2015 Atlanta Braves

[canes21]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

This is a 1st place team in the NL East with an average bullpen. Give them a pen that finishes in 15th or 16 place in all of the majors and they are in 1st place right now. They may not make it really far into the playoffs, but they'd be in first at this point.

What we have is literally the worst bullpen in baseball. After tonight their ERA might be over 5. It's ridiculous and kills any positives seen this year. Sure, maybe coming into the year the expectations weren't high, but we've seen this team can compete and win, and when the bullpen is costing us more games than not, it is irritating. Throw away any preseason expectations. The fact of the matter is this team should be above .500 and possibly in 1st. The only thing keeping them from that is the worst bullpen in organizational history.

[KSUowls]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

I won't claim to be an expert on the MLB draft, and maybe the two guys we got at 14 and 28 are great value picks. I'm a bit surprised that we did not take a stab at a position player with either of those picks though.

[Sportsforever]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

I won't claim to be an expert on the MLB draft, and maybe the two guys we got at 14 and 28 are great value picks. I'm a bit surprised that we did not take a stab at a position player with either of those picks though.

Not going to lie, our draft picks surprised me because 1) high school pitchers are far and away the riskiest commodity and 2) we need hitting. I'll trust they know what their doing...we certainly need a bullpen.

[canes21]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

How rare, the bullpen loses another game. I actually had some hopes for the year after seeing how hard this team plays, but I've lost any hope because of this bullpen. It is costing this team a 1st place spot right now and it is pretty frustrating to watch on a nightly basis. This is literally the worst bullpen in Atlanta history. That's pathetic. It's a pathetic bunch of pitchers and a terrible manager that helps them none.

[Sportsforever]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

How rare, the bullpen loses another game. I actually had some hopes for the year after seeing how hard this team plays, but I've lost any hope because of this bullpen. It is costing this team a 1st place spot right now and it is pretty frustrating to watch on a nightly basis. This is literally the worst bullpen in Atlanta history. That's pathetic. It's a pathetic bunch of pitchers and a terrible manager that helps them none.

I'm really at the point where I don't know what Freddie is doing...every night he rolls out the same guys with the same results. Miller had made 94 pitches through 7 innings...let him go 8 and give the ball to Grilli with a 2-run lead. Freddie also bears some blame though...you can't let that ball hit you. Cost us at least a run.

[canes21]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

The only positive I can think of right now is that Gonzalez will not be here next year at this rate. He'll be gone and I expect Hart to revamp the bullpen in the offseason shall this be the way the year goes.

Were those two occurrences to take place, I'd feel very good about next season. However, it's depressing that I'm already dreaming of next year in the first two weeks of June. That's not Braves baseball.

[DonkeyJote]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

Not going to lie, our draft picks surprised me because 1) high school pitchers are far and away the riskiest commodity and 2) we need hitting. I'll trust they know what their doing...we certainly need a bullpen.

#1, I agree with. In my limited knowledge of player development, college pitchers seem to be the better choice, and high school position players. #2, though, I strongly disagree yet. You never, EVER, draft for need in baseball. You have no idea what your needs will be 2, 3, 4, 5 years down the line when they crack the major league roster. You draft the best players you can, and accumulate assets. And if you end up with a surplus of pitching, and a hitting defecit, then you use your pitching assets to acquire hitting.

I'm really at the point where I don't know what Freddie is doing...every night he rolls out the same guys with the same results. Miller had made 94 pitches through 7 innings...let him go 8 and give the ball to Grilli with a 2-run lead. Freddie also bears some blame though...you can't let that ball hit you. Cost us at least a run.

Miller is already on pace for 222 innings, about 40 more than last year, which was 10 more than the year before that. And you want him to go in the 8th of a random game in June when he's already at 94 pitches? A fairly efficient inning, and he's at 110 for the game there. He gives up a hit and goes deep into another count, and you've put our 24 year old starter at 120 pitches for what? A June win? That's how you get a guy like Shelby to fall apart in September. He's already at the point where you probably have to monitor his innings pretty closely towards the end of the year so that he has anything left fir 2016. He ends 7 with 94 pitches in June, you take him out unless he's working on a no hitter.

[LowerWolf]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

I'm really at the point where I don't know what Freddie is doing...every night he rolls out the same guys with the same results. Miller had made 94 pitches through 7 innings...let him go 8 and give the ball to Grilli with a 2-run lead. Freddie also bears some blame though...you can't let that ball hit you. Cost us at least a run.

He could have let Miller go 8 tonight, but for the most part I don't know what Fredi is supposed to do. The entire pen stinks. No matter who he goes to, it's pretty much a guarantee they're going to give up runs. Even Avilan and Grilli have blown leads lately.

[TheMatrix31]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

Well it's not a "random game in June," it's a game in June that we can win with the two teams in front of us struggling and with our bullpen sucking balls night-in, night-out all year.

I would have made Miller throw a complete game. **** the bullpen. Send a message and don't waste a good start from your best pitcher.

Enough of this ****.

As for the draft, meh, whatever. We won't know anything until like 4 years from now.

[DonkeyJote]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

Well it's not a "random game in June," it's a game in June that we can win with the two teams in front of us struggling and with our bullpen sucking balls night-in, night-out all year.

I would have made Miller throw a complete game. **** the bullpen. Send a message and don't waste a good start from your best pitcher.

Well that's just incredibly short sighted. Shelby Miller has the potential to be a very good pitcher for us for a long time. He was at 94 pitches. He threw 100 pitches 6 times last year, he's already done it 4 times this year. I don't care one ounce about the bullpen, but I do care about Miller. And if you throw him out there for 8 or 9 innings to pick up a win in June, you're probably costing yourself wins in September, not to mention probably 2016 and 2017. Guys with huge spikes in innings pitched almost always have HUGE regressions the next year (like Teheran who went a from a similar 185 to 221 last year and has struggled this year).

Honest question, but what do you guys want from this team. When we averaged 91 wins a year, there was griping that it wasn't a championship team and there was even occasionally the sentiment that it should be rebuilt. Well guess what: this team is rebuilding! And while they are better than expected in year 1, the rebuilding is nowhere near done. This isn't even remotely a championship team. Our second best offensive player is Cameron Maybin. If you think he's maintaining a .798 ops all year, after posting a career .673 prior to this year, you're delusional. The cleanup hitter has 0 hr and 16 rbi. Our current #5 hitter has his 30 home runs over the last 5 seasons. Aside from Miller the starting pitching isn't good: Teheran has been bad, Wood is getting by on smoke and mirrors (1.44 WHIP and .297 opp avg will catch up real soon). Overall, this team has 4 position players worth a Win above Replacement right now, and two of them (Peterson and Simmons) do most of that defensively. Only 2 pitchers (Wood and Miller). While this team could probably be in first place with an even average bullpen at this point, everything points to this average offense reverting back to being less than average as the season progresses. Alex Wood appears to be heading for a statistical regression as well. This season isn't about contending this year; it's about setting this team up to contend in 2016 and beyond. That takes patience, and not wanting to sacrifice the development of young pitchers for a win in June and a shot, maybe, at a wild card spot.

[TheMatrix31]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

I want to win games we should win. Simple as that. I don't look at a season before it happens, assess it, then go through the entire season based on that initial assessment. If I thought the team was gonna suck and we ended up surprising, I'd evaluate what happens throughout the course of the season under the reality that we were better than expected.

Same thing here. If we're in a position to win games, I want them closed out and won. No excuse. I don't care if we're "rebuilding." If you can win, win.

I don't care what "should" happen. I care about what is happening. Right now we're 3.5 games back and even if we won half of the 11 blown save games that we've had thus far (ELEVEN), we'd be in first. You strike while the iron is hot. If your team is performing well in spite of expectations, you go for the gusto. You think Kansas City cared about their "plan" last year once they saw they were in contention? No. Houston just called up their top prospect because they're trying to ensure that they stay ahead of "schedule." Are the Twins like, "NO NO NO BRO SLOW DOWN WE'RE NOT READY YET BRO."

And even if you don't end up making the playoffs, who cares, that push is way more important than chalking up a year as a 65 win year in the name of "patience" before it happens and doing everything to ensure that that happens.

If you're a bad team that's already 15 games out, okay fine, take Miller out and run the sorry losers out there one more time. If the team is *really* that desperate to baby Miller that much, then fine, take the shot at the win when you have it and then find a way to skip his start and maybe bring someone up for a spot start to give him a rest then and make up for it. If we're this worried about Miller's and Teheran's innings, then maybe the team should have had a better bullpen.

All this ranting is about the bullpen. The bullpen is insufferably bad. The rest of the team is fine and fun to watch most nights. The bullpen? Every night, when the starting pitcher gets out of the game, I stop giving a a **** about the game. What an unlikable, detestable group of *******s they are.

Go for the wins if you have them. I hate that "oh well, we shouldn't even be at this point and we'll probably go back to sucking at some point because those were the expectations anyway" attitude so much. It's baseball. Ridiculous **** happens all the time. It's possible to keep the team in a place where ridiculous **** can happen *and* prepare for the future. Hate this one-or-the-other proposition crap that has infiltrated sports in recent years. ****ing had it. Never thought this **** would reach baseball.

At the end of 2015, I want everyone to say "damn, AND they have that farm system?" instead of "well, at least they have that farm system." And it IS possible, if we don't just accept our weaknesses and actually do something to address them, whether by trade, free agent, call-up, or throwing the entire bullpen in one cargo container and shipping them to Siberia for 20 years of hard labor, which is what I want to do to them at this point.

[DonkeyJote]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

You go for wins, but not at the expense of the future. Everytime you stretch Miller out this year, you're borrowing production from 2016. With interest. 2016, a year when this team could be legitimate pennant contenders (another year of development, plus having $50 million plus to spend in the offseason). But when Miller has a 4.40 era next year, everyone will be complaining that he was overworked this season!

[canes21]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

You can always go for the win last night and save his arm another game. What if his next start the team scores 8 in the first inning and he's got a 12-0 lead in the 6th? You can always take him out and save his arm. Maybe his next start is a clone of this one. We don't know what will happen.

I don't care what expectations were. You can call this a rebuilding year. I don't care. The facts are this team should be in 1st place right now if they had a bullpen.

This team should be in 1st and looking at moves to further their lead. Instead theyre in 3rd because of the worst bullpen in baseball and aren't making the efforts to improve their pen quickly enough.

Being in a rebuilding year and being in first and in the playoffs sounds a lot better to me than just saying we're rebuilding, don't look at the record. Why not go for the win and prepare for the future. You can do both. They're not exclusive.

I have to agree with Matrix. Send the bullpen off to Siberia and push to win every game. You can still rebuild while doing that. Put Simmons on the mound and just put Ciriaco at short the last 3 innings. He could do a better job than this pen and probably throw harder than any of them. Then throw Urine in to close and move Simmons back and slide Ciriaco over.

You could do that every game and have more success than this bullpen is having.

[aukevin]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

Then throw Urine in to close and move Simmons back and slide Ciriaco over.

You could do that every game and have more success than this bullpen is having.

Spellcheck gold, but even if you didn't mean Uribe then you're probably still correct. Lol

[LowerWolf]

Re: 2015 Atlanta Braves

Aardsma on the way up tonight; Martin going down.

Is there a reason Kohn, with a 0.00 ERA in 4.2 innings earlier this season, is still sitting in AAA? I have no illusions that he's a great relief pitcher, but he has to be better than some of the guys we're running out there right now.