It was a classic Braves game from years past: good pitching, many scoring opportunities lost, but just managing to eke out a victory. Oh, and there was a “Prado,” too:
Prado: Martin Prado has mastered the ability to make horrible plays on defense without being charged with errors — routine ground balls he waves at, “tough†plays that he botches for no reason, the old reliable bad relay on the double play. This leads to the term “Pradoâ€, which is both a noun and a verb: Prado, n. “an egregious misplay that is not scored an error for some reason.†Prado, v. “To commit a Pradoâ€. … The preceding was written by Mac during Prado’s third season in the majors. He’s really gotten a lot better since then. (Added May 6, 2008, edited September 23, 2012.)
The good Williams Perez showed up again, leaving both bad ones behind. They went six innings and did some expert wriggling, managing to yield just two runs on seven hits and a walk. The Braves offense did Braves offense things: Ender Inciarte opened the game by getting thrown out at second trying to stretch a hit into a double. Immediately after that, the next two men got on via a single and a hit by pitch, and naturally they were stranded, too, as were the two men who got leadoff singles in the second. The team actually got 14 hits, but the decisive two runs came in the eighth inning on a line drive that Martin Prado failed to corral.
Bud Norris, Ian Krol, and Arodys Vizcaino pitched three scoreless innings to shut the door. All in all, a good day at the office.
Aybar DL’d.
I was looking at our roster and had worked up a lineup in my mind that gave us the best chance to win, and sure enough, Snitker has the exact same lineup today:
Smith, CF
Beckham, 2B
Freeman, 1B
Flowers, C
Markakis, RF
Francoeur, LF
Garcia, 3B
d’Arnaud, SS
I had thought we had seen the last of Garcia at 3B since he seemed to spend the majority of his time playing LF in AAA, but if he can keep from kicking it nightly, I love this direction. Pretty horrendous defensively, but getting Aybar off the field immediately improves the defense anyway. Fortunately Mallex has enough range to make up for Frency and Markakis.
Assuming Markakis breaks out of his slump and Garcia can split the difference between 2015 and 2016 moving forward, that’s probably the first lineup we’ve had in several years that has a .700 OPS at every single position.
Also, can someone figure out what the cumulative ERA for the current 12 members on our pitching staff?
Well, that didn’t last long. d’Arnaud was replaced by Castro.
for any so inclined…
…at 2.45 this afternoon your local Fox station will show the championship final of European club soccer, as close to a Superbowl comparison as you could get.
Curiously, both teams are from the same city, Madrid. Try it, you might even like it!
My thank you to four position players. Too readily tarred with the same brush as the pure dross, they have stayed cheerful, hustled and made some of our evenings even fun. And because, by our standards, they can hit. Salut.
Jeff Francouer
there were so many of us so sure
so wrong
Chihuahua power, one deafened, was still his siren song.
Gordon Beckham
so David called, surprised you still could deck’em
but not so Spice
who’d always thought those Braves -well, you know, Chip her secret vice.
Chase D’Arnau
the Lady Mets are on the phone, it’s always comparo
they’re stuck with his awful looking brother
they want a trade, Conforto for the other.
1-800-Flowers
who could have foreseen his massive off-field powers?
the White Sox contingent
responding well to Braves BP, they find it very stringent.
Didn’t a “Prado” come to mean “showed up at the ballpark early, started at whatever position was needed that day, and got three hits”? :p
D’Arnaud was in a minor car accident on the way to the ballpark. That’s why he was scratched. Still available to play
Yeah if I recall, “Prado” entered the lexicon before Prado had established himself, and subsequently won all our hearts. After that time it seemed nitpicky to give a damn if he caught the ball or not, because all he did was hit .320 in the 2-spot and play everywhere but catcher and centerfield.
Frenchy has earned more PT
AAR, I distributed the journalistic masterpiece you posted yesterday to several of my old decrepit buddies. Without exception, they felt your article truly captured what it’s been like to root for the Braves since they came south.
Thank you again for your effort.
@Nocahoma and the free agent discussion on the last thread, I don’t have a wager about how or when or if the FO will make a free agent splash except that I don’t think it will be in the next year. This is due to the FA crop and the marginal benefit of additional wins to the 2017 squad.
Based on statements from the FO that FA acquisitions tend to underperform and disappoint, I wouldn’t be surprised if they actually target one elite level player (yes including Harper) rather than several mediocre players (like BJ Upton and Derek Lowe). I personally agree with that strategy, so perhaps it’s wishful thinking.
To illustrate this idea, it’s not that hard to pick up a catcher as good as Tyler flowers for nothing. It costs a fortune to marginally upgrade him to a matt wieters. It has a minimal impact on the team’s win total. It makes more sense to develop talent, sign bargains, and target an elite player who will actually be a bargain in dollars per war
Well played, Braves; and pitched, Aaron.
I think they need to look at bumping Freeman down in the order. I don’t know if it’s mental, but the dude just can’t get a runner home to save his life. He can’t even make contact when you just need a medium flyball. Even in this offense, there’s just no reason to have 15 RBIs this late in the season when you have 8 HR. It’s got to be in his noggin.
I dare say Frenchtoast is superior to his last Braves incarnation.
Seriously–assuming Blair works through his rookie yips, we may have 5 pitchers who can post a sub-4.00 era in the second half of the season. That is an above average starting rotation even before we get into the bust potential of Lucas sims and kolby Allard. It’s hard for me to get too worried about our starting pitching.
Gordon Beckham is unequivocally our best free agent signing of the season
@14
Yeah, you have to be pretty pessimistic to not be encouraged. And then you have Jenkins, Newcomb, and Ellis, and probably some trade value out of Weber and Gant.
The Mets just got James Loney for cash, and we can’t get a replacement level shortstop? Double-u tee eff?
Edwin Jackson, bless his heart.
What would possess a team to intentionally acquire Edwin Jackson?
home run, Dansby Swanson
Rosenthal through MLBTR:
The Braves will only trade right-hander Julio Teheran if they can get a major league hitter of similar quality and age in return, general manager John Coppolella told Rosenthal. “The days of us trading players like Teheran for prospects are over. We need to get better at the major league level. We would have to be overwhelmed to move Teheran,” Coppolella said. Teheran, 25, is off to a strong start this year (2.57 ERA, 8.43 K/9, 2.43 BB/9 in 63 innings) and is signed to a reasonable contract through 2020.
I could get behind that.
Who hangs up first: Teheran for Nolan Arenado?
Rockies. Arenado is one of the top 5-10 position players in MLB. Tehran is a top 25 pitcher, maybe top 15 with maturation.
Teheran is also signed to a team friendly deal if he reaches top-15 with maturation.
Make a counter-offer.
@22 Yeah, they’d laugh at that deal…
I guess I haven’t kept up enough to see why the Rockies would want to trade arenado now. Isn’t he still a few years from free agency?
Julio’s a good get. He’s also a good keep. You better get overwhelmed if you trade him, Coppy.
So,how many of you predicted that after 48 games of all players appearing in at least 25 games, the top 4 in OPS would be Beckham, Freeman, Flowers, and Francouer? Of course this is an indication that the Braves are really bad hitters, but Beckham with a .905 OPS in 82 at bats is crazy!
ManBan is stretching out: 3.2 IP, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K in AAA tonight.
What to do with Dansby now? Another HR tonight, and he has close to a .900 OPS in more games than he played at Carolina. With Albies struggling at AAA, they probably won’t call Albies up, so do you go ahead and move Albies to 2B so that Swanson can get the call to AAA? Do you just call Swanson to the bigs?
I’d hate to see Teheran traded to the Rockies. I genuinely like the guy and just hate to see that happen to pitchers I like.
@29, At some point don’t you have to move one of those two over to second base? (Or third, or wherever?) Albies can hang loose in AAA while Dansby gets promoted to join him. Let ’em play together for a while. I’d prefer to get a lot more losing in before we call up the rookies.
I’d rather see Braves go after 2 MLB-ready top prospects (hitter and pitcher) than 1 established hitter.
Ask the Gnats if they’re glad they skipped Michael Taylor past AAA
Arenado’s career OPS outside of Coors is 749. He’s essentially Vinny Castilla — good player, particularly suited to his home ballpark, seriously overrated.
Yeah I don’t want any Rockies or DBacks hitters. Not until a park-effects-discount becomes a thing.
@33 Arenado is Vinny Castilla? That drastically undersells him; I’d say Arenado is more like Scott Rolen – gold glove defender, middle of the order pop. Arenado is no Coors Field creation; last season he hit 22 HRs with an .835 OPS away from home. He just turned 25 and has improved his BB/K rate from .38 (career) to .83 this season. I wouldn’t put Arenado on the level of Harper/Trout/Machado, but he’s within shouting distance especially considering the possibility that he is developing his OBP game. Likely a 5+ WAR guy for years to come. If the Braves were somehow to acquire Arenado, it would instantly make the on-field product competitive.
Greetings from Detroit…
Looks like I missed all the fun.
Recap is up, finally. Sorry about that!