I bet we still get Borowski somehow. If so we need to resign both of them to new contracts. This way we dont have to spend the 1st half of next year trying to find a closer. Just think if we had gotten:
To be fair…how are we spoiled? We are simply pointing out that if we had just gotten one decent closer in the offseason, how much better would our season be instead of climbing out of a huge hole? That’s not spoiled, it’s just common sense.
As I have said…I can very much accept losing. But losing is OK if you have tried everything within your means the entire time. But we werent trying this offseason…well, “we” as in Braves fans may have been, but not upper Management.
No one was asking for Rivera…just a reasonable, reliable guy we could plug in…thats all.
The closer problem seems to be fixed.. if Bobby can continue pitching the way he has…
But now the problem seems to be to get the ball to him, while we are still leading…
We need one more arm in the pen, but I don’t want it to be in return for Wilson. We need to keep Wilson!
Rob Cope
on July 24, 2006 at 9:34 pm
CSG, did you see the two pitchers the White Sox gave up for MacDougal? If we had the guy from AA, he would probably be in Atlanta. Right now, with the state of our pitching in the minors, “a bunch of A and AA players” would probably mortgage our future for a bunch of relievers who could be here today, gone tomorrow.
Spoiled because the man has been at the helm for 14 DIVISION TITLES IN A ROW! Everyone wants to run him out now. How do we know that he didn’t offer Wickman something this winter and he turned it down to go to Cleveland(who looked like a contender as well) We went after Farnsworth, but the Yanks out bid us and he is a puss. There are conflicting stories about Todd Jones and everyone on the board was against Todd Jones coming here. We didn’t offer 15 million to BJ Ryan and weren’t going to seel out to Billy Wagner. We have had some guys like Boyer and Devine who we thought might fill the closer role or at least help the pen, but they have been hurt.
mraver
on July 24, 2006 at 9:39 pm
Also, I want to point out that JS did try to go out and get cheap, young SPs with upside. If you’ll recall, that’s what Cormier and Villareal were. IIRC, that trade was widely cheered on this website. Oh, and then there’s Blaine Boyer and Joey Devine and Macay McBride. Is it JS’s fault that two of those have missed the entire year while the other has performed towards the lower end of our expectations? I for one thought our pen was going to surprise everyone with all the talented youngsters we had coming in. Then half of them get hurt and the other half turn in poor seasons.
A lot of people here seem to think this kind of thing is predictable, but baseball is game of chance. You put yourself in the best position you can and hope you end up winning more times than not. We have been very unlucky this year with pitching injuries and players just not playing well. If the Mets had had half the injuries we’ve had to their pen (think no Sanchez and no Heilman), the East would be a helluva lot closer.
Rob Cope
on July 24, 2006 at 9:40 pm
I have to agree with Smitty. There is some spoiled-ness going on here. You can say, “We just want a decent closer,” but those don’t grow on trees. The examples people have sighted, Jones and Wickman, were gambles. They are 38 and 37, respectively, and had just as good of a chance of fading BADLY as they were of succeeding like they have. And IF we had gotten a guy that looked “reliable” and imploded, you would STILL be screaming for Schuerholz’s head.
How about all through this run Schuerholz has made good trades, appointed great baseball people who have produced a GREAT farm system throughout the years, signed COUNTLESS guys to extensions at contracts that NO team would have been able to sign them to, and was the steady mind at the head of a team who’s won 15 straight division titles. HE DIDN’T SIGN A FAT 37 YEAR OLD PITCHER TO A 2 YEAR, 12 MILLION DEAL, SOMEHOW PROPHETICALLY KNOWING HE WOULD HAVE A GREAT YEAR?!?! HANG HIM!
mraver
on July 24, 2006 at 9:44 pm
Oh, and just consider how much worse off we would be if we’d committed 18M over three years to a guy with an ERA of 4 and a WHIP of 1.5 or a guy with an ERA over 5 and a BAA of nearly .300.
The only “legit” closers out there were Wagner, Hoffman, and Flash Gordon (who I viewed as a major risk, given how hard the Yankees rode his arm the previous years). Of thsee, Hoffman wanted to stay in SD, and the Mets and Phills were going to spend more to get those guys than we could.
So really, what’s the criticism here? Hindsight is 20/20, and now it’s easy to say “oh, we should have gotten this guy!”. But you ignore the fact that we “could have” gotten someone who would not have improved our pen and be costing us enough money to preclude our getting Wickman now.
Rob Cope
on July 24, 2006 at 9:46 pm
Wow, that’s a really good post, mraver. I think he made the point excellently: hindsight is 20/20.
I bet we still get Borowski somehow. If so we need to resign both of them to new contracts. This way we dont have to spend the 1st half of next year trying to find a closer. Just think if we had gotten:
macDougal, linebrink, wickman, and williamson
could have for a bunch of A and AA players
Spoiled Braves fans
csg, amen…amen!!!!!
MacDougal sucks! We want Borowski!
Smitty,
To be fair…how are we spoiled? We are simply pointing out that if we had just gotten one decent closer in the offseason, how much better would our season be instead of climbing out of a huge hole? That’s not spoiled, it’s just common sense.
As I have said…I can very much accept losing. But losing is OK if you have tried everything within your means the entire time. But we werent trying this offseason…well, “we” as in Braves fans may have been, but not upper Management.
No one was asking for Rivera…just a reasonable, reliable guy we could plug in…thats all.
The closer problem seems to be fixed.. if Bobby can continue pitching the way he has…
But now the problem seems to be to get the ball to him, while we are still leading…
We need one more arm in the pen, but I don’t want it to be in return for Wilson. We need to keep Wilson!
CSG, did you see the two pitchers the White Sox gave up for MacDougal? If we had the guy from AA, he would probably be in Atlanta. Right now, with the state of our pitching in the minors, “a bunch of A and AA players” would probably mortgage our future for a bunch of relievers who could be here today, gone tomorrow.
Pretty much everyone in here knew Reitsma would be a disaster back in December.
Rob…I agree with you on something (see?)…we don’t have quite the farm system we nused to and the Sox are among some teams that are deeper then us.
Though to be fair, a lot of our “farm” guys all came to Atlanta at the same time.
Spoiled because the man has been at the helm for 14 DIVISION TITLES IN A ROW! Everyone wants to run him out now. How do we know that he didn’t offer Wickman something this winter and he turned it down to go to Cleveland(who looked like a contender as well) We went after Farnsworth, but the Yanks out bid us and he is a puss. There are conflicting stories about Todd Jones and everyone on the board was against Todd Jones coming here. We didn’t offer 15 million to BJ Ryan and weren’t going to seel out to Billy Wagner. We have had some guys like Boyer and Devine who we thought might fill the closer role or at least help the pen, but they have been hurt.
Also, I want to point out that JS did try to go out and get cheap, young SPs with upside. If you’ll recall, that’s what Cormier and Villareal were. IIRC, that trade was widely cheered on this website. Oh, and then there’s Blaine Boyer and Joey Devine and Macay McBride. Is it JS’s fault that two of those have missed the entire year while the other has performed towards the lower end of our expectations? I for one thought our pen was going to surprise everyone with all the talented youngsters we had coming in. Then half of them get hurt and the other half turn in poor seasons.
A lot of people here seem to think this kind of thing is predictable, but baseball is game of chance. You put yourself in the best position you can and hope you end up winning more times than not. We have been very unlucky this year with pitching injuries and players just not playing well. If the Mets had had half the injuries we’ve had to their pen (think no Sanchez and no Heilman), the East would be a helluva lot closer.
I have to agree with Smitty. There is some spoiled-ness going on here. You can say, “We just want a decent closer,” but those don’t grow on trees. The examples people have sighted, Jones and Wickman, were gambles. They are 38 and 37, respectively, and had just as good of a chance of fading BADLY as they were of succeeding like they have. And IF we had gotten a guy that looked “reliable” and imploded, you would STILL be screaming for Schuerholz’s head.
How about all through this run Schuerholz has made good trades, appointed great baseball people who have produced a GREAT farm system throughout the years, signed COUNTLESS guys to extensions at contracts that NO team would have been able to sign them to, and was the steady mind at the head of a team who’s won 15 straight division titles. HE DIDN’T SIGN A FAT 37 YEAR OLD PITCHER TO A 2 YEAR, 12 MILLION DEAL, SOMEHOW PROPHETICALLY KNOWING HE WOULD HAVE A GREAT YEAR?!?! HANG HIM!
Oh, and just consider how much worse off we would be if we’d committed 18M over three years to a guy with an ERA of 4 and a WHIP of 1.5 or a guy with an ERA over 5 and a BAA of nearly .300.
The only “legit” closers out there were Wagner, Hoffman, and Flash Gordon (who I viewed as a major risk, given how hard the Yankees rode his arm the previous years). Of thsee, Hoffman wanted to stay in SD, and the Mets and Phills were going to spend more to get those guys than we could.
So really, what’s the criticism here? Hindsight is 20/20, and now it’s easy to say “oh, we should have gotten this guy!”. But you ignore the fact that we “could have” gotten someone who would not have improved our pen and be costing us enough money to preclude our getting Wickman now.
Wow, that’s a really good post, mraver. I think he made the point excellently: hindsight is 20/20.