ESPN – Braves vs. Padres – Box Score – July 11, 2008
It’s two, two types of Braves offensive failure in one! In the first seven innings, the Braves were held to four hits (two by McCann, one by Kotsay, and an infield single by Chipper) and never threatened at all. Jake Peavy, at your service. In the eighth and ninth, the Braves had two hits in each inning off of the bullpen, but couldn’t score any runs. Typical.
Joseph Reyes didn’t have a whole lot of stuff. He gave up just two runs in four innings before Bobby hit for him, but just didn’t seem right. Carlyle finally had an off night in his long man role, giving up two runs, though one was “unearned”.
I, of course, blame Francoeur. In this case, I kind of have a point (not that I need one) in that he was 0-4 right between McCann, who was 3-4, and Kotsay, who was 2-3 with a walk. If Francoeur had done anything they might have made a game of it, but he sucks… Escobar didn’t play. Obviously, his shoulder is not healthy, and though he can play defense he can’t swing the bat right. Li’lbridge was in the lineup in his place, and struck out three times. It’s really not fair to expect a twelve year old to face Jake Peavy and Trevor Hoffman. I kept expecting a visit from children’s services.
The Jeff Francoeur obsession you have is becoming scary and is already very strange. Give it up already, we know you don’t like the guy and he has underachieved mightly this year.
This team has so many holes it’s almost as scary as your obsession.
The Francoeur strikeout in the 9th was typical Frenchy–it was eye high. I guess the 3 day visit to Pearl has worn off.
I think your Francoeur “obsession” is funny and valid. Also, why was Lillibridge such a highly touted prospect? Is he the one that had a high OBP? I’m not writing him off by any means, but it’s strange to think of how he was viewed at the time of the LaRoche trade.
I fail to see how anyone who cares about the Braves and knows baseball would not be at least mildly obsessed. Sure, the Braves have ‘many’ problems. But Francoeur is both the biggest and most reflective of the ethos underwriting those problems.
@3 I agree. Overshadowed by much of this wretched season has been Lillibridge’s tremendous step backward. This is kind of a blow. He was either going to be the starting SS going forward or a valuable trade chip. Now he’s basically neither. Hopefully he can develop, but time might now be running out.
This is a huge spread on the sports front of today’s AJC in print.
Francoeur’s not the first to lose his grip on Atlanta
Bradley sure changed his mind quickly.
I will stop calling Francoeur a big whiny baby when he apologizes for acting like a big whiny baby, and will stop saying he sucks when he stops sucking.
here here, Mac.
i say we send him to the independent league for a bag of balls.
I understand the final score was actually 4-0.
It was, of course. I have no idea what happened there. I blame Francoeur.
Jake,
I think what is very strange is your so called inside access to the braves which you cannot reveal.
Little Bridge:
When Escobar and Infante are out, why not play Diory Hernandez instead? He plays SS and has hit .292 in Richmond (including a .333 against lefties!). While his defense might not be quite as good as Little Bridge’s (who has made a few prado’s anyway), his offense seems like it more than makes up for it.
From the AJC:
The reason the Braves aren’t ready to trade away players is because they expect an infusion from within their own pitching staff after the All-Star break.
The Braves plan to have starter Mike Hampton and closer Rafael Soriano back from the disabled list shortly after play resumes.
Tom Glavine could be back within a month if he has no setbacks in his recovery from a flexor tendon injury in his pitching elbow.
Grasping at straws …
Lillibridge was highly touted first because of his defense. He hit for average, knew the strike zone and was very good at stealing bases. The only issue was power. This year, it seems, he has nothing.
Escobar is out until after the break. More Lil’ Bridge. I would have rather seen Diory Hernandez til Lillibridge gets back on track.
I feel like we have to be sellers.
I was hoping we would sell Tex for a young first sacker who is ready to go. Jettison Ohman and maybe Kotsay.
If we want to suddenly contend at that point, fine. I just don’t want to see us trade valuable chips for a rent-a-player in a season where we need a 2007 Rockies-type run to get back in it.
Our main problem as braves fans is that we are no longer used to any prolonged suffering. The streak did that to us. We take winning for granted. Winning is hard. Frenchy made a mistake, but remember HE IS A KID! when i was his age i was a moron not someone who a multi-million dollar franchise depended on. Lets stop being negative and pull for this team. They are trying.
The Braves offense has never been comparable to a really good offense, with grind it out at-bats, high OBPs in lead-off roles. For years outstanding pitching masked the offensive deficiencies. Only a sick organization would hire a Greg Norton or a Omar Infante. Frenchy should have gone back to the minors to learn the strike zone after he failed to progress his sophomore season. Who knows what the result would have been, but now he’s a resentful headcase with no clue how much he doesn’t know. The handling of Frenchy is yet another sign of an organization that doesn’t know what it’s doing. Andruw Jones is another case in point. Now we know what the Braves have known for a couple of years. Andruw Jones is done. Yet the replacement is for a player they knew was leaving is Kotsay? Frank Wren may suck even more than Frenchy, but Bobby, who I love to deaf, has to take some credit as well.
Andruw isn’t done. He’ll be back. Count it.
a misprint in Buster Olney’s blog today:
“Jake Peavy was The Man for the Braves”
we could only wish…
If he was The Man for the Braves, I hate to think of what the Braves were for Peavy.
The reason we replaced Andruw with Kotsay was because we were counting on Jordan Schafer being available in 2009. There’s no point in getting a long-term replacement for someone when you have someone a year away.
I hope Schafer is ready in ’09.
Is there any kind of option on Kotsay’s contract?
Hermitfool, Infante isn’t a bad backup. He’s the best backup we’ve had this year. The problem is when Infante is outhitting all 3 starting outfielders.
I suspect the Braves will wait until the deadline to sell when they hope to drive up the price.
I am calling Lillibridge “The Batboy” until he grows up.
I think Kotsay is in the last year of his contract. If I were Wren, I’d be looking to get something of value for him. (Maybe we could get Joey Devine back! j/k) The Braves aren’t going anywhere this year anyway, so they might as well put Blanco in center and play Jones in left (or a Jones/Diaz platoon) for the rest of the year. Then in the offseason, with the new cash that should be available, they could go get at least one new corner outfielder and a CF if Schafer isn’t ready.
@19 LOL!!!
@16.
I’d take Infante on my team anyday. He’s very valuable in a bench role. And I would do the Mark Kotsay deal again too. Granted he has been injured for a month, but he has played pretty well for us thus far. We can’t just plug in a superstar. What centerfielder would do a better job for us that we could have acquired?
Whiny game thread is up.
I’m jackin’ it