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Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Braves have a chance vs. Fredi’s Fish
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Wouldn’t you know, a forecast for rain, rain and more rain threatens a home series that the Braves might actually have a chance to win.
OK, if you’ll stop laughing. I know the Braves are 2-12 with a 7.11 ERA in their past 14 games, and have lost 13 of their past 16 home games (boy, they really are awful right now, worst team in the NL at this moment).
But the Florida Marlins are reeling (pardon the pun), too. OK, not quite as badly as the Braves. But Fredi’s Fish are struggling mightily as they arrive for a scheduled three-gamer with the Braves at soggy Turner Field.
I’m guessing that one way or another, we’re gonna have a doubleheader on Thursday, when the forecast isn’t bad, just partly cloudy. If we can get one of these games in during the next two nights, it’ll be a credit to the Braves grounds crew and a very good drainage system they have at Turner Field.
This is the Marlins’ last visit, so they’ll really try to get in all these games. But it could be difficult unless the forecast suddenly changes. It’s supposed to rain quite a bit tonight and tomorrow.
Anyway, the Marlins: They’re 6-10 with a .223 batting average since Aug 8, and they’ve been pretty spotty now for two months, going 27-30 since June 22 after going 40-34 up to then.
It’s probably no coincidence that their slippage has directly coincided with a slump by All-Star second baseman Dan Uggla. I looked it up, and I mean it’s over exactly the same time period, the team’s dropoff and his.
The Marlins have hit .239 with 59 homers in 57 games since June 22, after hitting .257 with 111 homers in 74 games (40-34) before then. Their team ERA was almost the same during both stretches.
Uggla has hit .190 (29-for-153) with four homers, 14 RBI and 50 strikeouts with a .621 OPS in 45 games since June 22. Before then, he hit .296 with 23 homers, 33 RBIs and whopping 1.025 OPS.
Yes, that’s dramatic reversal. And no it didn’t begin with his nightmarish All-Star Game performance. His slump began a few weeks before that.
The Braves are 7-5 against the Marlins this season (yes, a good team the Braves have a winning record against). Tonight’s scheduled matchup is between two pitchers who’ve recently hit the skids, Jair Jurrjens and Florida’s Scott Olsen.
Olsen is 0-4 with a 5.05 ERA in his past six starts, although part of that’s due to awful run support (two runs or fewer while he was in five of those games). He’s 1-0 with a 2.08 ERA in two starts against the Braves this season, after going 1-4 with an 8.54 ERA in eight games against them prior to this season.
Jair’s slide: The effects of his longest-ever season may be wearing on young Jair. But I say it’s just as likely that lack of run support plus opponent Tim Lincecum have been primary factors in his recent slide.
Kid’s kept a great attitude, but you could hear the frustration after he was a hard-luck loser a couple of times recently. He’s 1-4 with a 4.35 ERA in his past five starts, and he had quality starts in three of those four losses.
The Braves scored two runs while he was pitching seven innings of three-run ball in a loss to the Cardinals on July 30, scored one run while he was pitching six solid innings of a loss against the Giants on Aug. 4, and scored one run while he was pitching seven innings of two-run ball in another loss against the Giants on Aug. 15.
He was a serious Rookie of the Year candidate until a few weeks ago, but I don’t know that his stagnant wins total will be enough to keep him close in the balloting against Cubs rookie catcher Geovany Soto.
Jurrjens is 1-4 with a 4.35 ERA in his past five starts, after going 4-2 with a 1.84 ERA in his previous seven.
He’s also lost four consecutive home starts, after going 7-0 in the first 13 home starts of his career with Detroit and the Braves (his teams were 13-0 in those games).
In his past four home starts, the Braves have scored 0, 1, 2 and 1 runs while Jurrjens has been in, an average of 1.32 runs per nine innings he’s pitched in that span.
In the first 13 home starts of his career, his teams scored over 6.3 runs per nine innings that he pitched. Don’t ever let anyone tell you run support isn’t absolutely crucial in evaluating pitchers’ won-lost records on any sort of short-term basis.
Over a couple of seasons it’ll even out, but sometimes within one season or over another long stretch, run support can entirely skew a pitcher’s record in one direction or another.
OK, stat of the day: The Braves have eight home runs in August, which is only one more than Mark Teixeira has this month for the Angels.
Yes, the Braves have a majors-low eight homers in 773 at-bats in August, one every 96.6 at-bats. Meanwhile, Teixeira has hit .380 (30-for-79) with seven homers in 22 games this month for his new team.
For what it’s worth, he’s not been able to help the Angels win much lately. They’ve lost eight of their past 12 games and are 13-11 since Teixeira joined the team.
On a somewhat related note, guess we can stop with the Manny Effect chatter for a while. Manny Ramirez is 5-for-24 with no extra-base hits or RBI in his past seven games, and the Dodgers are 1-6 in that stretch.
In his first 16 games with Los Dodgers, Manny was 25-for-59 (.424) with swix homers and 21 RBI, and Dodgers were 10-6.
Then there’s Albert…. The biggest game-changing force in the game right now, for my money, is Albert Pujols. He’s been utterly Bonds-ian lately, and I really think it’s going to be next to impossible for Chipper to hold him off for the batting title.
As Bobby Cox conceded on Sunday, Chipper just isn’t going to get as many pitches to hit the rest of the way, without Teixeira hitting behind him.
Pujols has hit .379 in 45 games since the Fourth of July, including .404 (42-for-104) in his past 27 games with 12 doubles, 10 homers, 31 RBI, 21 walks, only 10 strikeouts, a .504 OBP and an .808 slugging percentage (1.312 OPS).
He’s a beast, plain and simple. And he’s got Ryan Ludwick hitting in front or behind him (Tony La Russa mixes it up).
Meanwhile, Chipper has hit .272 in his past 45 games (since June 11) with four homers, 22 RBI, a .395 OBP and .404 slugging percentage. He has one homer in his past 27 games.
In 59 games through June 10, he hit .420 with 15 homers, 41 RBI, a .506 OBP and .680 slugging percentage. Just over two weeks ago, Chipper had a 22-point lead in the batting race. Now it’s virtually tied (he’s a few thousandths of a point ahead).
By the way, Chipper’s next game will be his 2,000th, all with the Braves. He’s third on the franchise list behind Hank (3,076) and Eddie Mathews (2,223).
”HELLO IN THERE” by John Prine
We had an apartment in the city,
Me and Loretta liked living there.
Well, it’d been years since the kids had grown,
A life of their own left us alone.
John and Linda live in Omaha,
And Joe is somewhere on the road.
We lost Davy in the Korean war,
And I still don’t know what for, don’t matter anymore.
Ya’ know that old trees just grow stronger,
And old rivers grow wilder ev’ry day.
Old people just grow lonesome
Waiting for someone to say, “Hello in there, hello.”
Me and Loretta, we don’t talk much more,
She sits and stares through the back door screen.
And all the news just repeats itself
Like some forgotten dream that we’ve both seen.
Someday I’ll go and call up Rudy,
We worked together at the factory.
But what could I say if he asks “What’s new?”
“Nothing, what’s with you? Nothing much to do.”
Ya’ know that old trees just grow stronger,
And old rivers grow wilder ev’ry day.
Old people just grow lonesome
Waiting for someone to say, “Hello in there, hello.”
So if you’re walking down the street sometime
And spot some hollow ancient eyes,
Please don’t just pass ‘em by and stare
As if you didn’t care.
Say, “Hello in there, hello.”
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