The Nats, in their quest to be Kansas City on the Potomac, have picked up Gregor Blanco.
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The Nats, in their quest to be Kansas City on the Potomac, have picked up Gregor Blanco.
Use code “Journal” for a 5% discount.
The return of Rick Ankiel, but he’s disabled.
Curses, my first ever JC:
The average OPS for the league so far this year is .704 (.728 and .751 in ’10 and ’09 respectively); average OBP is .318 (.325, .333). Uggla might be struggling more than even he usually struggles early in a season (if that’s even something he usually does), but so is everyone else in the league (on average).
His BAbip is .226 and his line drive % is above his career average. The only major batted ball discrepancy is a higher ground ball %, but that just makes his BAbip look even more unlucky. The only thing that might be legit is that he’s swinging at more pitches overall, and he’s making contact with more balls out of the strike zone, which isn’t a good thing, but I could easily see how frustration at having nothing drop in for a hit could lead to some additional hacking.
Basically, he’s exactly the same guy we thought he was when he signed. Nothing has changed.
I wish I was good at Flash because if I was I’d put together that marvelous sequence of Victorino being called out and drop a laugh track behind it.
And send it to him.
Every five minutes.
@3 If you’ve got the clip I can do it.
@2, the OBP has changed dramatically. The # of liners caught on the IF and pop ups is way up (SSS) and to me, the # of grounders are a signal that he’s rolling over the balls he can get to. If his LDs are being caught, that’s as much a sign that they weren’t hit that hard as right at someone. Turner is a much tougher park to hit in, and without power, his game gets very ordinary very fast.
There’s time to right the ship, of course, but his peripherals and rate stats are alarming to me.
Braves are 9965-9970 all-time. Can they make it to .500 before they make it to 10000?
“If his LDs are being caught, that’s as much a sign that they weren’t hit that hard as right at someone.”
Every piece of evidence I’ve read on line drive batting average implies it centers around .725 and that any fluctuation is pretty arbitrary. Year-to-year, players don’t generally hit bad line drives or good line drives. In the absence of more detailed information, line drives are just line drives, and LD% + .125 is a good estimator of future BABIP.
I am surprised that we are that close to .500. The teams of the 70’s and 80’s put a lot of L’s up there.
Thanks for the tip about mlb.tv.
@7, In the absence of more detailed information,
His infield line drive outs/fly outs are also way up.
ATL Braves are 3701-3482. MIL Braves were 1146-890. BOS Braves were… not good.
This is NL play only. They were 225-60 in the National Association!
We oughta be like UNC and claim those wins – we could call them “Braves Helms Wins”.
Diory starting tonight.
I’d stay cautious and give Seabass an extra day off.
Ah, Big Country—MTV-era Scots:
*Ringing guitars, denoting U2-esque stridency.
*Thatched roofs, denoting Scottish authenticity.
*All-terrain vehicles, denoting…. WTF?
I’m not that concerned with Uggla’s BA. I tend to agree with @2 on that point. However, the team didn’t hire Uggla for his line drives. Even if you add 60 points to his BA, which is about right, he’s still underperforming. His BA will come around. It’s his power that’s an issue.
His ISO is really low and his HR/FB is really low. Spike mentions his new park, but if you look at his spray chart, he isn’t even hitting balls in the area where they would be home runs in Miami. There’s a huge gap in the left field fence area where he got nearly all of his doubles and home runs last year. He just isn’t pulling long fly balls.
I don’t know if he’s trying to go the opposite way, and it’s killing his game, or if he just needs to pound a pot of coffee before game time so he can turn around those fastballs more quickly, but he’s just not hitting balls anywhere near where he needs to hit them to be successful. His power is as a pull hitter, but he hasn’t really been one this year.
Anybody going to see Fleet Foxes or Flaming Lips in ATL this/next week? I’m fully expecting to leave the Foxes show with a marijuana contact high, but I’m less sure about the effects of standing next to hundreds of sweaty, LSD users at the Lips concert. Does it rub off? Should I be worried?
No, but you should be concerned about your sunburn from exposure to all of that whiteness.
You should be okay, just don’t lick them.
Crap, time to rewrite my gameplan I guess.
Ah, Big Country—MTV-era Scots:
LOL! I read this as SCOTS and immediately got that head at an angle look the dog gets when it doesn’t understand what you say.
#16
As long as you don’t eat any paper or, say, sugarcubes, you’ll get a regular night’s sleep.
But if you do, I recommend Pink Floyd’s “Meddle” on repeat.
I wish they sold Meddle as just an EP with “Echoes,” and just cut out all that crap beforehand. It’s like a reverse version of Da Capo by Love — a bunch of short songs and then a 20-minute freakout, except on Da Capo the short songs are amazing and the freakout sucks, and on Meddle the 20-minute song is amazing and the short songs suck.
That’s what the good lord made the MP3 player for.
Yeah, but Floyd won’t sell individual MP3s, only MP3 albums.
#22
At UGA, I dated this girl who insisted on playing “Echoes” every time I visited her dorm. She began to scare me. I think she’s a lawyer now.
#24
It’s like David Lynch won’t break up DVDs of his films into chapters.
Or make films that make sense.
Ah, Big Country
Loudest gig I ever went to. Also outperformed Bowie when they were the support act
Stuart Adamson sadly missed, but following in the grand tradition of 80’s revival acts and have reformed with Mike Peters (of the Alarm fame) as lead singer
@24, I just ripped my CD’s.
Shows what I know. Back then, I thought Big Country and The Hooters would have long, successful runs.
This is looking sort of ominous.
@23 – you mean, that’s what Al Gore made the MP3 player for.
@21 Made me laugh out loud! (In a good way)
On another note, I can never get the sound adjusted right for both Joe and Chip. Joe’s quiet and then Chip comes blasting in with his noise! Gives me a headache after awhile!
After all of the excitement of the past couple weeks, I kind of lost track of the fact that the Braves’ offense still sucks.
Holy smokes.
holy crap what in god’s name is going on
Diory Hernandez has turned this team from a pretty good defensive club to a terrible one.
McLouth!Incredible. What an epically horrendous inning.
Unbelievable.
I would drop a ball too if I saw Heyward coming at me full speed.
God, this team drives me nuts. Go into the Phillies’ house and dominate, then come back home to face a crappy pitcher for a crappy team and have a collective brain fart. Great teams don’t do this.
Jeeebus Hudson, go ahead put that pitch anywhere
Rally killer
Ah Big Country. The first rock concert I ever went to. The old Fox theatre in Atlanta. They played “In A Big Country” twice. It was awesome.
I think Prado should hit cleanup.
Heyward is turning into Cerrano… He no hit curveball
Jason Marquis is perhaps my least favorite ballplayer. I had high hopes for this game. Alas and alack.
Horrible. Just… horrible.
Let’s all agree that Uggla is responsible for this.
Jason Heyward-out machine.
You just gotta tip your cap.
There are some errors you never forget. Adam LaRoche running to first base and Nick Johnson beating him there in 2006, Kelly Johnson dropping that ball in the ninth inning against the Phillies and now: McLouth’s drop.
You know, they should at least make these guys watch a baseball game before they give them a job.
Are you talking about the announcers, the umpires, the managers, or the players?
Yes.
Did you notice that in the two starting lineups there are only two players hitting over .300?
And they both started at catcher.
Weird.
Would someone please inform Chip Caray that the Braves are not winning this game and to stop getting excited by singles?
Two down. Four to go.
Actually, Marquis was hitting .333.
Yunel was booted from this team after his lob to Glaus last year. Lets all hope that the one Diory about killed Freeman on will give him the same result.
McLouth isnt the only one to blame. Freeman booted one the preious play and Hudson gave up a meatball twice tonight. Oh yeah, Heyward looks completely lost at the plate too.
Okay, Uggla. Time to start the home run stretch of your season.
Ha!
ALRIGHT!
Well that’s more interesting than the hawks.
YESSS!!!!!
If Uggla wasn’t a failure, that would have been a grand slam and we would be tied.
Still Uggla’s fault.
they better come back and win this game
HR’s kill rallies, right?
Chip Caray just called it a rally-killing home run.
Did he really? I have Powell on.
Having checked out on the game prematurely, what happened to Heyward?
#66 – he did
Good call joeyt
This is what happened to Heyward I think…
#Braves’ Heyward struck out on 3 pitches to start 6th, makes him 2-for-28 with 13 strikeouts in May 48 mins ago
Venters is unreal.
the lisp pitched well
I guess riggelman doesn’t read scouting reports
good for us
Dear Mr. Gonzalez,
Please use David Ross this inning.
Fudge. Conrad because he’s a switchy. Not Ross, the actually good hitter.
I wouldve hit Ross for Diory and worried about it later
@70 – Thanks. I guess. Ugh.
thought he had it
Chip Carey calls are the worst.
Thanks Chip for making me think what I believed to be a fly-out from the get-go was a home run.
Chip Caray sucks at his job
I hate Chip Carey. This is all his fault.
I don’t understand. One run game, bottom of the ninth, and the game ends with one of your best hitters on the bench. F this guy.
btw, why is it every time that Im happy about a Matt Young or a Brandon Hicks getting booted from this team that we get stuck with a Joe Mather or a Diory Hernandez in return?
@82 – See what happens when the team doesnt play well and Fredi has to manage.
Recapped.