Big Braves Blog; Part 2

Anybody who knows the Atlanta Braves knows pitching. Tom Glavine’s recent retirement serves as a reminder of the Braves tradition. For the first time in a long time the Braves look tooled to build on the Maddux, Smoltz, Glavine years. With Javier Vazquez now residing in the slightly colder, higher pressured New York City the team has a new ace; and despite last year it’s not Tommy Hanson. Over the last two years Jair Jurrjens has built a resume as strong as almost any other major league pitcher. Despite having only spent two years in Atlanta JJ seems to have found himself right at home, improving dramatically from his first year. He took his ERA down from 3.68 in 2008 to 2.60 last year, which was good for third best in the National League and only 0.12 higher than eventual Cy Young winner Tim Lincecum. As well as improving statistically Jurrjens took on more of the work load, throwing 26.2 more innings that 2008 and going over 200 for the first time in his career. Oh yeah, on top of all that, he just turned 24. Nothing I say can do justice to how good Tommy Hanson really is. People far more talented than I am have waxed lyrical about Hanson’s talent and every word is justified. For most Braves fans the prospect of having the 23-year-old Californian from Opening Day is almost illegal and he may be on the mound at Turner Field against the Chicago Cubs. Both Hanson and Jurrjens will win at least 15 games and have sub-3.00 ERA’s, the keys to the Braves season, however, will be the 3, 4 and 5 starters. Tim Hudson gave the organisation enough confidence in 7 games that he can pick up where Vazquez left off, whether that will include the 2.87 ERA and 238 strikeouts is yet to be seen. The biggest question surrounding Tim is obviously how his Tommy John repaired shoulder will hold up over 30+ games instead of the 42 innings he pitched in 2009. His performance over those big league games was encouraging, they included a 3.61 ERA and very impressive 30 strikeouts to only 13 walks. If he returns to pitching 200 innings, as he has in 6 of his 11 major league seasons he will have fully justified Frank Wren’s faith in him. Kenshin Kawakami and Derek Lowe provide the biggest question marks. Kawakami’s issues last year can easily be attributed to 31 year old rookie, but statistically these glitches did not hurt the Japanese star, he finished pitching in 32 games, starting 25 and amassing a 3.86 ERA. If he does that again in the fifth spot in the rotation he will prove to be a very solid investment and useful piece of the bigger puzzle. D-Lowe on the other hand has got way more to prove. Last season was an unmitigated, unimaginable disaster for the man labelled ‘Ace’. I know of no other staff ace who would end with an embarrassing 4.67 ERA. Despite this, and my desperation to trade Lowe instead of Vazquez, we now need to get behind Lowe and look at what he can give us. In his last year with the Los Angeles Dodgers he produced his career year but that is never a good indicator in a contract year so let’s look back a little further. Over his previous three years in LA his ERA’s were; 3.61, 3.63 and 3.88. If he can forget about last year and produce his usual level of performance, 3.70 ERA and 15 wins, it would help Lowe’s case for not being a hugely expensive bust.

Those coming out of the Braves bullpen provided record levels of relief for the Braves, especially Peter Moylan, Mike Gonzalez and Eric O’ Flaherty. Well Moylan and O’Flaherty are going to have to do it all over again, between them they pitched 129.1 innings, an almost unheard of number. Unlike last year they won’t have the help of Mike Gonzalez, now a Baltimore Oriole; instead they will be hoping that potential future starter Kris Medlan can build on his improvements of last year. Despite his nightmarish debut the young pitcher didn’t shrivel and die like other young Braves pitchers have (Jo-Jo names) he came back and improved every time he pitched. He ended with a very solid 4.26 ERA in 37 games (4 starts); the amount he pitched will also help him in the upcoming season.

After this very solid middle relief there is now a completely brand new closing unit. They have experience working together last year in Boston but how Takashi Saito and Billy Wagner perform for the team will depend on how well their bodies stay together, especially Wagner. While not recording a save last year his strikeout-to-walk ratio was highly impressive; 48-15, and he will need to keep that up if he is to be the effective closer the Braves need. The other thing he will need to be, if the Braves are to go to the play-offs, he will need to be clutch. Last year Rafael Soriano fell apart down the stretch costing the Braves (and Tommy Hanson in particular) several games. Wagner will need to preserve the leads he is given, the Braves offense isn’t good enough to give him 3 run leads every time he is called on. He will have several games that he only has 1 run to work with and they will be the games he earns his money in.
Pitching is without doubt the Braves ultimate strength, and what Bobby Cox will be leaning on most to take him to his fifteenth division title. The recent revelations about Jair Jurrjens needing an MRI back in Atlanta just a week before Spring Training is disturbing to say the least, we can only hope that it is as unimportant as JJ is making out.

Next time I will examine the four men who will be making up the increasingly important infield.