I didn’t watch this game, and judging from the box score my limited Internet access this evening was a blessing. This was basically Monday’s game minus the improbable comeback. That means the Braves are back to a losing streak, the Braves bullpen is back to putting up zeros on the board, and the Braves offense is back to hitting no home runs. Yes, life is back to normal. The dream world was nice while it lasted.
The Williamses started and were not much improved over their last start. Mr. Hyde appears to be overpowering Dr. Jekyll in that duo at the moment. They lasted six innings, gave up 10 hits and 6 runs. Jake Brigham and Ryan Kelly closed out the game without further damage, but contrary to recent experiences, being down 6-0 against the Giants is not something you can recover from.
Ryan Lavarnway doubled in Jace Peterson in the 7th to put the Braves on the board and avoid being shut out. That is actually a pretty decent accomplishment. I mean, the Braves starting lineup had Jonny Gomes hitting 3rd and Chris Johnson hitting cleanup. Top to bottom, the Braves lineup wasn’t exactly what you’d call intimidating. There are AAA lineups that are more fearsome. Heck, some AA lineups might give that one a run for its money.
The Braves will now turn their attention to celebrating Alumni weekend when the Marlins come to town, which will give Braves fans the chance to dwell on happier times and Atlanta’s lone world championship. Memories and hope for a return to that are all we got right now.
John Gant for M Braves tonight: 6ip, 1 hit, 9k, 2 walks
Mark Bradley of the AJC ripped CJ a new one: http://markbradley.blog.ajc.com/2015/08/05/the-braves-chris-johnson-master-of-the-total-head-spasm/
Busty Poser is annoying but he knows how to hit!
When I saw the Braves official Instagram post the lineup card picture earlier today I broke a rib with laughter. What a joke…
For some reason, when I read Mark Bradley, I remember this near delusional fanboy article he wrote after the BJ Surhoff trade–something like “maybe his bat will have 20 hits in it this October”.
Seasons like this make you miss Skip and Pete.
You didn’t miss much, ‘Rissa. Neither did your recap; it was spot on.
Watching the post-waiver trade deadline Braves requires an absolute love of baseball that I often cannot manufacture. It’s not whether they win or lose but how they play the game.
They’re playing it rather poorly right now with occasional bursts of adequacy; but I have hope for the future.
Liberty Media’s latest filings show Braves revenue down $14 million from this time last year, and $59 million committed to player and coaching salary in 2016.
Good for Bradley. One of my pet peeves is that beat writers will never criticize the players. I understand that they have to see them every day, but the endless sucking up to players and failure to call them out when truly appropriate irks me.
@8 – I wonder how it compares to 2013 revenues – I’d imagine last year’s mediocre results had to lead to some kind of decline compared to the previous 96 win team. I also wonder about the likely collapse in revenue beyond just attendance drop. I saw somewhere that Braves tickets are the third cheapest in baseball this year, and anecdotally, I’ve seen a ton of ticket giveaways and discounts. I’ve been to 7 or 8 games so far myself and haven’t paid for tickets for a single one of them. Friends who have access to corporate season ticket accounts have gotten them with much more regularity, which makes me think there might be a ton of non-renewals next season for corporate accounts. Given rapidly declining revenues, counting on any spending at all in free agency next year seems wishful at best, so any improvement in the team is going to count on a ton of winning prospect lottery tickets.
Obviously there will be some kind of revenue boost for the new park, but it’s fair to wonder whether Liberty Media will view shopping mall and restaurant revenue as relevant to the budget for the baseball team that happens to play next to the shopping mall and restaurants.
Bradley isn’t really a beat writer, though. He’s a sports columnist, and since he isn’t dependent on access the way a beat writer is, he has more leeway to criticize. This is what makes it remarkable how rarely he criticizes anything the Braves do. Yeah, CJ is the low-hanging fruit who has made himself an easy target by demanding a trade, and Frank Wren is no longer with the team.
…coming Monday, the Clerihew
a new way to vent.
Nothing like a good, old-fashioned payroll death spiral to get the blood pumping.
Last night at the GABP Tom Brennaman who is not known locally for talking around a point came up with this lulu as JHey came to the plate(0 for 4, hitting third)-
‘How can the Cardinals offer this guy a new contract? He’s played almost every game(103), hit 9 home runs, driven in 35.’ On cue Jason popped up after the usual display of tics, jerks and stutters ( God, it still hurts to watch this, the more so having watched Posey all week- smooooth).
My point/question is this. Last Winter there seemed to be a consensus on here that as a FA he could command, maybe,a $200 million contract. Gone, done, obviously. Now I don’t believe he’ll get half of that and here’s why.
Look at his next contract not in terms of how many years or how much a year but simply on the total you are committing to him, the bottom line. Would you commit $100 million to him, would you? Good defense,9/35 in August. I wouldn’t and i love the guy. Extrapolation doesn’t change the basics.
If i’m wrong please explain why.
@10 – I’ve been a season ticket holder since 1992 and I am not planning to renew next year. Just about everything the Braves have done in the way of treatment of season ticket holders over the last couple of years has finally driven me away. I had hoped to be able to say I had season tickets for all of the seasons of Turner Field but I just can’t stomach it.
@14 I agree with what you have stated completely. I do not see a team sinking that much money on Heyward on perceived potential. He’s been in the league long enough to have an established body of work. At this point in time, it looks like his big homerun season is not going to be the norm due to his performance power wise being around the same every other year. I am anxious to see what type of contract he eventually ends up with.
@10, I think the die was cast for the lame-duck seasons at the Ted. Attendance decline was definitely going to be hard to avoid. The reason I’m so pissed at management is that they virtually guaranteed a revenue death spiral by dismantling the team. They made a bad situation much worse. The “rebuild” was going to be a tough thing to go through no matter when they started it. They should’ve delayed it one year and let the fans watch JUp and Heyward and Gattis one more season.
Blowing up the team that had some exciting and likable players on it has cost them a bunch of casual fans.
Yes it’s definitely true that the same 2014 lineup might’ve sucked again this year. But they won the division the year before so at least there was hope. There’s no hope with this roster, and won’t be for many season. Punting away a year of hope ticks me off and alienates me as a fan.
I would gladly have Jason Heyward back here at $100 million over 6 years. I’m not willing to pay 100 cents on the dollar for corner OF defense, but 50 cents, sure.
I think someone will take a flier on him for a 9-figure deal (or is it a flyer?). He’s just too young and too good not to, what with all the obscene amounts being thrown at 31-year-olds these days.
@15
Hap, that’s a heck of a track record, 22 years, commiserations that you have to let it go.
On the upside, the more the attendance drops, the better the traffic will be on Cobb Parkway in 2017. Right?
I’m more worried about traffic on 75. I’m going to have to stop at NCS@WFF just so I can have a drink and wait it out.
@14
He’s so young someone will give him at least the Ellsbury contract (7 @ 153). I’d love to see him back, but I don’t think the Braves would pay him that much.
@14
In a vacuum, I don’t see why not. As it is, we’ve already got a worse player signed for a contract that big–so it might strain the budget a little bit to add on.
Anyway, you framed the question wrong, basing it on an 0-4 night at the plate. Heyward had an awful, awful, awful April. But for the past 4 months, he’s been better than an .800 OPS hitter, he’s stolen 16 bases while only getting caught twice, and if you believe the numbers he is, once again, playing the best right field in baseball.
So the real questions are:
1.) Is Heyward an .800 OPS hitter?
2.) Will he ever have a decent April again?
3.) Is an .800 OPS hitter who plays a stellar right field at age 26 worth a $100 million/year contract?
I have a friend who is a big Padres fan. I talked to him about what seemed to be the Padres spending a lot of money for very little return (their record was the same as Atlanta at the time). He had a different take than I expected: season ticket sales, excitement and revenue were all up even though the product on the field hadn’t improved drastically.
For the Braves, it looks like the opposite has happened. Similar record to last year’s (although it’s on a huge downward trend lately), but revenues are down sharply. I still like what we’ve done, but I think this puts more pressure on competing and bringing back the fan base in 2016
Speaking of the Padres and other tragicomic things:
Melvin, 2015: .237/.317/.366 – 94 wRC+, 0.7 fWAR (105 PA)
Maybin, 2015: .266/.327/.373 – 95 wRC+, 0.7 fWAR (393 PA)
(Ben Duronio pointed this out on twitter)
Its going to be interesting. Heyward is having a good season. I’d say that the only thing the Cards could be disappointed by is April and his lack of homerun power. Personally I think the Jacoby comparison is invalid. Jacoby signed with the Yankees, who never overpay their players and he is a dang center fielder not a corner outfielder. It’ll be interesting to see what he gets this off season. I can pretty much safely say he won’t be a Brave.
I’m still kind of shell shocked by all the trades. I understand them but it sucks that we went from at least competitive to not really. At least this is better than the bad old days when it didn’t seem like the team had a plan. We have a plan but we sure are hoping for a face card and a 10.
@23
my thoughts had precisely nothing to do with Heyward’s night at the plate…
rather than with those two numbers which shocked me..9 and 35 after 102 games…
which means awful Aprils or wonderful Mays get sucked into the ether for me…
you eventually have to ask yourself just exactly what it is you’re paying for.
BTW…what happened to your Milton on the Fourth, did I miss it?
I’m also shell shocked, understand the plan, but I don’t think we’re needing the type of luck that “face card and a 10” implies. We’ll certainly need some pitchers to stay healthy and develop, but we should have enough resources to get moving by next year. Regardless of what their financials are currently reporting, we’ll make a couple FA signings, and we’ll make some trades from our area of strength (pitching) to land some hitters.
You are right. The plan is more than just luck. Its a solid strategy. Hart and co are right to use pitching as currency. They are right that good pitching will defeat good hitting 70% of the time. I guess I’m still wrapping my brain around trading a good lefty under team control + your ‘best’ prospect for a ”30″ year old Cuban that has only a few PAs in the dang PCL on his resume.
Cameron Maybin has gone from poster child for the Seitzer method to proof that hitting coaches don’t matter one whit. He’s basically the same hitter he was in 2011. The only difference in his overall value is that his defense measures out way worse.
@23, I don’t see why not either. The opportunity cost to buy an FA of Jason’s current output is nontrivial to say the least, and his age and reasonable chance for improvement on that are big value adds.
@30 It’s amazing how far Maybin’s perceived value has fallen in the last month or so, isn’t it?
Demi. God.
Adonis Garcia is the new Folk Hero.
I hope Wisler turns out to be good. Sometimes he looks like he has the goods. Sometimes he looks like another guy with a straight low-90’s fastball.
Are ancient Greeks allowed to be folk, or is he our epic hero? I’m for either, I just don’t want other mlb-team-journal sites to accuse us of not thinking through our sobriquets.
@blazon, As for the fourth, I plead the 5th. Well, not really. There were family obligations keeping me away all day, and I was not clever enough to write one in advance. I’ve been searching for poetic occasions–I was surprised you missed my e.e. cummings riff when we extended Fredi, but no one was living in the pretty how town that day, I guess.
His strikeout rates in the majors are not very good so far
Wisler doesn’t look like anything special to me. This team is going to miss Alex Wood next season.
It’s going to take about 30 starts before we know what Wisler is.
Didn’t we win 9-8 the other day?
I believe someone used Olivera and Garcia’s similar numbers in Cuba to criticize the Wood deal.
Not that it matters much, but it’s always nice to win.
some of these young Braves are fun to watch!
Any word on why Whalen came out for Carolina?
First career save for Vizcaino: may he have many more wearing our laundry.
@36
Edward..eec is not within my, limited, ken..limey you know. but i know enough about him to suggest he might be a rich vein here if you would care to lead…this time though please so identify initially while i/we do our homework. Meanwhile enjoy the Clerihew which starts on Monday with a ripe plum from AR and i suspect will suit your style. Cheers.
Recapped.