Atlanta BravesThe Braves are once again the favorites in the East, but with the Mets hard charge last year, many pundits are wondering if the Braves time at the top has finally come to an end.
There's a dirty little secret in Atlanta that very few people know about. The bullpen has always been blamed for the Braves failures in the postseason, but in reality, it has been the offense that has failed the Braves time and time again. Too much reliance on the home run has cost them against the better teams. Sure, you can pummel bad pitching staffs into submission with a barrage of homers. But if you need to manufacture a run or are facing a guy on the mound who knows what he's doing, and all you can do is bash, then you're gonna have big problems. And that's exactly what's happened with the Braves. They've consistently had 4 or 5 guys in the lineup who hit 20+ homers, but only one or 2 with an OBP of better than .350. This year might be different. GM John Schuerholz finally addressed the Braves most pressing need over the past few years by obtaining two players with better than average on base ability: Quilvio Veras and Reggie Sanders. Both have good on base and both have decent speed. Unfortunately, both players have had some difficulty staying in the line-up for more than 130 games over the past several years. But if they can stay reasonably healthy, Chipper Jones won't be hitting as many solo homers as he did last year. Andres Galarraga has returned from a bout with cancer and has looked great this spring. However, he's 39, he's never been particularly disciplined at the plate and cancer is not something you fight off over the weekend. The affects of fighting it can linger for years. It would not be surprising if he has a good April but cools down over the grind of a full season and finishes hitting about .270 with fewer than 25 homers. If he's able to duplicate his numbers from his pre-cancer days, it will indeed be a miracle. Javy Lopez is back after missing half of last season with a knee injury. If he's completely healthy, he'll be one of the more productive offensive catchers in the majors. Brian Jordan is also relatively healthy and a solid run producer. Shortstop was a black hole offensively last year and it will be again if the Braves leave Florida with Walt Weiss and Ozzie Guillen manning the position. The Braves do have an option as uber-prospect Rafael Furcal is waiting in the wings. He's only 19 years old, which means inconsistent, but he has amazing speed and an incredible eye for balls and strikes. He's outhit both of the incumbents this spring by a wide margin. The two guys who'll be driving the Braves bandwagon again to the playoffs if they make it are the Jones boys: Chipper and Andruw. Andruw, like Furcal, came up to the majors at a very young age and true to form, was very inconsistent. He's now 23 and entering his 5th year in the majors and with the help of hitting coach Merv Rettenmund, looks like he's ready to explode offensively. What do I mean by "explode"? He's often been compared talent-wise to Hank Aaron and when Hank turned 23, he turned in his first year of slugging .600 and had the first of his 8 career 40+ homer seasons. Jones is certainly capable. The other Jones, Chipper, is coming off an incredible MVP season and with the addition of the two guys who get on base ahead of him, would normally be looking forward to challenging Hack Wilson's RBI record this year. But this winter he encountered a problem with a bone spur in his right elbow. A chip off the spur has broken off and is now floating around his elbow joint. As you might imagine, that can cause some pain when throwing or swinging a bat. But that's not the real problem here. Chipper's a pretty tough guy so he can cope with pain. The real danger occurs if the chip lodges itself in the joint, locking it up. The only way to repair that problem is surgery, followed by about 3 months of rehab. Can the Braves survive without Chipper? It's a question they have to consider seriously. The bench has Wally Joyner as a precaution for Galarraga going down, and capable Keith Lockhart if Quilvio Veras goes down. George Lombard appears ready to step in if either Sanders or Jordan goes down in the outfield, Furcal is ready in case Cox and company get a clue that they have two scenic overlook plaques wearing gloves at short. Eddie Perez has shown that he is a capable everyday catcher if Lopez experiences problems with his knees. But the Braves have no one who even comes close to being able to replace Chipper and if he goes down to, ironically, a chip. If the Braves encounter no serious health problems (60% chance is my guess) then they could be one of the best offensive teams in the NL. But right now, they look like they could lead the majors in time on the DL. GRADE: 60
Defensively, the Braves are pretty good. They have the luxury of the best defensive centerfielder since Willie Mays in Andruw Jones. To give you an idea of how good he is, he had 492 putouts last year. The second highest in the majors was 395. If that's not impressive enough, Maddux, Glavine and Mulholland, who accounted for 76 of the Braves starts, are each very much groundball pitchers, meaning Jones gets fewer opportunities to make catches. In fact, Kevin Millwood is the only flyball starter on the Braves staff. Brian Jordan and Reggie Sanders have about average range in the outfield but both possess better than average arms. Both Galarraga and Joyner are above average glovemen at first. Lopez and Perez are above average behind the plate, but there are still lingering questions about whether Lopez is fully healed. The official word is that he is, but his throwing behind the plate has been off this spring and several observers have noted that he's favoring the repaired knee and it's throwing off his mechanics. If this is true, it might affect the rest of his game as well. The Braves are below average around the rest of the infield. Veras has average range, but a below average arm. Weiss and Guillen were very good defensively at one point in their careers but those days are long past. Chipper Jones has a decent arm but often tries to time ground balls rather than surround them, leading to a number of hot grounders to jump past him. While it's nice to have an athletic outfield, this team depends heavily on it's infield defense. GRADE: 55 (60 if the Braves go with Furcal at short).
Among the things the Braves and pitching coach Leo Mazzone have been credited with is the amazing health of their pitchers. The Braves pitchers rarely get injured. Maybe not. It's true that Maddux and Glavine have been incredibly consistent over the past 5 years and Millwood has yet to encounter any problems. But John Smoltz will miss this year because of his 3rd arm surgery in 5 years. In addition, Odalis Perez, Rudy Seanez, Pedro Bourbon and Kerry Ligtenberg have all gone under the knife either as Braves or the season after they left the Braves. Denny Neagle's shoulder gave out on him in his last season as a Brave causing him to miss much of 1999. And Steve Avery hasn't been the same pitcher since his abusive workload at such a young age at the hands of Mazzone/Cox. One might be tempted to include Mark Wohlers in this group, but his problems stemmed from a pulled chest muscle and a self-imposed change in his mechanics in order to compensate. Regardless, the Braves still have solid starting pitching. Millwood was brilliant last year and there's no reason to expect a let down. A couple of years ago when Peter Gammons said this guy could become as good as Smoltz, many people snickered. Smoltz was coming off a season where he'd won 24 games and Millwood was a rookie with spotty control. But give the guy his props, he got this one right. Maddux and Glavine were good last year but began to show the cracks of an impending decline. Maddux will still be an above average pitcher but this might be the year that Glavine comes back to earth. He's never been a hard thrower and his control is showing signs of faltering. His days of being an elite pitcher are probably over. Without Smoltz, the Braves will rely on Terry Mulholland and Bruce Chen to round out the rotation. Mulholland is a battler, but more so than Glavine, has seen his best days and is probably better suited to bullpen duty. Chen is coming off a horrific year in which he was pounded by major league hitters. His spring wasn't all that encouraging either. Steve Avery is still a possibility, but not a very good one. Luis Rivera might be the last resort for the Braves. He throws a fastball in the upper 90's but has several things working against him: 1) he's never pitched above A-ball, 2) he has spotty control, and 3) he has continuing problems with blisters. He's probably better suited to bullpen work. This year is the first one in a very long time where the Braves, unless they pull off a blockbuster trade, are vulnerable in their starting pitching. GRADE: 60
The Braves bullpen will be tested this year. With Smoltz, who averages over 7 innings a start, being replaced by Mulholland/Chen, who average 5 innings a start, the bullpen will have a lot of innings to make up. John Rocker, although controversial, is a very good closer. He walks a lot of batters, but he offsets that by giving up very few hits and getting a lot of strikeouts. It'll be interesting to see if his offseason troubles in the media affect his performance this season. Kevin McGlinchy and Rudy Seanez can both capably handle right handed setup duties, as can Mike Remlinger from the left side. Former closer Kerry Ligtenberg is coming of Tommy John surgery and has been good in his brief spring training appearances. The key question to be answered is can the Braves get to those guys often enough with the lead? As of now, that question will have to be answered by the loser in the rotation sweepstakes and a bunch of youngsters with no major league experience. With a growing trend of games decided in the middle innings by middle relief pitchers, this has to be a huge concern for the Braves. GRADE: 60
Many people credit the Braves success to the arrival of John Schuerholz back in 1991. However, if one were to take a closer look, it's quite clear that 2 men have had a far greater impact on the Braves' winning ways: Bobby Cox and Paul Snyder. Cox and Snyder were the architects of the Braves resurgence. Snyder was a talent scout par-excellance and Cox has had a hand in the development of the franchise as both a GM and manager. Through Snyder's bird dogging, the Braves have produced one of the most productive farms systems in history, if you consider what it's produced on the field and in trade. And Cox as GM made some sagacious choices (Chipper Jones as a #1 pick instead of Todd Van Poppel) and as a manager has been a steadying influence. But now Snyder is retired and there are plenty of indications that the Braves farm will suffer terribly: Schuerholz fired Snyder at one point and the Braves following #1 choices in the draft were Mike Kelly and Jamie Arnold. They rehired Snyder the following year. Unfortunately for the Braves, Schuerholz is not a good enough GM to make the Braves fool-proof, and Cox is not a particularly good game manager. The result is a quality productive team and a robust farm system that produce consistently good regular season records and consistently "underachieving" post-season records. Most analysts underestimate the value of a great farm system. If a regular player goes down, a good farm can offer a better replacement than a poor farm can. And since players go down to injury so frequently, it's certain that a good farm will keep the quality high enough on the ML team to gain a few extra regular season wins. Unfortunately, the farm system is of no use in the post season because rosters are fixed. So that added depth advantage is nullified. Schuerholz won't make a trade unless it's fairly lopsided (your best player for my 5th best prospect), and consequently, has had trouble making the big trade during the season the past couple of years. Instead, he's settled for smaller trades, which, like last year, weren't usually enough to put his team in the championship winner's circle. GRADE: 55