It was an awful week for the Braves, as they narrowly avoided being swept in consecutive series for the first time in over 20 years. The five-game losing streak to start the week was almost entirely a result of the offense, which managed just 10 runs in the 5 games. Looking at the WPA, the offense was responsible for -2.111 in win probability, which amounts to over four losses below .500. The Braves’ 1-5 record was exactly four losses below .500, so it’s clear that the offense was the culprit in this difficult week.
Here are the stats for the past week:
Overall WPA
Player Gm PA Off Pitch Field WPA AV WV
Remlinger 3 0 0.000 0.184 0.000 0.184 0.000 0.000
C. Jones 5 21 0.272 0.000 -0.099 0.174 0.164 0.079
Thomson 1 2 -0.103 0.157 0.000 0.054 0.267 -0.193
Ray 3 0 0.000 0.050 0.000 0.050 0.000 0.000
Smoltz 1 2 0.022 0.015 0.000 0.037 0.185 0.060
Renteria 3 14 0.013 0.000 0.003 0.016 0.135 0.007
Orr 3 3 0.014 0.000 0.000 0.014 0.144 0.033
James 1 0 0.000 -0.004 0.000 -0.004 0.000 0.000
Reitsma 2 0 0.000 -0.010 0.000 -0.010 0.000 0.000
Cormier 3 0 0.000 -0.018 0.000 -0.018 0.000 0.000
Villareal 4 0 0.000 -0.019 0.000 -0.019 0.000 0.000
McCann 5 15 -0.014 0.000 -0.011 -0.026 0.197 -0.005
Sosa 1 2 -0.047 -0.027 0.000 -0.073 0.241 -0.097
Prado 1 3 -0.080 0.000 0.000 -0.080 0.206 -0.130
Jordan 3 7 -0.111 0.000 0.000 -0.111 0.230 -0.069
Giles 6 27 -0.136 0.000 -0.015 -0.151 0.176 -0.029
Davies 2 4 -0.100 -0.055 0.000 -0.156 0.209 -0.120
Pratt 3 7 -0.159 0.000 -0.001 -0.160 0.343 -0.066
Francoeur 6 26 -0.142 0.000 -0.017 -0.160 0.249 -0.022
Langerhans 4 16 -0.166 0.000 0.000 -0.166 0.141 -0.074
Hudson 1 2 -0.030 -0.195 0.000 -0.225 0.173 -0.087
LaRoche 6 18 -0.132 0.000 -0.107 -0.238 0.202 -0.036
Betemit 4 10 -0.356 0.000 0.000 -0.356 0.221 -0.161
Diaz 4 10 -0.400 0.000 0.000 -0.400 0.274 -0.146
A. Jones 6 25 -0.456 0.000 0.003 -0.452 0.194 -0.094
TEAM 6
0.278 0.000 0.000 0.278
Starting Pitching
Player Gm IP Avg. P Tot. P WPA WPTP EO%
Thomson 1 6.7 0.048 0.414 0.157 0.379 1.000
Smoltz 1 7.0 0.048 0.314 0.015 0.048 1.000
Sosa 1 5.3 0.048 0.306 -0.027 -0.087 0.000
Davies 2 12.0 0.048 0.710 -0.055 -0.078 0.000
Hudson 1 7.0 0.048 0.424 -0.195 -0.460 0.000
Relief Pitching
Player Gm IP Avg. P Tot. P WPA WPTP EO% USG
Remlinger 3 2.7 0.084 0.252 0.184 0.732 0.667 -0.003
Ray 3 3.0 0.017 0.050 0.050 1.000 1.000 0.079
James 1 0.3 0.049 0.049 -0.004 -0.090 0.000 -0.012
Reitsma 2 2.3 0.060 0.154 -0.010 -0.068 0.500 -0.038
Cormier 3 2.3 0.037 0.111 -0.018 -0.166 0.333 -0.004
Villareal 4 2.3 0.046 0.238 -0.019 -0.079 0.500 -0.022
The season-to-date stats are updated if you follow the link on the left navigation bar.
Player of the week: Chipper Jones. I’m going somewhat against custom with this pick, giving it to Jones, even though Remlinger had the week’s highest total WPA. I thought Remlinger basically lucked into some higher-P situations, and he was strangely effective in them. Since it was close, I don’t have a hard time giving it to Jones, who more or less carried the offense after returning from the DL. He was just 5-for-20, but he had two homers and a double, and the hits were timely enough to make a .250 batting week a good one.
Thoughts:
1. Jeff Francoeur needs just one more day like today in order to get back to some sort of replacement level for the season. I still don’t have a lot of confidence that he’ll be able to do that anytime soon, but today’s 4-5 day with a monster homer was certainly encouraging.
2. Lance Cormier and Mike Remlinger have both appeared in 14 team games out of the first 24, and I worry that Cormier might be getting a bit overworked at the expense of guys like Chris Reitsma and Chuck James, who need to be pitching some innings to balance things out. Perhaps Macay McBride is ready to step in and get a few people out, now that he’s off the DL.
3. What’s going on with Bobby Cox’s silly platoon/pinch-hit maneuvers? Did he not notice that Tom Glavine got out both lefties and righties in all his years in Atlanta? Bobby really needs to play the better guys like Langerhans, McCann and LaRoche (yes, LaRoche is better than Jordan). I know the platoon guys had three of the five hits in that game, but don’t count on that keeping up.
This wasn’t a single-game phenomenon, either. Cox pinch-hit for McCann with Pratt when Billy Wagner was trying to nail down Saturday’s win with the bases loaded and two gone in the ninth. It’s not like McCann can’t hit lefties…he had a .941 OPS against them last year in 33 ABs, but Bobby’s still not giving him a chance against them this year. On top of that, Betemit was on the bench if a pinch hitter was absolutely necessary.
4. The Braves are six games out of first place after this tough week. I’m proposing that they go 3-1 against the Rockies and Phils and then take 2 of 3 against the Mets to shave a game or three off this lead. It’s time to put some pieces together and get rolling in the new month.
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