Boyer is a bit of an odd choice to get a callup. He’s not a top prospect (not in Braves terms anyway), he didn’t have a lot of upper-level experience (this is his first year above A-ball) and he had pitched very poorly as a starter, if better since being moved to a relief role. I’m sure that they didn’t want to derail the development of a more prized prospect like Anthony Lerew just to pitch middle relief, and anyway nobody in the upper levels of the organization was really setting the world on fire. (Unless it was Jorge Vasquez, who was called up the next day anyway.)
Boyer’s career ERA in the minors entering this season was 3.33. Last year it was 2.98 at Myrtle Beach, which isn’t all that great for that park. He had a big dropoff in strikeouts, getting only 5.6 per nine, which is far too low. His walks were down as well and he was probably trying something to get better control. But if he can’t do better than six per nine he’s not going to make it as a big leaguer.
Boyer’s ERA for the year in Mississippi was 5.04, amassed in 48 1/3 innings. He had struck out 40 men (versus 18 walks) which is not spectacular but acceptable. His big problem was that he was very hittable, allowing 62 hits, which continued to yesterday’s game when he allowed three including a double. Some of that is certainly a fluke; he’s never allowed much more than a hit per nine before. It’s questionable if Boyer is ready to contribute on the major league level, but he can hardly be worse than Colon.
Again, why not call up GREISINGER?
Can’t. Unless someone goes on the DL they can’t call him up until ten days have passed since his demotion. Plus they floated him back off the 40-man to make room for McCann and I think they’d have to take someone off it to make room. (I’m not sure; they may have space, but then they may want to keep it in case they want to make another move.) So they called up a hard-throwing youngster and threw him to the fire. Well, the A’s, who have a pretty poor offense when not facing the Braves’ relief corpse. Hopefully Vasquez will do better.
I think the braves are in the “throw it against the wall and see if it sticks” portion of the season. I am betting that unless things go awful at Myrtle Beach, we will be seeing mr devine in Atlanta before the end of August.