ESPN – Braves vs. Phillies – Box Score – September 24, 2008
Well, that was unexpected.
The Braves took a 2-0 lead in the first, and led 3-1 entering the bottom of the third, but Jo-Jo the Dogfaced Pitcher couldn’t stand prosperity. Bobby yanked him in the fourth after solo shots by Utley and Howard had tied it up.
But the Braves answered with a big inning in the fifth, chasing Myers and scoring six runs. A lot of the runs were “unearned” (stupid rule) after Howard threw a potential double play grounder into Kotchman’s back. The big blow was a three-run pinch-hit homer by Chipper. The ridiculously overqualified pinch-hitter is now hitting .365 and has a fifteen-point lead in the batting race over Pujols, who did not start tonight. If Chipper stays a pinch-hitter in the final series of the year, it’s basically impossible for Pujols to catch him.
McCann and Slugging Third Baseman Martin Prado each had three hits. The Braves had fifteen in all. Carlyle wound up with the win.
Well, let’s see: The Braves have three games left and the Cardinals have four games left. The only way I see Pujols getting back into this race is if Chipper has two 0-4 games in a row.
Cubs take the lead on the Mets in extras. Shea is quiet, but Cub fan Bill Murray is there yucking it up.
Mets’ll be tied with Milwaukee after tonight.
Interesting piece on Aaron vs. Cox, if this hasn’t been covered already.
http://www.sabernomics.com/sabernomics/index.php/2008/09/a-divorce-on-the-horizon/
It’s apparent to me that somebody’s got Wren by the balls–and that might be Bobby. I’m sure it’s been pointed out here many times, but his departure is overdue. I don’t care how many players are drinking the Kool-Aid.
Yeah Bobby is holding back Frank’s genius and should be shown the door. Bobby’s never done anything as a GM except lay the foundation for a near dynasty. Get him out of here so the guy with no resume can call the shots.
This fanbase deserves some lean years.
Anyway, seriously, Prado hits the hell out of the ball. Can’t we find a regular spot for him?
I love Joracio Reymirez. Let’s call him that for the rest of his career, or at least until we inevitably trade him to the Royals.
Chipper to have MRI next week.
http://tinyurl.com/4ruk5j
I keep telling myself that the way the Braves have played over the last month is a good sign for next year. This is a good theory, but reality says that it means absolutely nothing. We still need two excellent starting pitchers and a vastly improved outfield – even if we went 27 and 0 this month.
at least we all know that Jo Jo isnt the answer. He just appears to be another one of our AAAA starters.
A package headed by JoJo and Brandon Jones is a pretty good one.
Yes td, this team is two SPs and two big bats away from being competitive IMHO.
#9–
for a mediocre #4 starter.
we GREATLY over-value both of those players. they’re both, basically, AAAA players.
if we want to get a good power bat in RF/LF through the trade front (Hermedia is an interesting idea. the kids’ got great tools, just hasn’t put it all together until at the end of 2007) we’ll have to START with Hanson or Medlin. unfortunately, that’s the way it’s gonna be.
I think Chipper should have tommy john surgery just for the sake of continuity
I didn’t realize we are in a race with the Giants for the sixth overall pick of next year’s draft. With the season we have, I honestly thought we would end up with a top five pick.
i actually was hoping the Phillies would win but it sure was fun watching Myers suck………….couldnt happen to a nicer guy.
Another option is Jo-Jo’s Circus, which is a child’s claymation show about a five-year old female clown named Jo-Jo. That was suggested by John Kincaid a while back. This could lead to some good photo-shop contests.
http://disney-clipart.com/JoJos-Circus/JoJos-Circus.php
Mets To Play Brewers In One-Game Choke-Off | The Onion – America’s Finest News Source
Thank you Mac, that made my morning (immediately sent it to my Mets fan friend).
FWIW – I had a dream last night, and in it the announcer was saying that the Yankees were just crazy about wanting to get Escobar. Maybe they would move him to second since Cano had a bad year. I don’t know who they were going to offer for him, but I thought it might be some young pitching – but more likely it was just the “every player is a once or future (or wants in their heart to be a) Yankee” stuff.
It made sense at the time, but now not so much.
“Anyway, seriously, Prado hits the hell out of the ball. Can’t we find a regular spot for him?”
in trade talks would be the perfect place, his glove is too bad to have him playing everyday
This is looking a lot like Prado’s career year. In 214 at-bats, he’s batting .327/.387/.477; in 1920 minor league at-bats he batted .300/.352/.393. He always hit for a high average, but not this high, and he never had power.
#20 – sell high, yes, I agree
Mac,
The Onion headline was all I needed to see to laugh. 🙂
Who has the stats showing how many men LOB a team had in the season? and maybe a ratio of LOB to runs scored or total base runners? I’m just curious HOW bad we’ve been about leaving guys on.
Let’s see… That would be the ratio of runs scored to (H+BB+HBP+reached on error) – (DP+CS). I could calculate it, but I don’t want to.
Mac,
Seriously, what would you do with Prado? It’s easy to say trade him, but I don’t see us getting much more than a middle inning relief guy at best. Maybe he’s having a career year, or maybe he’s finding his stroke. I don’t expect him to keep an OPS of over .850, but an OPS of .800 is achievable. However, his career fielding percent of .972 is deceptive considering he is the source of the “Prado”.
Keep him on the bench. I can’t stand his glove at second, third is taken, and he doesn’t have the bat for an outfield corner.
Who’s on first
Yes Dix
Prado would be very valuable as a utility player. I would love to keep him, Infante, and Norton, but if they trade KJ to give this guy an everyday job thats just insane
Yeah, what csg just said in #29. I think Prado/Norton/Infant is a decent bench… but we don’t want any of them on the field 150 games (or even 100).
Watching JoJo struggle this much in the majors is frustrating for me because he absolutely dominated here in Double AA. I thought he was a for sure ace but for some reason he went right after batters there and seems scared to throw in the majors.
FWIW, if Chipper never recorded another AB this season, he’d technically end up with the highest single-season BA for a switch hitter.
Mickey Mantle 1957: .3649789
Chipper Jones 2008: .3652968
Let’s assume that he only pinch hits and won’t get more than 1 AB per game the rest of the way. As long as he gets one hit, he’ll finish ahead of Mantle. If he pulls any kind of o-fer, he doesn’t.
0/1: .364
1/1: .367
1/2: .366
1/3: .3651
How ’bout 1 for 2 with a walk? More stuff for Cooperstown…
td, why do you say that an OPS of .800 is achievable for Prado? His minor league OPS is .740. He has never had an OPS of .800 at any level until this year; last year in AAA it was .794, and he was 23, so he doesn’t get a huge age-relative-to-performance uptick. Do you think he’s going to be able to keep slugging .450?
Maybe an OPS of .800 is just wishful thinking. He did seem to be in an upward trend during his last year in the minors.
ohhhh thanks for that info ububba.
Speaking of Cooperstown, Chipper only needs to hit 355 HRs in his hext few games in order to finish the season as the all time home run leader. 347 to supplant Hank Aaron as a nice kick in the butt on the way out the door.
#33
Prado was fairly young for his level throughout much of his minor league career, yet consistently achieved very good batting averages from the beginning. He was probably a skinny kid who’s had to work hard to add strength, but he’s been spraying line drives all over the park like Rod Carew since the beginning of spring training, and not in the Matt Diaz swing-at-anything mode either.
The glove thing is a mystery to me, since he always had a good glove rep.
For some reason, BBRef shows Prado to be 6’1″, 170 in his major league profile, but 5’11”, 188 in his minor league profile….
Dix, that would be a lot of HR’s to hit in just a few games 🙂
td, why do you say that an OPS of .800 is achievable for Prado?
Having a .800 OPS at AAA last year and only being 24 makes it pretty easy to project a .800 OPS at the major league level.
He’s a good guy to have around, especially since being Chipper’s injury caddy is pretty regular work.
He’s a good guy to have around, especially since being Chipper’s injury caddy is pretty regular work.
I agree with this. I would not be in favor of just handing him the starting job at second base, though.
PS: If switch-hitters were football conferences, Chipper would be the SEC.
good cow. Dale Murphy’s kid playing for the Dolphins is huge… 6’4″ and 320 lbs!
And just like Chipper, the SEC is eventually going down
So does that mean Ole Miss is Chipper’s big toe that is always acting up?
Vanderbilt therefore is his defense, which has gotten surprisingly strong late in his career.
After much debate, I’m going with Luis Castillo for this season’s Pac-10. One very strong skill (working the count/drawing walks = USC) mixed in with a bunch of crap.
Lance Berkman is the Big 12?
so UGA is his right handed swing and UF is his left?
Darryl Kile is FSU
A-Rod is THE Ohio State. Blazes through the regular season, then doesn’t show up for the big game at the end of the year.
Kazmir has given up 4 solo HRs to detroit in what SHOULD have been Tampa’s clenching game. Oh, and Pujols is 1-1
And Francoeur is Florida International.
OK, what would it take to get Jake Peavy?
The Padres are so adrift that they might be easy pickin’s about now.
How ’bout a Right Fielder who has had his own SI cover and a hitting coach (they need one, right) for Jake?
#51- I would give just a ridiculously stupid amount of prospects to get Peavy
saw this on MLB Rumors…
Olney extols the virtues of Derek Lowe, who could get a deal comparable to Jason Schmidt’s three years/$47MM. That was two years, ago though…I think Scott Boras gets Lowe $18MM a year.
If Lowe gets $18 per, we had better not be the winning bidder
Francoeur is UAB, just needs to be shut down
How adrift are the Padres? well, they’ve psychologically scarred me for life:
http://www.gaslampball.com/2008/9/17/616757/padres-rookies-photographe
I’ve been a booster of getting a pitcher like Lowe or Garland rather than Sabathia or Sheets this offseason, but Lowe ain’t worth a damn at $18 per. At $12 per, he doesn’t look bad. Since getting to LA, his home/road splits have been pretty massive: 3.15 ERA in 65 starts at home since 2005 (avg: 6 2/3 IP per start), 4.06 ERA in 69 starts on the road (avg: 6 IP per start).
Still, $10 mill a year is pretty much the price of mediocrity, and if he could give us a 4.00 ERA and pitch 6-7 innings a game every game, that’d be worth the cash.
And Francoeur is Florida International.
lol
Pujols 2-2 and BB, now at .352
I think Chipper’s pretty safe.
Dix’s FSU comparison is on time. Who would Matt Morris be?
Pujols just homered. He’s 3-3. I run down the BA possibilities on Chop-N-Change.
The Onion
Still relevant.
Obviously Bobby Cox is Penn State
I laughed.
As for the poll question, I’m going to have to go with Horacio, because we did manage to trade him for Soriano. I’m still not sure how we pulled off that trade.
Mike Piazza = University of Arkansas-Monticello Women’s Basketball Team
http://www.uwgsports.com/news/2008/3/6/23369.aspx
see paragraph 2
If Larry was a real man he would play and get that 26 for 26 stretch to clinch the .400 season.
If Larry were a real man we wouldn’t call him Chipper
Would Chipper’s shoes that gave him so much trouble be Arkansas and Mississippi State? Or would it be his knees?
Alabama his home run swing? Over time its consistently good. Had a period in the nineties (70’s) that was just dominating. Has gone through some dry patches but nothing too bad for too long. Except when he’s hurt which would be the equivalent of probation.
Say what you like about Jeff, but he does have a healthy grip on reality
“I felt I was the worst baseball player in the world…”
Posnanski:
Don’t Jump, Man
Poor Mr. Met…
I went to a Shea game earlier this year vs. Pittsburgh, tagging along with a group from the Queens DA office, which had hard-to-get left-field bleacher seats.
As I walked into the specially cordoned-off entrance, I literally walked smack into Mr. Met.
Of course, I felt much stranger apologizing to a mascot than I did bumping into one.
Yes, folks, the Met faithful is on another bumpy ride this week.
Micah Hoffpauir, career: 57 AB, 0 HR, 3 RBI
Micah Hoffpauir, tonight vs. the Mets: 4 AB, 2 HR, 5 RBI
“Micah Hoffpauir”? You made that up.
Petroleum exec says governor should cancel Georgia-Alabama football game to save gas | Political Insider
They ought to cancel it to save Georgia’s ass.
No, Mac, he’s not. 😛 If you’re being sarcastic, then good one.
Does Jesse Palmer as an announcer remind anyone else of Pepper Brooks, the dumb announcer from Dodgeball?
USC: officially not scary. Remember when everyone was blaming John David Booty for holding them back?
How bad is Ohio State?
Maybe the Pac-10 really is a balanced conference.
Wow, Brewers win on 10th-inning Braun GSHR.
Too bad the Mets came back & won, too.
Saturday is going to be insane.
Trojans!
nice little wrench in the BCS gears there.
I guess that makes Yankees USC. All the advantages, same amount of FAIL
OOOOOOOOOOO
SSSSSSSSSSS
UUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU
Oregon State, Fight! Fight! Fight!
I was hoping Ol’ Robert would be on here, spouting some PAC 10 nonsense, oh well.
When your big teams lose to the crappy teams, it doesn’t make your conference better, it means your good teams aren’t all that good.
Well, it could just mean your good team had a bad week. But it should certainly keep you from taking shots at other good teams, I’d think.
Stu,
exactly. By the way went to nashville a couple of weeks back for the USC/Vandy game with my roommate Luke (guy who fell down the elevator shaft) and hung out with a bunch of old vandy football players- fun town
Good teams have bad weeks. USC is still a strong team, and I still don’t want Florida to play them.
Rob, is that because if Florida did play them that would mean they weren’t in the title game? Because USC won’t be there.
don’t start saying that too soon.
USC lost early, which means if it’s starts rolling over teams in november and december, and there are a host of 1 loss teams, they could still be there.
but that ain’t happening.
#90
Yep, gotta go all the way back to last year to find an example. A one-loss USC team would have been a lock for the title game last year, and would stand at least an even-money chance of being so again.
Of course, saying something is an even-money chance of being a lock is a bit like saying that half the game is 90% mental.
The other half also being extremely mental…
But you know what I mean…..
Robert is a standup guy though he does enjoy taking his pot shots at the SEC. And it’s good for us that he does–keeps us honest and sharp.
This is a down year for the PAC-10 which has been a pretty good conference lately (Top 3 since late-90s), though not historically past USC and maybe Washington.
Plus, USC has only managed one National Championship lately (2004 over Oklahoma, everyone’s BCS whipping boy, when Auburn should have had the shot) yet they are treated as if they have rolled out several national championships in the last decade. This is mostly because of their stellar recruiting classes, in-conference supremacy and La-La Land hype. But when it comes down to the business of winning games as a team, USC finds a way to drop one here and there to teams that aren’t in its class, and is nearly always less than the sum of its parts.
I’m not afraid for my team to play them and have never been. Never. They’re damn good, but alas, they are human. This should be the point at which folks begin to understand that and deflate the hype balloon like so much silenced Ohio State Buckeye yammering.
Thank gawd. 🙂
Good comments all, Cary. I agree.
The main point is that Ohio State sucks.
OSU > tOSU
Did anyone hear ESPN talking about who could be your 1 loss team in the Championship game vs Oklahoma? They were talking about how USC and OH St could still make it in the title game. USC just lost to an UNRANKED team and they play in a garbage conference. How could they possibly still see USC in the title game. Could you see the possibility of LSU or Florida only losing 1 game to a top 10 team and getting the shaft so USC could get a title shot. ESPN is a joke
The BCS is a joke.
I’m pretty confident that a 1-loss, SEC-champion Florida, UGA, or LSU would get in before a 1-loss USC, and I’m certain that they would before a 1-loss tOSU.
Actually, the BCS has done a lot of good and lacks only one thing to make it darnearperfect:
A Plus+One Championship.
1 plays 4. 2 plays 3. Winners play each other for the crown.
5 whines like a War Eagle on estrogen, but TOO BAD!
Regular season is not de-valued. Teams can schedule up because two losses (with the right wins) can land you at 3 or 4.
The Kentuckys of the world can strive for the Peach unaffected by the “Final Four” …
What’s not to like?
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!
Anything that overly relies on human subjectivity to determine its champion doesn’t approach perfect, in my book.
The conversations we have about teams jumping or dropping in the rankings are goofy. Is Georgia as good as Missouri? I have no idea, unless they play each other.
Put 6 or 8 teams (essentially determined by conference championships) into a 3-round tournament. If you want to use “rankings” (computer or human) to determine seedings, I’m fine with that.
But unless you give a teams an opportunity to win out, you’ll never know which one is really best.
@100. The funniest part is the Mets fans ranting about how horrible the Braves and their fans are. Makes you remember why one despises Mets fans.
I can tell you that the Mets fans around here are so nervous they can barely talk about their team. Last year really scarred them.
Weird thing: Y’know there’s a chance we could have a 3-way tie with NYM, Pha & Mil?
If that happens, we get a one-game NL East playoff in Philly, then the loser plays the Brewers in a WC playoff the next day. How ’bout the Mets lose both?
Also, the White Sox may have to make up a rain-out game with Detroit on Monday, which could lead to another playoff.
Actually, the BCS has done a lot of good and lacks only one thing to make it darnearperfect:
A Plus+One Championship.
1 plays 4. 2 plays 3. Winners play each other for the crown.
I like the BCS but I don’t like the plus 1. There really is no perfect solution because each year demands a different solution. In a year like USC-Texas, the current system worked just fine. Two teams deserved it, they played, championship determined. In a year like LSU-Oklahoma-USC or USC-Oklahoma-Auburn maybe a plus 1 would work better, maybe not. I sort of like the BCS the way it is. I doubt there would be so much celebrating of SC’s defeat if there were a eight or 16 team tournament safety net at the end of the year.
When your big teams lose to the crappy teams, it doesn’t make your conference better, it means your good teams aren’t all that good.
It depends on which side of the argument you are trying to make. People use it both ways. I would agree that SC’s championship hopes should be dead after last night unless everyone in the Big-12 and SEC ends up with two losses.
Plus, USC has only managed one National Championship lately (2004 over Oklahoma, everyone’s BCS whipping boy, when Auburn should have had the shot) yet they are treated as if they have rolled out several national championships in the last decade. This is mostly because of their stellar recruiting classes, in-conference supremacy and La-La Land hype. But when it comes down to the business of winning games as a team, USC finds a way to drop one here and there to teams that aren’t in its class, and is nearly always less than the sum of its parts.
Now this I don’t really get. 11-2, 12-1, 13-0, 12-1, 11-2, 11-2. 5-1 in BCS bowls, two national championships. What are you expecting exactly? In a scholorship limited world, that’s as good a run as is probably possible. You can’t even say they fold in big games because they don’t, they fold in small games. I mean, you can’t win every single game.
Remember when everyone was blaming John David Booty for holding them back?
Everyone still is. Sanchez played fine last night, but they didn’t get him involved until things were already dire. They obviously thought they could run the ball and were clearly mistaken. Mike Riley and his staff simply outcoached PC and his staff. Throw in some home cooking, a weird bounce or two and there you go. Not that surprising, same thing happened two years ago.
Game thread is up.
Robert,
I wouldn’t call an end-of-year mini-tournament a safety net; I’d call it a way for the best teams to actually play each other, just like the NFL, just like all the other college teams below Division 1.
When fans still argue about who the champion is after it’s “been determined,” that’s no kind of championship.