Atlanta Braves Minor League Recap: 4/09

post from Talking Chop on 09 April 2010 11:48:00 PM. © Talking Chop

Charlotte 3, Gwinnett 1

F. Freeman 1-4 2K
B. Hicks 1-2 BB, K
J. Lyman 2.1IP 3H 2R 1BB 1K
S. Proctor 1IP 0H 0R 0BB 2K
M. Dunn 2IP 1H 0R 0BB 2K

Gwinnett couldn't muster much offense against Charlotte in game 2 of the series. Chris Resop wasn't terrible as a starter though he only made it through 3.1 innings. Scott Proctor and Mike Dunn did well in 3 innings of relief giving us a reminder of the wealth we have in AAA in case things go poorly in Atlanta.

Tennessee 5, MIssissippi 4

D. Linares 2-5
M. Gomez 2-4 HR, K
K. Cofield 4IP 4H 4R 2BB 4K

Not a whole lot special going on in this game. Cody Johnson went 0-2 with another 2K. Maybe he can crack 300 this year. Kyle Cofield's first start was inauspicious after a positive spring training. I said a couple of days ago that I didn't know if Mauro Gomez would hit well for Mississippi, maybe I was wrong?

Wilmington 9, Myrtle Beach 10

Y. Campusano 3-5 HR(1), 2 RBI
A. Milligan 2-4 HR(1), BB, K, SB
S. Moody 3-4 HR(1), 2 RBI
J. Sucre 2-4 2 2B, RBI, K
C. Rohrbough 3IP 6H 4R 0BB 3K

Snap Judgement: Myrtle Beach could have a really good offense this year though don't expect anymore homers from Shayne Moody, his walkoff tonight matched his career total. Cole Rogrbough pitched better than the outcome suggests so I wouldn't panic with him yet. Also learn the name Yeliar Castro, he could be in the Braves bullpen next year.

Rome 4, Kannapolis 0 - Game 1, 7 Innings

K. Rose 2-4 SB(1), CS
C. Harrilchak 2-2 SB(1), CS
J. Kreke 2-3 2 2B, RBI
C. Bethancourt 1-3 HR, 3 RBI
J. Teheran 6IP 2H 0R 1BB 7K

Rome's teenagers were making some noise in both of their games today. Teheran had an spectacular season debut. Chris Masters chipped in with 3K in 1 inning to finish the game. The big blow offensively was Bethancourt's bomb. Remember this kid is just 18 years old. Harrilchak, Rose and Ware all got their speed on with a stolen base each.

Rome 1, Kannapolis 0 - Game 2, 7 Innings

K. Rose 1-3 2K
RSF 1-3 RBI
R. Weber 4.1IP 1H 0R 0BB 3K

Ryan Weber is a guy everyone might want to keep an eye on. He was pretty dominant in a short stint in the GCL last year and the Braves thought enough of him to give him a $125,000 signing bonus in the 22nd Rd. He won't be 20 years old until August. I'm not sure what his role will be long term, but he has excellent control and generates a lot of groundballs (3.26 ratio last year and 10 GB to 0 FB tonight). I think he might be my first minor league man crush of the season.

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Game 4 Overflow/Postgame Thread

post from Royals Review on 09 April 2010 11:03:51 PM. © Royals Review

Game 4 Overflow/Postgame Thread

Go Royals.

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Braves Lose in 13, Prove that Baseball Is Not
Hand Grenades

post from Talking Chop on 09 April 2010 11:03:46 PM. © Talking Chop

More photos » Justin Sullivan - Getty Images

It was a beautiful day in San Francicso, as long as you weren't a Braves fan. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Browse more photos »

Look, I'm not going to pretend like that game didn't suck. It did. Any time your team loses after leading 4-2 in the ninth, or wastes a dominant pitching performance, or fails repeatedly in the clutch, it sucks. And having a home plate ump with a wacky strike zone and who seems to have forgotten the part of the rulebook dealing with "interference" doesn't help either. But it was just one game, and there were a good number of positives to come out of it. To wit:

Tim Hudson pitched great, facing the minimum through six innings while giving up only 2 baserunners (1 hit and 1 reached-on-error), both of whom were immediately erased in double plays. He tired a bit in the seventh, giving up a single to Aaron Rowand and a double to Albert Pujols Edgar Renteria to lead off the inning, which set up two straight RBI groundouts to get the Giants on the board. I thought it was an odd decision to concede those two runs when we only had 3, but you've got to hand it to the Giants for their good situational hitting there. They took what we gave them. Hudson's final line was: 7 IP, 2 ER, 3 H, 0 BB, 2 K, and 77 pitches (52 strikes). His WPA (Win Probability Added) was 0.177, which means he improved our chances of winning by about 18%. It was the best start of the year for an Atlanta hurler, bar none.

(More positives after the jump)

Another positive was the all-around play of Martin Prado, who was practically always on base, ending up 3/4 with 3 BBs and 2 runs. Prado, who now has a sweet line of .627 AVG / .700 OBP / .750 SLG, also made a stellar defensive play at 3B. His WPA for the game was 0.168. Probably the next biggest bright spot on offense was Matt Diaz, who went 2/3 and drove in 2 runs before being lifted in a defensive switch. The catcher tandem of Ross and McCann was quite solid as well, going 2/5 with a bases-loaded walk by Ross to drive in a run. Troy Glaus also had 2 hits, a run, and an RBI. Even Melky Cabrera was on base 3 times with a hit and 2 walks.

The Braves had Giants starter Jonathan Sanchez and the numerous Giants relievers on edge all night. Sanchez lasted only 4.1 IP, giving up 3 ER, 7 H, and 2 BB, though he did get 6 strikeouts. Overall, the offense managed to get 20 guys on base, which is pretty good even for a 13-inning game. They couldn't get enough of those guys in, but at least they weren't dominated.

As for the relievers, we got excellent scoreless frames from Saito, O'Flaherty, and Moylan. Medlen also pitched very well, though he was victimized by some bad luck and bad umpiring. Braves pitchers only walked 1 batter all night--I know the Giants are free-swingers, but that's still impressive. Given that Wagner won't be serving up game-tying homers regularly (I hope), our pen sure is looking good. By the way, here are our numbers in relief this year, counting today's game: 16.1 IP, 3 R (2 ER), 10 H, 2 BB, 19 K, and a sparkling 1.10 ERA. That'll work.

So, what I'd like everyone to do is take a deep breath, focus on all those positives, and try to forget (or at least get over) Renteria's 2-run blast in the 9th, the Eric-Gregg-like strike zone on Heyward's 4th strikeout (heck, forget Heyward's other 3 strikeouts too, while you're at it), the odd decision to pinch-hit Conrad with the bases loaded and 1 out, and all the other choke jobs, double plays, bad calls, and bloop hits. OK, now. Deep breath.

There. Does that feel better?

No? Well, at least there's always tomorrow. And that's a beautiful thing.

Awards

Tonight's MVP (aside from Tim Tschida): Edgar Renteria-- 3/5, game-tying HR, 0.515 WPA

Tonight's LVP: Billy Wagner-- 1 IP, 2 ER, -0.418 WPA

Tonight's MVPILE (MVP In a Losing Effort): Tim Hudson

Tonight's Clutch Play: Renteria's 2-run HR in the 9th (duh), 0.465 WPA

Final - 4.9.2010 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 R H E Atlanta Braves 00201001000004112 San Francisco Giants 0000002020001591WP: Jeremy Affeldt (2 - 0)
LP: Kris Medlen (0 - 1)

Complete Coverage >

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Good News

post from Disastros on 09 April 2010 09:55:36 PM. © Disastros

Y’all, I am tired this week.Way more tired than the Astros, ahem, and I did my job!Then today I read good news!Oh, no, don’t get too excited. As I post this, we are still losing to the Phillies.I’m not talking about good results, people. I said good news.Bagwell will be joining Brownie and Deshaies on FSN on Saturdays?!Good news!Now if we could [...]

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Baseball History And Baseball Memories

post from DMB Historic World Series Replay on 09 April 2010 09:40:06 PM. © DMB Historic World Series Replay

Before jumping into the 1903 DMB World Series I wanted to take a moment to point out some of the blogs that I check out on a regular basis, specifically the blogs that deal with the history of the game, as well as personal memories of the game of baseball.In no particular order:1. The [...]

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l-memories/

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Angels 1-4 for first time since 1988 (AP)

post from MLB News Blog on 09 April 2010 09:29:38 PM. © MLB News Blog

Daric Barton and Rajai Davis each had three hits and two RBIs, No. 9 batter Cliff Pennington added a three-run homer, and the Oakland Athletics sent the Los Angeles Angels to their fourth straight defeat with a 10-4 victory Friday night. Pennington’s homer, which gave Oakland a 10-2 lead, was the 10th allowed by Angels [...]

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Vazquez Rocked As Rays Roll Over Yanks

post from Sliding Into Home: A Yankees Blog on 09 April 2010 09:27:00 PM. © Sliding Into Home: A Yankees Blog

(Photo by J. Meric/Getty Images)

Final123456789RHEN.Y. Yankees000200010380Tampa Bay 00050400x9101
WP: D. Price (1-0); LP: J. Vazquez (0-1)
It was an ugly night for Javier Vazquez and the Yankees down in Florida, as they were hammered by the Rays 9-3. In his first start since returning to the Yanks, Vazquez allowed 8 earned runs on 8 hits and 3 walks in 5.2 innings pitched. Not exactly the way he wanted to re-introduce himself to the Yankees and their fans.

For the first three innings Vazquez pitched very well, allowing just a hit and a walk. Both baserunners reached at the start of the second inning to put runners on 1st and 2nd with nobody out, but Vazquez was able to get through the mini jam fairly easily. Alex Rodriguez than gave him a 2-0 lead in the fourth when he smashed an RBI triple to center and was then able to score on a throwing error by Rays catcher Dioner Navarro. That's when the night took a turn for the worse.

Vazquez seemingly lost his stuff as he began the bottom of the 4th, and would eventually get lit up for 5 runs on 5 hits and a walk. Carlos Pena tied the game at two with a two-run homer. Later in the inning the Rays would string together three straight two-out hits, including a single by Navarro to give the Rays the lead, and a two-run double by Jason Bartlett to give them some breathing room. The ball hit by Bartlett landed just out of the reach of a diving Marcus Thames, and I have to believe that if Brett Gardner was playing left that ball ends up being the final out of the inning. I'll have a little more on this later, but for now, back to Vazquez.

He would settle down to pitch a 1-2-3 5th inning, but thing got worse for Vazquez in the 6th. Willy Aybar got the inning going with a two-run homer to make it 7-2 Rays. Vazquez would leave the game a few batters later after walking Bartlett with two out. Sergio Mitre came in and by the end of the inning it was 9-2 Rays and the game was all but over.

The Yanks would add a third run in the eighth, but that would be all they would be able to push across against David Price, who was excellent tonight and at times looked unhittable. His fastball was sitting in the mid-to-high 90's, and he was locating his breaking stuff--a lethal combination. Price ended up allowing 3 runs on 7 hits, walked 3, and struck out 7 over 8.2 innings pitched to pick up his first win of the season.

Back to the whole Gardner-Thames situation. Why aren't the Yankees allowing Brett Gardner to prove himself against lefties? Isn't the hope within the organization that Gardner will eventually be an everyday player? If it is, than the least they could do is let him fail before creating a platoon situation. Yes, the Yankees have faced two lefties with dominating stuff, which is probably why Thames played today and in the second game in Boston with Jon Lester on the mound. But I still think Gardner should be getting these starts. He will never develop into an everyday player if he only faces right-handed pitching.
Plus, Thames isn't exactly knocking the cover off the ball.

Anyway, let's just turn the page on this stinker and move onto tomorrow's game. CC Sabathia looks to rebound off his rough start in Boston on Opening Night as he takes the mound for the Yankees. 24-year-old right-hander Wade Davis will get the ball for the Rays. First pitch is set for 3:10 p.m. and the game will be on FOX.

HittersABRHRBIBBSOLOBAVGDerek Jeter, SS5120002.333Nick Johnson, DH5121021.143Mark Teixeira, 1B4000002.000Alex Rodriguez, 3B4111011.158Robinson Cano, 2B4010010.375Jorge Posada, C2000200.357Nick Swisher, RF3010124.357Marcus Thames, LF3010001.250 a- Randy Winn, PH1000010.000Curtis Granderson, CF4000024.250Totals3538239

a-struck out for Thames in the 9th

BATTING
2B: Jeter (1, Price), Johnson, N (1, Price).
3B: Rodriguez, A (1, Price).
TB: Jeter 3; Johnson, N 3; Rodriguez, A 3; Cano; Swisher; Thames.
RBI: Rodriguez, A (2), Johnson, N (2).
Runners left in scoring position, 2 out: Jeter; Granderson; Swisher 2.
Team RISP: 2-for-8.
Team LOB: 8.

PitchersIPHRERBBSOHRERAJavier Vazquez (L,0-1)5.288835212.71Sergio Mitre2.12110103.86Pitches-Strikes - Javier Vazquez 98-62, Sergio Mitre 34-19Ground Balls-Fly Balls - Javier Vazquez 6-6, Sergio Mitre 2-4Batters Faced - Javier Vazquez 28, Sergio Mitre 9

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-rays-roll.html

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Polanco, Phillies drop Astros to 0-4 (AP)

After collecting 52 hits in their first four games, the Phillies’ hitting is something to talk about. Just don’t ask Philadelphia starter J.A. Happ to be part of that discussion. “I don’t want to make anything of it. I don’t want to jinx anything,” Happ said. “Let’s just let these guys do their job.

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Phillies get 16 hits, drop Astros to 0-4 (AP)

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Hardy lifts Twins over White Sox in 11 (AP)

J.J. Hardy drove in Joe Mauer with a single in the 11th inning, and the Minnesota Twins beat the Chicago White Sox 4-3 on Friday night for their fourth straight win. The go-ahead rally started when Mauer, pinch hitting for rookie Drew Butera, drew a leadoff walk against Tony Pena (0-1). He was sacrificed to [...]

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