Just your average night where Bryce Elder outdueled Sandy Alcantara, all nine men in the lineup reached base safely thanks to nine hits and nine (!) walks, and it was all over in about two hours and forty minutes. If the Braves hadn’t gone 1-11 with men in scoring position, it might’ve taken a little longer, but it’s awfully hard to complain about a single thing that happened tonight. Kirby Yates and Joe Jimenez took over from Bryce Elder, giving the bullpen a much-needed night off. Neither of them looked like the next coming of O’Ventbrel, but they got the six outs we needed, and the team rolled on.
So… about Bryce Elder. His Statcast page is like a cuckoo’s egg inside a Tiffany box: blue, and more blue. He doesn’t have velocity, and when his pitches get hit, they can really get yanked. But he’s getting swings and misses, and like Dylan Lee, he’s walking the tightrope of staying out of the heart of the zone while also avoiding walks. He’s got an old-school sinker-slider mix, but Statcast sees his slider as by far his most valuable pitch, while the sinker he throws even more often has nowhere near the effectiveness in getting outs. He’s had a really nice start to this season, but before I start believing that he’s turned some kind of corner, I’d like to see more evidence of a repeatable skill.
The top of the lineup went 3-12 with six walks, and that’ll do just fine. Unfortunately, Marcell Ozuna played his first game in a week and had his best game since last October: two singles and a walk with a run scored in five appearances. His days are still numbered, no doubt, but they ought to be negative numbers.
I tuned in around the 7th inning or so, so I don’t have much other brilliant insight to share. But I do have one bit of news. Last week, I proposed to my girlfriend, and she said yes. And the Braves are in first place.
As Manuel Maloof once said: “Anybody don’t like this life is crazy.”
Well … Congratulations, Alex!
Congratulations! Does she know what she’s getting into? Has she seen the scouting report?
Thank you Mr. Remington.
Congratulations Alex.
Thanks AAR and congratulations. The Braves have not lost a series since The Proposal. Well done.
Congratulations, Alex.
Go Braves.
Congratulations!
Congratulations!
Alex, what wonderful news! Elder is a hard one to figure out.
Career ERA: 2.60
Career FIP: 3.70
Career xFIP: 3.90
No matter the real ERA or expected, those are great results.
Then…there’s the minors:
2022: 4.46 ERA in 105 IP at AAA
I’m still baffled by his MLB results. Maybe it’s the contrast? Take his arsenal and throw him into the 90s and he’s one in a million. In today’s game, he’s an outlier.
As far as I can tell, his 2022 was partly result to a spike in his home run rate. But fundamentally, I have a much easier time believing his xERA – 4.25 last year, 4.38 this year – than his ERA. And that wouldn’t be a terrible thing! It would be perfectly fine for a fifth starter.
My null hypothesis on Bryce Elder is that he’s the guy his components say he is. Ninety innings into his tender major league career, he’s outperforming them to a wonderful degree. But just like we all knew that Jesse Chavez wouldn’t stay at 0.00 for the year, we know that Bryce Elder won’t keep his ERA below 2.00 the whole year. So the pendulum will swing. How he handles that adversity will say a lot about the kind of career he’s bound to have.
Same for Michael Harris II, by the way. He’s not much used to the Mendoza line. But I loved his hustle double yesterday, and he hit one hard at the end of the game that looked like it would be an RBI single before it got speared by the shortstop. Once he gets through this slump, he’ll come out stronger on the other side.
This is Austin Riley’s profile right now. Yikes. The offense will work itself out, but I think the defense is who he is and that’s not so great.
IMG_6979
He’s in a bad funk right now but will get out of it with a vengeance. With him and eventually Harris III back to normal, this team is just scary.
Remember when I said the Braves should go with Elder over Shuster and Dodd? Pepperidge Farms remembers.
I think you’re in line for a ball spike! That was a great call.
You were right
Mazel Tov, Alex!! And a Manuel Maloof reference! Manny was right about that.
Toda raba 🙂
I remember, Chief; you were right about Elder, and you deserve full credit. Now, as to Jason Isbell….
I’ll take Sturgill Simpson and y’all can have the rest.
Congrats, Alex!
We already knew this but now it’s broken down for the whole internet to see how bad of a play (and decision not to challenge) this was. (Thankfully we still won the game)
https://www.closecallsports.com/2023/05/braves-fail-to-challenge-bona-fide.html
Someone said the other day that Riley needs to spend some BP time with Chipper, and I think that’s a good idea. Chipper could also work with MHII.
Another big congats to AAR!
Re: Great Live Sports Events
For me, many of the “greatest” live games I’ve seen were losses: In ’82, UGA loses to Penn St. 27-23 in Sugar Bowl; In ’12 UGA loses to Bama 32-28 in the SEC title game; In ’81, Falcons lose to Drew Pearson/Cowboys in NFC playoffs; In ’94, Devils lose Game 6 to Mark Messier & his “guarantee”; In ’96, the Braves lose to Jim Leyritz; & in ’10, there was the Brooks Conrad game. See what I mean?
Anyway, these are the best ones from the 6 major US sports:
College Football: Georgia 65 TCU 7 (2023). National Championship game, SoFi Stadium, Inglewood, Calif.
Personal fave. For all-round greatness, this one stands alone.
Best Game: Georgia 19 Auburn 14 (1982), Jordan-Hare Stadium, Auburn, Ala.
Larry Munson’s “look-at-the-sugar-falling-out-of-the-sky” game. UGA clinches SEC title with a memorable, last-minute defensive stand. I climbed a barbed-wire fence to get in & got chased to the top of the stadium… but somehow lost the War Eagle security team. Hey, I was 19.
NFL: I’ve only seen about a dozen NFL games in-person, including just 2 playoff games. Falcons gagged one up at home (30-27 to Dallas ’81) & got thumped on the road in the other one (24-2 to NYG ’12). The Cowboys game was great for about 57 minutes, then Drew Pearson happened.
College Basketball: Georgia 86, LSU 85 (1990), UGA Coliseum, Athens, Ga.
UGA wins its only SEC regular-season hoops title by erasing a 19-point, 2nd-half deficit, beating Shaq & Chris Jackson on a free-throw by a rail-thin, back-up center from the Virgin Islands named Neville Austin. Fans storm the court.
NBA: Hawks 123, Bulls 95 (1986), The Omni, Atlanta
Dominique scores 57, Jordan scores 41 & gets half the content for his “Come Fly With Me” video. ’Nique was on fire with his usual astonishing repertoire, but Michael Jordan was a cartoon character that night, just unreal.
NHL: Devils 3 Ducks 0 (2003) Game 7 Stanley Cup Final, Meadowlands, E. Rutherford, N.J.
The Devils win & hoist their 3rd Cup with another Martin Brodeur shutout.
MLB (tie): Yankees 6 Red Sox 5, 11 innings (2003) ALCS Game 7, Yankee Stadium, Bronx, N.Y.
The Aaron Boone HR Game. Never been inside a ballpark that was so completely nerved out. (At that point, the Sawx had never beaten the Yanks in a big spot, so there was that strange mix of expectation & fear.) What’s funny is that I’m sure I was the only fan in the stadium who didn’t really care who won – but everyone else was cleaning out their diapers the whole game. Went to World Series Game 1 vs. the Marlins two nights later & the place was dead, still completely exhausted.
Braves 10 Mets 9, 11 innings (1999) NLCS Game 6, Turner Field, Atlanta
The Andruw Jones Walk-Off Walk Game. Given the fact that a Game 7 loomed after the Braves took a 3-0 series lead, the back-and-forth of this game was positively excruciating – a big lead blown, followed by 2 late comebacks, then the weird walk-off. But so many big moments from both sides (Mike Piazza & Melvin Mora, Ozzie Guillen & Gerald Williams) made this one so memorable. All’s well that ends well.
Mets losing early in the 1st game of a DH in Detroit. Scherzer returns in Game 2.
By the close of business tonight, the lead could be as much as 5 games or as little as 2.
The Odd Symmetry: Tampa Bay is playing .800 ball, while Oakland has shrunk to the .200 mark.
The best illustration of the difference between trying to win and not trying to win. They’re both skinflints, but Tampa seems to believe that winning has value, while Oakland appears to believe that winning would only make it harder for them to get out of Dodge.
Our old pal Joey Wentz is not helping us in this one. Mets up in the 6th.
And the Mutts lose!
Fangraphs seems to think Soroka is going to start the first game of the Orioles series on Friday. Anyone know anything about that?
Oh well. Looks like FG changed their minds and have Jesse Chavez starting tomorrow and pushing Max back to the first game of the Orioles series. I was hoping to see how they handled bringing up Soroka.