The Braves are currently 75 and 75 and are 4.5 games out of the last Wild Card position. The true Braves fan in me says they could get into the Wild Card game and then make it to the World Series and upset the American League champ. The realist in me says this will not happen.
The Braves just cannot score runs with any consistency. The lack of clutch hitting over this season has been extremely frustrating. I like Justin Upton a lot but with just ever so slightly better clutch numbers he would probably have 20 more RBI and be leading the league. A big stat I just found is that Atlanta only has 26 Sacrifice Flies this year. That is 6 less than any other team in the National League.
A stat I heard on Friday's TV broadcast was that the Braves had scored 1 or 0 runs in 37 games this year. That is basically a quarter of the season. Add in the games that the Braves scored 2 runs and is must be a third of the season, at least.
Best example of the team weakness is when the Phillies no-hit them on Labor Day the Braves had runners on second and third with nobody out in the first inning and could not get a run in.
The only reason the Braves aren't last in the majors in runs scored is that the San Diego Padres are absolutely pathetic this year.
The pitching has been good. I don't think that anyone can be mad at Julio Teheran, Alex Wood, Aaron Harang and Ervin Santana but Mike Minor has been too inconsistent for my liking. They have, arguably, the best closer in baseball in Craig Kimbrel and an overall team ERA of 3.35 so nothing wrong with the pitching overall.
I think a complete clean out of the coaching staff is in order (that means you Terry Pendleton), if not the manager, and Frank Wren is not making the offensive deals that need to be made. Dan Uggla was a total bust in the end and it looks like BJ Upton could follow in his footsteps. Wouldn't any Braves fan still like to have Michael Bourn in center field instead of BJ? Ryan Doumit has not brought the big bat we thought we were getting and Chris Johnson has become useless against right-handed pitching, although I am hoping that he can bounce back next year.
This season has done nothing to change my plan to stop rooting for the Braves when they leave us every day, public transportation riding fans behind and move to Cobb County in a few years. They're moving away from Hank Aaron Drive!
See you in the sports pages,
Scott
The Braves just cannot score runs with any consistency. The lack of clutch hitting over this season has been extremely frustrating. I like Justin Upton a lot but with just ever so slightly better clutch numbers he would probably have 20 more RBI and be leading the league. A big stat I just found is that Atlanta only has 26 Sacrifice Flies this year. That is 6 less than any other team in the National League.
A stat I heard on Friday's TV broadcast was that the Braves had scored 1 or 0 runs in 37 games this year. That is basically a quarter of the season. Add in the games that the Braves scored 2 runs and is must be a third of the season, at least.
Best example of the team weakness is when the Phillies no-hit them on Labor Day the Braves had runners on second and third with nobody out in the first inning and could not get a run in.
The only reason the Braves aren't last in the majors in runs scored is that the San Diego Padres are absolutely pathetic this year.
The pitching has been good. I don't think that anyone can be mad at Julio Teheran, Alex Wood, Aaron Harang and Ervin Santana but Mike Minor has been too inconsistent for my liking. They have, arguably, the best closer in baseball in Craig Kimbrel and an overall team ERA of 3.35 so nothing wrong with the pitching overall.
I think a complete clean out of the coaching staff is in order (that means you Terry Pendleton), if not the manager, and Frank Wren is not making the offensive deals that need to be made. Dan Uggla was a total bust in the end and it looks like BJ Upton could follow in his footsteps. Wouldn't any Braves fan still like to have Michael Bourn in center field instead of BJ? Ryan Doumit has not brought the big bat we thought we were getting and Chris Johnson has become useless against right-handed pitching, although I am hoping that he can bounce back next year.
This season has done nothing to change my plan to stop rooting for the Braves when they leave us every day, public transportation riding fans behind and move to Cobb County in a few years. They're moving away from Hank Aaron Drive!
See you in the sports pages,
Scott
Comments
Post a Comment