Sequential offense? Who needs it? The Braves lived by the longball last night, though it helps that they were facing a team with any even worse offense.
In the first inning, Brian McCann, the best catcher in baseball, hit a solo homer to make it 1-0. That held up until the fourth, when Brandon Beachy made his one mistake, allowing Adam Kennedy (seriously?) to homer to tie it.
Through six, nobody but the best catcher in baseball had a hit for the Braves. His third of the game, a single, came leading off the seventh. Chipper flew out, then Freddie Freeman connected for a homer to center to make it 3-1.
Beachy struck out nine and allowed just three hits and a walk in six innings, though he needed 107 pitches to do it. George Sherrill allowed two hits in a third of an inning in the seventh, but the increasingly competent-looking Scott Linebrink got out of it. Eric O’Flaherty pitched the eighth, and Craig Kimbrel struck out the side in the ninth.
Fredi had Chipper Jones DHing, and Julio Lugo playing third and batting second, because that’s the sort of thing he does.
Solo homer doesn’t do McCann’s shot justice. It was a bomb.
I really dont understand why BMac didnt sit and have Ross DH’ing vs Bedard.
Dan Uggla career BAbip: 291
Dan Uggla 2011 BAbip: 188
Is he just insanely unlucky, or what?
“but the increasingly competent-looking Scott Linebrink got out of it” -high praise from Mac
Thanks to all for rooting the Braves home last night. I enjoyed reading the game thread when I hauled my well-rested carcass out of bed this morning. Keep up the good work.
@3, no, not necessarily. he’s line drive % is down from 16.3% (career) to 13.5. His GB% is up from 38.2 (career) to 45.0. He’s not driving the ball, which is going to cause a drop in babip. Is some of it luck? Sure. But he’s not been insanely unlucky this year.
#3 – He would be considered unlucky if he was making solid contact. Slow rollers to the left side and weak popups to the SS and LF will create a low BABIP.
Joe was talking the other day about Uggla’s BP. He said he was hitting moon shots down the LF line. If you were Parrish, wouldnt you want him hitting everything in BP up the middle and/or to RF??
@3
Becasue he can’t lay off breaking balls away from him, he tapping a lot of balls the the shortstop.
There are some ridiculously-good rookies on this team.
At what point, if ever, will Uggla be benched? I don’t think a .175 hitting, average (at best)fielding second baseman will stay around forever. At least I hope not.
What is the NCAA and the Universities going to do with the growing problem of former players now coming out and talking about cash they’ve received and/or selling their jerseys? Seems like former players are throwing anyone and everyone under the bus now. Im sure School Pres’ are a little bit worried.
What is “Admit that college football is an athletic feudal system, and pay the players something above rather than under the table for a change?” Alex!
Chipper and Freddie are both OPSing .768 after last night’s game.
Freddie Freeman’s home run was an American triumph. It was majestic. He hit it to the deepest part of maybe the second-worst hitters’ park in the majors.
By the way, I’m glad that we don’t hate Craig Kimbrel any more. What he did last night was simply unfair.
Brandon Beachy, stud.
Brian McCann, stud.
Freddie Freeman, stud.
Craig Kimbrel, stud.
We ran out a 4/13 stud rate last night. That’s good for a studly .307 stud-average. That’ll do, most nights.
One thing that should be mentioned was the play that Nate made in CF last night. It probably saved the game for the Braves last night.
.307 stud average is higher than the teams OBP.
You know what, I forgot to count Sherrill. We were studded 4 out of 14 last night, down to a .285 stud average. Still, quite serviceable.
csg said:
“Joe was talking the other day about Uggla’s BP. He said he was hitting moon shots down the LF line. If you were Parrish, wouldnt you want him hitting everything in BP up the middle and/or to RF??”
Yes! Yes! A thousand times yes!
This comment alone should indicate that the Braves’ hitting coach is incompetent or unable to get his hitters to listen to him. Doesn’t really matter which. Were I Wren, I’d tell Fredi that Parrish goes or everybody goes. Today.
Look. The pitching on this team is World Series-worthy. To diddle around with obviously flawed approaches just cannot be acceptable.
So here’s a crazy idea: Rafael Furcal.
Dodgers may have a fire-sale, he makes 12m. They have Dee Gordon at short, and with Furcal returning from the DL, they’re talking about playing him at 2nd. Jamey Carroll has played pretty well at second, and there are rumors that they may move him. Carroll only makes 1.8m, so moving Carroll doesn’t help them much.
Furcal can’t stay healthy, of course. But he’s GOT to be as good or better than Alex Gonzalez, right? And assuming Alex Gonzalez isn’t part of the trade (no reason he should be) then he’s your backup IF, with no more Lugo/Hicks/Diory.
Furcal is in his contract year, but he’s got a team option for 12m next year. With his 10/5 rights, he might demand it be exercised. But from his side, he has to know the Dodgers won’t exercise it. Maybe a chance to get healthy, prove himself for Free Agency, and do so for a winner, in a place he’s been comfortable before…
If he can play, he’s a lead-off hitter who gets on base and has speed, even if his stolen base days are behind him. And hes a switch hitter, which gives us a righty at the top when there’s a lefty starter.
Fredi obviously wants Chipper to stay off the field to DH vs. some of the AL clubs & I’m fine with that.
This organization never admits its failures in the best of cases, and absolutely would never concede defeat in the Yunel deal by trading for another SS.
Furcy and Lowe could compare notes.
If we’re targeting highly-paid Dodgers, we might as well go all out for Kemp.
Can you imagine…?
Okay, so… we make the move for Kemp, work out the details and the prospects and the money.. and then we say “You know what, keep Minor, Hoover, Bethancourt, and Lipka.. But swap Delgado in for Teheran, and in exchange, we’ll take Furcal’s contract off your hands.”
Do we even know if the Dodgers are allowed to move assets until the BKR judge rules on the motions?
@8 – He’s always had that problem. That doesn’t help to explain why he is struggling this year.
Derek Lowe, Randall Delgado, Arodys Vizcaino, and Jordan Schafer for Matt Kemp and Juan Uribe.
The Dodgers are having a fire sale?
“If we’re targeting highly-paid Dodgers, we might as well go all out for Kemp. Can you imagine…?”
Imagine another high-priced player with recently great offensive stats on another team coming here and doing diddly? Yeah.
Kemp, just last year, hit .249/.310/.450 in 668 PAs.
Kemp, in 2803 career PAs: .291/.346/.491. He’s 26 years old and plays CF. He makes $7.05 million this year and is arbitration-eligible for one last time next year. If he’s available, the Braves would be foolish not to try.
CF and SS are the only two positions that the Braves could realistically upgrade. If Kemp is available, most definitely, the Braves should try to bring him over.
I would take Kemp on my team. I don’t really want to pay the price it would take to get him. Also, no one wants Derek Lowe.
Ryan Madson to the DL.
Kemp, just last year, hit .249/.310/.450 in 668 PAs.
And yet the Dodgers refused to trade him, despite team concerns about his attitude and multiple willing takers for his services. I find that quite telling.
33—Nobody wants Uribe, either. I think the deal I proposed is a salary move that would benefit both teams.
Just saw this though…
•The Dodgers should sell off impending free agents like Hiroki Kuroda, Jamey Carroll, and Casey Blake, writes Jon Paul Morosi of FOX Sports, as well as non-tender candidate James Loney. How about MVP candidate Matt Kemp? “We trade him, and we’re done,” one member of the organization told Morosi.
It leaked that the Dodgers wanted to extend Kemp and Ethier earlier this month, and the Dodgers didn’t deny it. Even if they can’t do that now, it seems unlikely that they’d sell them off quickly before their situation has a chance to get settled.
If someone yells “FIRE SALE!” on a crowded blog, everyone scrambles for the MVP candidate, I suppose.
I don’t see how a team in financial trouble, that is bound to be sold, can gain by trading their best players, unless those players happen to be grossly overpaid.
If you want to sell your team for as much money as possible, doesn’t owning affordable talent help? Wouldn’t a buyer consider Ethier and Kemp to be assets?
On the other hand, Furcal..
Our team’s in pretty good shape. Once Prado replaces Wilkin on the roster, the only tweak will be to scrap Proctor and Two Name for Gearrin and a third catcher. Sadly, burning a roster spot on a bench-warming third catcher is the only way I can think to get Fredi to use Ross effectively.
The Braves are not going to trade for Matt Kemp.
How much financial trouble are the Dodgers really in?
We know the owner is a dope, but doesnt the team draw well?
What I am saying is that the Dodgers are an attractive acquisition for a billionaire and having a fire sale will drive there value down more than the 10 or 20 million that will be saved in payroll I would think.
If the Braves were to trade with the Dodgers, it would most likely be for a reliever. And they are not looking to immediately replace AAG.
Kemp was dating Rihanna last year. That presupposes a certain lifestyle not necessarily conducive to being a professional athlete. I honestly believe that’s the difference.
Dodger ticket sales are down 8,000 per game this year, I just read somewhere(CNNSI, I think); and that’s only ticket sales, not butts in the seats.
Yeah, they’re getting slammed at the gate, and McCourt has (as I understand it) already borrowed against future revenues in some form. The TV contract they wanted to sign is essentially another version of this — a crippling contract that is frontloaded so they can get money now to pay operating expenses, leaving the team getting far below market value for future TV rights.
Wow, that is a bad decline.
Who swoops in and buys that team?
@47, a friend of Buds. There is little interest in allowing just anyone to join the owners club. And actually, that might be the one good thing that a BKR judge could do in this case is force an auction.
That would be a helluva franchise to pick up on the cheap.
Wonder if MLB would let Mark Cuban into the picture. Unlike McCourt (and the Wilpons), he’s pretty liquid.
Unfortunately, he’s new money; and the way he runs the Mavs just wouldn’t fit the MLB owner mold, at least not since Ted and the Boss are no longer members.
It would be fun to watch Cuban irritate Selig like he does Stern, however.
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban calls the Los Angeles Dodgers’ situation a “mess,” but he hasn’t ruled out making a run at the team if it is put up for sale.
“I have an interest in Major League Baseball for the right deal,” Cuban said in an interview with TMZ.com. “But it’s just such a mess, right? I can’t imagine that it’s not going to be such a mess that it’s [not] going to make it hard to turn around.”
Whenever any team is about to go up for sale, Cuban’s name comes up. He says that he “looked at the Rangers. I looked at the Cubs.” But to him, the Dodgers’ financial woes are more of a hurdle.
“But if it’s just so screwed up, that the pieces are so messed up, that it takes 20 years to fix. … I mean, there’s literally franchises out there that are just in such disarray and such a mess, in multiple leagues, that no one can fix them,” he said to TMZ.com.
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=6691219
I predict someone named George jr. buys the dodgers.
There was a comment I heard (Dan Patrick show maybe?) that indicated that the bankruptcy court was not amused by MLB’s dealing with the Rangers a while back. To the effect that it might negatively impact their position in this case. Sorry, I know this is terribly light on the details, but that was the gist of it, if someone else has more color…
Also, Cuban is just too loud to get into the owners club. Personally I think he might be very good for the sport, but would be very surprised if he got the chance to prove it.
The Braves have a Cuban manager, why not a Cuban owner too?
Frenchy, perfectly encapsulated in a photo:
http://l.yimg.com/a/p/sp/editorial_image/18/181e9aff325c79b9380c36603b80896f/cirque_du_soleil_performer_gets_nutty_with_padres_first_pitch.jpg
Minor/Lipka for Ludwick/Bell.
@49, that would be the beauty of an auction – I don’t think that MLB could interfere in who the winning bidder was. McCourt is prohibited from selling without the judge’s consent, and it would be by far the best way to set real market value and obtain the max for the creditors as well as McCourt.
@56, I’d do that deal.
Me too, but I’m surprised Stu would.
Casey Kotchman, who has never hit over .300 for an entire season, added three more hits on Saturday night to raise his batting average to .342 for the year.
Maybe Liberty Media will sell the braves to buy the dodgers.
One can hope
@43
We couldn’t pass on a chance to get Rubby De La Rosa, right?
The nicknames alone are worth league minimum.
Or Minor/Lipka for Byrd/Wood.
@3 I was looking at that myself just yesterday, and I think the biggest tell that it’s not just, or even primarily, luck is how his IFFB% has jumped this year. It’s hard to get hits off of in-field fly balls. While anecdotally I feel he’s been somewhat unlikely with his few hard hit balls not falling often, the evidence seems to be that he’s not been making good contact. In fact, if you look at performance on particular pitches I think it’s very telling. He’s been much less productive on fastballs than previous years, but also better at with curveballs. This suggests to me that he has a timing issue (admittedly not a novel observation, as many have said so just from watching him).
Bodog has the odds of Mark Cuban purchasing LA Dodgers at 3/1. I wouldn’t make that bet.
Byrd’s on the DL so you can’t trade him, and he has 6.5M for next year on his deal. I’d be ok with him as the short term answer in CF if you think he can still play decently there, but I think I would need some money back on it.
This amuses me to no end: “As for righties, there has been some buzz that the Braves, desperate for offense, could use their rotation depth and trade a starter such as Jair Jurrjens. But the Yankees’ policy has become pretty much to run away from Atlanta pitching after having successful Braves hurlers such as Javier Vazquez, Kyle Farnsworth, Jaret Wright, Steve Karsay, Chris Hammond, Denny Neagle and [Rafael] Soriano blow up on them.”
http://www.nypost.com/p/sports/yankees/as_race_with_the_red_sox_heats_up_LYAR40t84JoCrlODGmAdgL#ixzz1QbKfZkL9
Perhaps one could pry Kirk Nieuwenhuis from the Mets? He looks ready to me.
#67 – Awesome.
Only starters I could see the braves actually trading are Lowe for salary relief or Minor/Vizcaino.
Are the Braves moving JJ Hoover to the bullpen?
http://web.minorleaguebaseball.com/milb/stats/stats.jsp?pos=P&sid=milb&t=p_pbp&pid=543331
Adam, that’s hilarious. The only one of those whom we actually traded to them is Javier Vazquez — who had already sucked in a Yankee uniform before we traded him to them.
Farnsworth, Wright, Karsay, Hammond, and Soriano were all free agent signings. Soriano, of course, played for the Rays after he played for us and before he got to New York, and they got Neagle in a trade with the Reds after Neagle had already left the Braves.
Moreover, Farnsworth, Karsay, Hammond, and Soriano were all 30-or-over middle relievers to whom they handed multiyear contracts, for which everyone criticized them at the time.
If the Yankees actually believe they’ve been burned by the Braves because they kept handing out multimillion contracts to middle relievers, then Hank Steinbrenner really is dumber than his father.
Game thread. Once again, morning recap, maybe fairly late morning this time.