Archive for the ‘Braves/MLB’ Category

A kick of the leg, a flip of the wrist … but what's the xFIP? (AJC photo by Curtis Compton)

In the light of Mike Minor’s latest strange outing — he yielded five hits in six innings, but four were home runs — I thought I’d pass along some data presented by Red Reporter in its preview of the Reds-Braves series. (Warning: If your eyes glaze over at the mention of sabermetrics, cease and desist reading.) My two favorites:

That Minor has a left-on-base percentage that’s off the charts, and not in a good way.

That Minor, who now carries an ERA of 6.97, has, at least according to one key stat-geek metric, pitched almost as well as Brandon Beachy, whose 1.33 ERA leads the majors.

The metric in question is xFIP, and it stands for expected fielding independent pitching. Here’s the simple definition — actually, it’s not all that simple — from the really useful site FanGraphs: “ Fielding Independent Pitching measures what a player’s ERA should have looked like over a given time …

Continue reading Numbers suggest Minor hasn’t been quite as bad as all that »

Mike Minor in a start at Colorado earlier this month. It wasn't good, either. (AP photo)

Fredi Gonzalez said Wednesday night that he thought Mike Minor threw very well — for three innings. Which he did. Minor carried a no-hitter into the fourth. He was gone five outs later, having yielded seven base runners in the span of 10 Miami batters. For the fourth consecutive start, Minor was charged with at least six earned runs. His ERA rose to 7.09.

It’s clear that Minor is becoming a bit of a mess. After Wednesday’s game he said he let down his teammates, the organization and the fans. He said he didn’t want the other Braves looking at him wondering if this start was going to be as bad as last week’s, didn’t want them thinking they’d have to score a lot of runs to win — which had happened both at Colorado and St. Louis — just because Minor is pitching.

Minor is hard on himself, and you can see why. Last month he worked 7 1/3 one-hit innings against Milwaukee, which can hit, and …

Continue reading What do the Braves do with Minor? There aren’t many options »

"First place is over that way, I do believe." (AJC photo by Jason Getz)

(Updated to reflect Wednesday’s rather shabby outcome.)

Not so long ago, some believed the National League East had grown too tough for the local nine. Sports Illustrated even picked this club to finish fourth in a five-team division. And yet, with almost one-fourth of the six-month season gone, who awoke Wednesday holding first place?

Said Brian McCann, smiling: “Bravos.”

Yep. The team that didn’t spend big on free agents — unless you count paying Derek Lowe $10 million to leave — stood atop the division that has stamped itself as the NL’s best. OK, so it was only by a half-game over Washington, and so the skinny lead didn’t last the night. (The Nationals won at home and the Braves played horribly and lost to Miami here.) Still, let’s focus on the bigger picture:

The Braves were rather easy to forget amid the winter Eastern movement, and through 37 games they’d looked pretty darn good.

Granted, the 38th …

Continue reading The Braves were leading the NL East. They aren’t anymore »

Continue reading Video: On the Atlanta Braves, Scott Boras and Michael Bourn »

Sabermetric discussions can sometimes turn heated. (AJC photo by Curtis Compton)

“Show me a good offense,” Chipper Jones said Monday, “and I’ll show you a good leadoff hitter.”

For a change, the Atlanta Braves have a very good offense. For an even bigger change, they have a terrific leadoff hitter. We’ll get around to Michael Bourn’s non-numerical contributions in a bit — not to be confused with BABIP, one of those categories stat geeks love — but first a little fun with numbers.

If you’re a sabermetrician, you believe WAR is good for absolutely everything. (Say it again!)  It stands for “wins above replacement.” It’s a complicated measure that fuses offense and defense and purports to reflect how many wins Player X is worth when measured against a garden-variety big-leaguer. There are two recognized WAR formulae — one by Baseball-Reference.com, the other by FanGraphs – and if you go by the former, the Braves’ leadoff hitter has been the best everyday WARrior in the National …

Continue reading Bourn-again Braves: The leadoff man is now the leading man »

"Sorry, Bill, but I've got a new managerial guru. Guy named Wren." (AJC photo by Curtis Compton)

They were seen in some local circles as Dumb and Dumber. The Braves went 9-18 in September, wasting an 8 1/2-game and losing the wild card in the 13th inning of the 162nd game. The Falcons went 10-6 but beat almost nobody of consequence and managed no offensive points in a 24-2 playoff loss to the 9-7 New York Giants.

The Braves’ response: Stay the course.

The Falcons’ response: Stay the course.

The response from large segments of their respective constituencies: Dissatisfaction, disbelief, disgust.

And yet … the Braves awoke Wednesday percentage points out of first place in the National League East, and the Falcons are set to open rookie camp this weekend with a spring in their collective step. Neither made an abundance of offseason noise, but both look to have improved themselves via tweaking. (Tweaking, as opposed to panicking.) The methodology involved:

1. Don’t overreact to …

Continue reading Braves changed little but got better. Will Falcons follow suit? »

"Listen to me, Frank, and you'll be hitting .300 in no time." (AJC photo by Jason Getz)

Greg Walker, the Braves’ new — and, if early returns are to be trusted, wildly successful — hitting coach, returned to Chicago on Monday and made the media rounds. Walker had spent nine seasons with the White Sox, helping the Pale Hose win the 2005 World Series but ultimately falling from favor with general manager Kenny Williams.

As Bruce Levine of ESPN Chicago writes, Williams fired Walker after a clubhouse spat last August only to be overruled by owner Jerry Reinsdorf. (And here we thought Frank Wren could get impatient.) According to Levine, some in the organization blamed Walker for the lack of success enjoyed by prospects Gordon Beckham, who’s from Atlanta and who played at Georgia, and Brent Morel. And it didn’t help that the relationship between Williams and manager Ozzie Guillen, who can be high-maintenance, had clearly reached the point of diminishing returns.

According to the …

Continue reading Greg Walker on leaving Chisox for the Braves: ‘It’s a lot of fun’ »

Chipper puts the Braves ahead. He's done that before. (AP photo)

It wasn’t so long ago — 17 days, to be precise — that we noted that the 2012 Atlanta Braves’ window of opportunity mightn’t be as panoramic as that of most teams embarking on a six-month season. The Braves, as we know, were coming off a regrettable September, and they’d started 0-4 against teams slotted to finish last in their respective divisions. To which we said: Yikes.

Today we say: That window has grown so broad that on a clear day you almost can see October.

The Braves have won 12 of 15, taking five consecutive series in the process. They’re tied with St. Louis as having the third-best record in the National League and the fourth-best in baseball. Yes, they’re 2 1/2 games behind Washington, which has caught a flying start, but they’re three games ahead of Philadelphia and four up on Miami. And — get this — they’ve scored the most runs of any NL club.

The team that couldn’t hit is hitting .261, up from last …

Continue reading Remember how the Braves needed to get going? They have »

Continue reading Video: On Jair Jurrjens’ demotion – a crisis of confidence? »

Jair Jurrjens on a dark Monday in L.A. (AP photo)

I wonder if this would have happened in the days before pitch speed became a measurement available on ballpark scoreboards and TV broadcasts. I wonder if Jair Jurrjens would be headed for the minor leagues if those on the periphery didn’t keep harping about his velocity, or lack of same.

By any measure, Jurrjens has been awful over his four starts. He has lasted five innings in only one of them, and the reason he’s 0-2 and not 0-4 is that his team scored 10 runs for him in Start No. 2 and 14 in No. 3. His ERA is 9.37. Opponents are hitting .411 against him. On Monday in Los Angeles he faced 17 batters; 10 reached, five scored.

Jurrjens is pitching so badly that it can’t be called pitching at all. At issue is why he’s not pitching. Speculation continues to swirl that he’s hurt, although he and the Braves deny it. By sending him to Class AAA Gwinnett, as opposed to parking him on the disabled list, the Braves have sent a powerful …

Continue reading Jurrjens to the minors: How does a good pitcher go so bad? »