy and he is proving to be a great closer.
At least for now the young Braves starters are great. Foltynewicz was great in the critical first game against the Nationals. He also gave seven great innings in Monday night’s win against the Phillies. Fried has also been the pitcher he was hyped up to be for a few years now. The Braves would give the Dodgers, Yankees and Astros a real run for their money with a true number one starter. The problem is there are very few of them out there. The offense is being led by the veterans Freddie Freeman and Josh Donaldson. Freeman has been good all year as he leads all of baseball in RBIs. The hot one as of late has been Donaldson. He hit his 37th homerun in Monday night’s win over Philly. Acuna, who has been ice cold, hit his 38th dinger to lead off Monday night. October baseball should be very interesting.
It was no shock in Georgia that the Dogs blew out Murray State 63-17 on Saturday in Athens. There were three freshmen that stood out. Redshirt freshman running back Zamir “Zeus” White had 72 yards on just eight carries and a touchdown. The wide outs were also very good. George Pickens had 78 yards on just four catches and a touchdown. The other is Dominick Blaylock. He had 48 yards on just three catches. It looks like the offense will be in good hands after this year even if Fromm and Swift leave for the NFL draft. I don’t think either one will return.
Then there were the Falcons. They were bad in so many ways. They did nothing on offense and the defense was beat up and for good measure they got a punt blocked. Everything went wrong.
They will take another shot at things this Sunday in the home opener against the Eagles.