Someone get me my gold tooth…

Pascual the Predictor is back! He’s got an 8 ball, his driver’s license, and an abandoned bus to take us home.

I have a lot of fun with Pascual. He doesn’t have a fancy name and he’s certainly no monkey, but he’s entertaining in his own way. I mean really, who would YOU rather hang out with?

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, I’ve been tweaking the system to see if I can instill a little more accuracy. Looking through Last years numbers, we were all over the place. Pascual was way off on Andruw Jones and Chipper Jones, but dead on with Kelly Johnson and Matt Diaz. As far as the Pitchers, we had the peripheral stats for Hudson and Smoltz but totally blew it with the relievers.

I’m going to post Kelly, Matt and Chipper today, throughout the next few weeks I will post everyone else as well. Let me know what you think or if you have anything to add.

	PA	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	SB	CS	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG
Matt Diaz	413	384	50	123	22	3	11	49	6	3	19	67	.320	.360	.481
Chipper Jones	561	482	96	154	36	3	27	94	6	1	75	78	.319	.410	.574
Kelly Johnson	444	384	65	104	20	6	12	51	6	3	55	83	.271	.366	.450

Couple of things. Matt Diaz is crazy consistent. At least in the form the Braves have employed prior to 2008. I feel very confident that if Cox continues to use Matty as the righty half of a platoon that we will see numbers very close to what Pascual has predicted. He’s currently crushing Lefties to the tune of a 1.079 OPS. Unfortunately he’s only had 38 ABs against Lefties, while compiling 50 against Righties. Right handed pitchers own Diaz thus far, allowing him a measly .412 OPS. I’m sure of two things – Matty’s lost any opportunity he had to prove himself against Righties for 2008. He’ll still get a few ABS here and there, but as long as he’s a Brave, he’s a platoon. I don’t know if 50 times at the plate is a fair opportunity, but I also see where Cox is coming from. I’m also sure that Matt won’t continue to own such a pronounced platoon split. Expect to see the numbers against the Lefties regress more towards the mean and settle in right around what Pascual thinks they will be. What I”m not sure of is whether or not Diaz will actually take an unintentional walk this year. Zero and accounting so far.

Pascual thinks Chipper will miss more plate appearances than he did last year, and that his average will “drop” down all the way to .319. I hope he manages to pull off more time at the plate, but early season indicators are that Chipper is still prone to nagging injuries, some of which are more concerning than others.

You can bet that Kelly will out perform that line. Pascual’s not sure what to do with Kelly’s missed time in 2006 due to the TJ surgery and that’s led to lower than expected plate appearances as well as an under performance in regards to batting average. I’ve learned not to go in and screw around with the numbers and just let them be, so we will see how it all pans out. Its worth noting that Kelly has had some knee issues that have caused him to miss time, and Cox does like to rest him at times to help him iron out his swing, but its still a more reasonable bet to assume closer to 550 PA and a batting average closer to .300.

That’s it for today, enjoy the game tonight!

The Horror…The Horror…

Glavine went six last night, which was one less than I needed to become world conqueror, but one more than I thought he would actually do. Despite back to back solo homers (vintage Glavine, really, giving up the bases empty shots but bull dogging it with men on) Glavine looked good. If only he could have hung in one more inning the Braves may have avoided the 7th inning apocalypse.

Chipper had another good night, going 2 for 5 with his 8th homer of the year. The rest of the offense was lackluster, leaving men on base, striking out at inoportune times, and generally looking like a team that would only score two runs. The most egregious offense (or lack of offense) came in the 7th inning when they put men on the corners with no outs and proceeded to ground into three straight outs.

To make it more fun, Smoltz hit the DL for the second time this season. Dr. James Andrews, according to ESPN, diagnosed him with rotator cuff inflammation and gave him an injection at the point of swelling. The reccomendation is to rest, and not pitch, until the swelling goes down and the discomfort desists. That could be a fair amount of time based on Smoltz’s reaction and the nature of the injury. Hopefully, he will be able to return in a few weeks and again be a productive member of the staff.

I haven’t heard who the call up will be to replace Smoltz. Since he has been put on the DL, the Braves are allowed to call up James, and its my guess that that is who they will use. I’d like to see Charlie Morton get the call. He’s pitched 26 innings with 23 strikeouts against 11 walks and 19 hits. He has yet to issue a Home Run. Cox loved him over spring training and while he has been a wild, it would be fun to see what he does against Major League pitching.

In other “Minor League News”, Mike Hampton is pitching right down the road in Durham, for the Richmond Braves today. It’s possibly his final rehab outing before rejoining the big club and pitching on Saturday the 10th. It still kills me that he strained his pec while warming up. I just don’t know what to say about it? Ever piece of his body appears to be hanging by the thinnest of threads. I worry that he’s going to detach a retinae snapping his to the side as a line drive whizzes by. Though, with his luck, the line drive will hit him dead on and detach his entire face.

Braves vs. Nats, again, tonight. Jair Jurrjens takes the mound against Shawn Hill. Jurrjens has been a nice consistent addition to the staff and Shawn Hill was awesome while playing for one of my minor league teams on EA Baseball, so I assume this will be quite the pitcher’s duel.

Bubble Gum and Tissue Paper

Is apparently all thats keeping the Braves together at this point. Glavine, one of three injured starters, makes his way to the mound tonight. Hopefully pitching against the Nats will make that strained hammy feel better. The injuries aren’t a surprise to anyone that’s actually looked to the roster, but its no less disappointing. The Braves training staff, according to WIll Carroll over at the Baseball Prospectus, is towards the bottom of the league in keeping people healthy and on the field, but its hard to fault them. Chipper, Smoltz, and Hampton all have their histories and are at an age where these things can happen while getting out of bed, let alone sliding into second base or throwing an 87mph slider.

With 7 innings out of the starters in the last two games, it would be great to see Glavine go seven. But then, it would be great to stand atop a tower of my enemies’ bodies with an adoring public screaming my name in rapture as well. I don’t think either one is going to happen tonight.

Sometimes it doesn’t pay to get out of bed…

Today is one of those days, and unfortunately, its not ending anytime soon.

Before the next disaster of the day hits, I’ll fire this off and let y’all be for the rest of your fine Monday.

The Braves dropped two of three to the Mets this weekend, had subpar performances from Smoltz and Hudson, while Chipper had back spasms, Yunel suffered through an injury to his throwing hand, Soriano still experiences elbow “discomfort”, and every Braves Blogger on the planet either laments the heart of the team, tries to contrive ridiculous, if not downright stupid, line up reconstruction, or just moans into beer with true heartfelt sobs.

The injuries are concerning, though for some, just not that surprising. We know that if the Braves have their A team out there, they are a tough team to beat, but when you have to field Prado instead of Chipper, and rely on the bullpen to pitch 5 and 6 innings every time out, wins are going to be hard to come by. The next couple of weeks will determine if the season will be one in which the still productive veterans can play with any real consistency, or if this team will be a patchwork of prospects and middle of the road talent.

Those of you carrying over from BraveSoxTalk will remember our little projection system, Pasqual. Named after the infamous Pasqual Perez. Pasqual had an inconsistent year last year, i’ve made some tweaks that will hopefully let him step up a bit. I don’ t have anything to show you all yet, because I can’t get my Lahman Database to work properly. From what I can see, the 2007 statistics aren’t complete. Anyone else having the same problem?

Good luck with the rest of your week, I’ll be here off and on, drop me a line…

32 Pitches, 2 Strikeouts and 0 walks

And then the third inning. Braves lead 2-0. Jarrjens pitches and Single, Single, Sacrifice, Groundout and…then four straight walks. Strikeout. Mets lead 3-2. He proceeds to set the next 6 down in a row. Pelfrey’s fooling no one, so even if Jar has another seizure, the Braves should hit their way out of this one. Hopefully…

I let my brother go to the devil in his own way

With apologies to Robert Louis Stevenson, lets get into the strange case of the Atlanta Braves.

Its difficult to find a category, offensively or defensively, that as a team, the Braves aren’t in the top 3 in. Yet they are currently sport a 10 – 12 record and sit uncomfortably in next to last place in the NL East. We all know about their record in close games (1 – 7), and their poor bullpen support, but still, you are talking about a team with a 24 run differential on the positive side, yet they have a losing record.

I thought I would take a closer look at the stats and see what was going on here. If we can chalk up the poor record to the luck of one run losses, then we can all sleep easier at night, because as we all know, the first rule of luck is that eventually, we all even out. Bad makes way for good and vice versa, it gives some reliability to the seemingly unreliable nature of luck. When things are bad, you can pretty much assume that some point, without even trying, your luck will change. Its the silver lining in bad luck and the paranoia in good, it keeps you on your toes while not letting you stay for too long.

However, once I pulled everything apart and really looked at, there appears to be something much more sinister than Lady Luck at work here.

Some stats to throw at ya:

	AB	R	H	BB	SO	2B	3B	HR	OBP	SLG	OPS	BABIP	BB%
Overall	738	105	208	73	119	35	6	27	0.345	0.455	0.8	0.336	9.0
Loss	387	37	90	35	55	12	3	9	0.296	0.349	0.645	0.271	8.3
Win	351	68	118	38	64	23	3	18	0.401	0.573	0.974	0.411	9.7

Pretty easy to understand, right? Top line is the Braves overall performance, the Loss line is their offense during losses, and the Win line is their offense during wins. Generally, I think you can assume that teams play worse in their losses, I mean, thats why they lose right? But this is a HUGE difference. We’re talking 300 points difference in OPS, thats ridiculous.

Ok so the offense sucks when they lose. But surely the pitching is picking them up at least a little in those losses right? So maybe we can just blame this all on the offense, right?

	IP	H	R	ER	BB	SO	HR	K/9	bb/9	HR/9	h/9	ERA	RA
Overall	186.2	164	81	72	70	157	13	7.57	3.38	0.59	7.92	3.48	3.92
Loss	96.2	99	65	57	37	83	11	7.76	3.46	1.03	9.26	5.33	6.08
Win	90	65	16	15	33	74	2	7.39	3.29	0.2	6.5	1.50	1.60

Umm, no. The pitching sucks when they lose, too. Pretty even on the K/9 and the BB/9, but wow on the extra hits and home runs. Not only has the pitching fallen apart during these losses, but based on the earned run and runs allowed differential, it looks like the defense has been in the bag as well.

I don’t have access to line drive percentages and defense metrics per games to be able to break this down all super stat, but I can look at it quick and dirty by errors. I know that errors don’t mean as much as plays made in their zone, or plays made outside of their zone, but it does give us something.

Losses – 10 errors

Wins – 5 errors

The Hardball Times has all kinds of great fielding stats, and when comparing the Braves to everyone else, they are a pretty dead on average. Their infield is a little better than the norm and their outfield is a little worse than the norm, but overall, they do just fine.

However, just based on errors, it looks like the defense falls apart during losses as well. As I said, errors aren’t everything, but they’ve made twice as many when they lose as when they win, thats at least a little significant.

So wow, brother Hyde rears his ugly head in this maddeningly inconsistent team. This kind of up and down performance really cuts into my leisure time. Instead of sitting back and drinking a beer or five and watching the beautiful graceful sport of Baseball, I’m on the edge of my seat wondering who’s going to show up.

I guess if I’m going to choose not to panic, since its only April 24th, I can do so with relative ease knowing that this is a solid offensive baseball team and they are not defined by the .645 OPS of their losses. April can be a month of working out kinks and figuring out where to get your groove on. Its hard to believe they could maintain such a split over the long hall and that their overall OPS of 800 is probably right about where they should be. As things smooth out, I expect to see that be a more a consistent output.

As far as the pitching goes, it will continue to remain a work in progress. Its a rag tag bunch for sure, and if I was going to expect inconsistency, I’d look for it there, in both the starters and the bullpen. If the offense evens itself out, and has more games in the 5 – 6 run range, the Braves should still be able to overcome an inconsistent pitching staff.

Speaking of luck…anyone notice that .411 average on balls in play? Yeah, i noticed that too. I’m electing to ignore that for now and hope that Lady Luck likes the new Home Jerseys…

BraveSoxTalk

Its been a while, but the remains of BraveSoxTalk are rising from the ashes to rain some serious baseball minutiae on your poor souls.

I’m sure most of you know about BST, but for the uninitiated here’s a quick brief:

BraveSoxTalk was founded by Alan Wright and Matt Ankerson during the 2005 Baseball Season. They brought together old school and new school thought along with a healthy dose of alcohol fueled fanaticism and a healthy sense of humor.

The website was a HUGE hit, especially, and inexplicably, in Japan. The guys both hold high level jobs with a computer company and found themselves having less and less time to research and crunch numbers. That’s when they brought me on Board. I’m Eugene St. Athead. That’s right, its me, Eugene. The rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.

We worked together for the ‘06 and ‘07 season. When I say work together, I mean that I worked, and they drank. A lot. They dragged me everywhere they went, constantly yelling at me to “write that down” and “make our internet connection faster” and “why are there no good looking hookers in Bradenton?”.

We had a fairly good run in ‘06, but the train derailed pretty fast in ‘07. The guys were drowning in their day jobs and drowning at the local pub at night. They ideas and notes they sent to me were increasingly more and more illegible, and well, frankly, crazy. Here’s a typical day of messages while working for BST Productions:

1. Look up last Sox player to hit into an unassisted triple play.
2. Run predictions for Matt Harrison at the MLB level
3. Find out if Jaeger and Koolaid really do taste like fruit loops
4. Figure out how to remove blood stains from walls without destroying paint or having to repaint
5. Run Pythagorean W/L records of all MLB Teams
6. Prank call Tony Larussa
7. Buy more beer
8. Put together a list of whose hot and whose not, write witty comments
9. Email the senior writers of every major baseball website and tell them they suck.
10. Write a top 10 prospects list for both teams, explain in depth why each player is on the list
11. Call John Schuerholz, apologize for the late night phone call, tell him I’m suffering from tourettes
12. Figure out how to write a piece that explains why Alan likes Barry Bonds and thinks that everyone else is stupid
13. Take a bath, you’re starting to smell ‘Gene!

Trust me when I tell you that was a short list. Eventually, the weight of their day jobs and own egos drove them into hiding. It was fun while it lasted.

They’ve achieved some kind of strange underground cult status in Japan, which they will NEVER forget to remind you of, and currently spend their free time in much the same way they did while running the website, which is to say, Drinking.

That pretty much brings us to here. One third of a once storied writing troika attempting to spend a little time writing about the Braves and anything else that comes into mind. I’m sure there will be the occassional guest spot from the guys, but for the most part it will just be me having some fun with baseball, and for once, not having to answer any drunken phone calls at 3:00am from someone wondering how to convince information to give them Scott Boros’s unlisted phone number.

Hope you all enjoy.