9/29 News, Links, Discussion: Braves-Mets, Recapping Chipper Day, Minor/Maholm
September 29, 2012 at 1:26 pm by David Lee under Atlanta Braves
Game 2 vs. Mets
The Braves were downed 3-1 on Friday as Lucas Duda took Tim Hudson deep with the go-ahead, three-run homer in the seventh inning. The Nationals were routed by the Cardinals, so the Braves were unable to take advantage of a rare Washington loss at this point. They remain four back with five to play.
Chris Young takes the mound against Mike Minor in the second game of the series. Young has been tough to watch at times this season, sporting a 4.21 ERA and 4.68 FIP over 109 innings. His 15.9% strikeout rate is off his career mark by around 5%, and a 7.5% walk rate barely gets him by for the lack of strikeouts. Young has always been one of the most extreme fly ball pitchers in baseball, and it’s only more extreme this year. If you count 100 innings as the minimum mark, Young’s 59.5% fly ball rate ranks first in MLB, with Phil Hughes coming in second at 47.6%.
Young avoided trouble in his last start against the Braves, allowing two runs over six innings despite four walks. He benefited from seven strikeouts, which tied for his second best this season.
In fact, you should expect plenty of fly balls from both sides, as Minor holds a 44% fly ball rate. But Minor has utilized strikeouts well lately, recording 24 punch outs over his last 24.2 innings, and allowing just one home run over that span. He allowed two runs over six innings against the Phillies last time out, walking one and striking out six.
A note from the MLB.com preview linked below: “Left fielder Martin Prado has a National League-best 59 multihit games, including nine in his last 19 contests. His next one would make him only the 10th player in franchise history to have 60 multihit games in a season and the first since Terry Pendleton in 1992.”
Game time is 7:10. Atlanta: Fox Sports South, Peachtree TV. New York: SNY.
MLB.com preview
STATS preview
More Links
Braves.com recap for Friday’s loss.
AJC quotes following Friday’s loss. Chipper Jones: “Do you have an hour? It’s all overwhelming. I’m sitting up there on the stage, my family and my best friend on the planet and Bobby Cox and Hank Aaron and all the people who have helped get me to this point. There’s standing room only in the stands. I just remember thinking when Bobby went through it, golly, there’s a lot of love in this ballpark. And look at how much adoration they have for Bobby. And I was thinking to myself ‘Wow,’ I see all those 10s flashing up. I even said to Josh Thole when I stepped into the box one time, I was like ‘how the heck am I supposed to hit with all this going on.’ It got to me.”
“There were a lot of people there and I appreciate each and every one of them. As I said when I was up on the podium, I know it’s not just the 40 some odd thousand people that were here (more like 51,910) but it’s everybody sitting on their sofa watching TV, everybody listening to the game on the radio. Braves country extends far beyond the 40,000 people that come to the games. It’s an entire region of the United States and I could feel them, I could feel them pulling for me tonight.”
Mark Bowman has a great article on the Chipper ceremony, including quotes from Paul Snyder, John Schuerholz and Chipper’s mother, Lynne Jones.
In notes, Dan Uggla is playing with a cut on his left hand after somehow cutting himself during the clinching celebration. Also, Fredi Gonzalez said he would choose between Mike Minor and Paul Maholm to start a possible Game 2 of the NLDS. Hopefully Fredi will come to his senses and choose Minor.
Jay Busbee of Big League Stew recaps the Chipper ceremony.
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I wouldn’t be too upset if Fredi went with Maholm for game 2 of the NLDS (assuming the Braves make it that far), but if we’re basing the decision strictly on performance, it has to be Minor with the way he’s pitched lately. It’s not like Maholm has pitched poorly, but Minor’s just been better.
if i was uggla i might cut myself too
^^
Unless the NLDS is decided in 3 games, the Braves will need to use both Maholm AND Minor. If Game #2 is at Cincinnati, a ground ball pitcher (rather than a fly ball pitcher) might make more sense.
First two games are in Atlanta but I don’t see why Minor would be the obvious choice.
Paul Maholm’s last four months have been a bit better than his career peripherals would indicate. Mike Minor’s numbers over the last two months are more in line with his career peripherals and are a good indication of his performance going forward.
Does this mean anything over one start? Probably not. Factors like the ballpark and opposing hitters’ strengths against each starter’s better pitches are probably more important in one start. But it doesn’t hurt. If I’m calling it right now, I would go with Minor.
Baseball America is out with their selections at each level of play in the minors. Only one Brave made the list. At AA. Evan Gattis was selected as the catcher of all AA teams. Gattis continues to be a controversial player to assess.
I was curious to see how we have been hitting in the past month or so, after watching us get shut down once again by Niese, effectively ending our run for the NL East title. Last 28 days:
Michael Bourn: .203 / .329 /.246
Martin Prado: .341 /.385 /.443
Jason Heyward: .258 /.307 /.430
Chipper Jones: .219 /.346 /.297
Freddie Freeman: .225 /.326 /.425
Dan Uggla: .278 /.384 /.458
Brian McCann: .220 / .273 / .380
Andrelton Simmons: .257 / .325 / .286
Jon Jay: .262 /.307 /.336
David Freese: .268 / .397 / .411
Matt Holliday: .222 /.364 /.346
Allen Craig: .313 /.330 /.434
Yadier Molina: .310 /.407 /.549
Carlos Beltran: .242 /.359 /.379
Skip Schumaker: .186 /.250 /.279
Pete Kozma: .291 /.344 /.564
So basically Uggla, Prado, and a whole bunch of garbage.
The big thing that I see here is that even though a lot of our guys are not getting the hits, they are still walking at a decent clip.
Seems to be really very similar to the cardinals. Of course they might not even make it if the Nats keep beating up on them.
that’s some outstanding work on arbitrary end points.
Haha yeah I know it’s kind of arbitrary, but I think that the 2011 Cards and Braves showed us how recent success-or lack thereof-can be crucial late in the season. Our pitching has been insanely good, and simultaneously we have scored 3 runs against Niese and Young. Even when we put a lot of runs on the board, it seems to be from a mistake.
@harrisK: The statistical snobbery gets a little much when we start feeling the need to lambaste anyone who posts an arbitrary sample of data. It’s not as if he drew some far-reaching conclusion from it. The point with samples in statistics is that you should be mindful of them when drawing conclusions. The conclusions, if any, can be criticized. If you don’t draw conclusions but just look at the sample for curiosity’s sake (e.g., “let’s see how we’re hitting this month”), there’s no room to criticize.
@vivabeta: you have no reason to apologize for being curious
Since it’s just one game, I like Minor as well. Maholm has been pretty solid, but Minor simply gives the Braves a better chance to win IMO. Plus he’s got slightly better stuff all around.
JohnWDB: well spoken