-Well, I am back. The Mitchell Report was released to wall-to-wall coverage by ESPN, but it has been less than satisfying. On one end, the sheer randomness of players mentioned (big stars, bench players) is kind of scary, but we expected that, right? What bothers me is that the players do have a legitimate beef to be concerned about the amount of evidence cited. However, this was not a criminal investigation, but a view at the usage of steriods and HGH in baseball. In that, it was probably fairly successful. One player cited, Andy Pettitte, has admitted to usage. For two days.
“If what I did was an error in judgment on my part, I apologize.”
If? Um, Andy, IT _SO_ WAS! While I think HGH is way overblown as an effective performance enhancer, your usage is still clearly wrong. For a fun bit, check out Pettitte's talking up God, as reported by Fire Joe Morgan via BeliefNet, here.
-Thankfully, no current Braves (*ahem* Chipper?) made the list, but twelve former Braves did. You have to take this with a grain of salt, however, because the Mitchell Report's star witnessess both worked around the New York players more than any others so if you were a roided up freak not calling New York home, you were a bit more safe. The former Braves to make the report are: P' Paul Byrd, Darren Holmes, Kent Mercker, Denny Neagle, John Rocker, and Mike Stanton; C Todd Pratt, 1B's Ken Caminiti, Matt Franco, and Wally Joyner, and OF's David Justice and Gary Sheffield. Byrd, Holmes, and Sheff were all apparently using or at least purchasing drugs during their time as Braves. No Marcus Giles, Javy Lopez, or Jesse Garcia, but again - they didn't ask the Braves clubhouse guy.
-Justice did add to his dickdom. I should patent that word. When approached about his own steriod usage, Justice named names as if he was about to get killed. He still gets reported and now, his names are reported too. In the 20's, he would be sleeping with the fishies by now.
-The voice of clarity is Jeff Francoeur. He essentially read and thought about the Mitchell Report for a day and then went to play golf because it didn't mention him. Such a needy bastard.
-Other stuff happened this week. I have a weak source to comment on here, but a livejournal post here reports two things of interest. One, the Braves might be seeking Damian Miller, a perfect backup catcher. Good defender and has some pop. Would make for a great backup, but with a few teams still looking for a starter behind the plate, he will be looking for starting time until that is cleared up. Also brought up was the rumor that the Braves might be interested in Steve Finley. God, I just threw up in my mouth.
-Willie Harris and Peterson Orr are Nats Orr is getting closer to Canada and signed with a former Canadian team so you know he's psyched, but Harris was less thrilled of leaving Atlanta. I love how the article implies that Harris "tailed off?" because of less playing time. Dumbass homer Willie articles.
-Finally, DOB is back to report that the Braves are quite interested in former Rockies closer, Brian Fuentes. However, he is due at least $4.5M in arbitration, his final year of arbitration, and the Rockies have no need to trade Fuentes, when makes his package tough to benefit the Braves.
-Um. Merry last week before Christmas.
Showing posts with label Willie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Willie. Show all posts
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Winter Meetings and Such
-Well, I would have updated yesterday but I had a date. Yes, it's actually possible.
-Anywho, the Braves had a slightly busy week. They traded a young arm for two players, DFA'd half of their starting LF platoon, released a shitty player, lost another shitty player in the Rule 5 draft, and announced who will be making sure our kids is learning next year. Let's get to it.
-First, the trade. Jose Ascanio, a guy I really liked, was traded to the Cubs for Will Ohman and Omar Infante. The latter was picked up in the Jacque Jones deal last month so his time as a Cubbie was pretty short. I will go more into each player in my meet and greets over the next day or so, but suffice it to say I am indifferent. Ohman can get lefties out, important when facing the Phillies, but you also lose a young power arm.
-To make room for the players acquired, Willie Harris joined Peterson Orr and Lance Cormier on the DFA'd list. Unlike Orr and Cormier, Harris could still possibly stick in the organization, but here is hoping the Braves can find someone willing to pass along a high-reward prospect our way. By the way, Cormier was the shitty player released spoke of earlier. The Braves decided to not even attempt to keep him around.
-The Rule 5 draft passed with the tragic loss of Sergio Valenzuela to the Reds. Why the Reds felt it incumbant on themselves to pick up Valenzuela is beyond me. In four years stateside, Valenzuela had yet to make it out of A-ball, though he was on the Richmond roster (probably to protect him from the AAA and AA portions of the Rule 5 draft). He has not pitched often in four years, but has pretty well sucked either way. Last year, he pitched for both Rome and Myrtle Beach and posted a 7.00 ERA and a 1.93 WHIP. The Reds pissed away $50K they could have given me.
-The Braves have announced their 2008 coaching staffs for the minors. Chris Chambliss returns to the organization as the R-Braves hitting coach. The rest of the R-Braves staff remains the same. Crazy ass Rocket Wheeler is back with Mississippi and the M-Braves and Pelicans staff remain the same. Rome's staff was bolstered with promotions from Danville. Carlos Mendez, a former Braves farmhand, joins the Danville coaching staff as a hitting coach. Danville also includes Derrick Lewis, another former Braves farmhand who was GCL's pitching coach last year. Lewis last played in the Braves organization in 2003.
-A couple of former Braves joined new organizations. The lesser known one, Jose Capellan, was traded by the Tigers to the Rockies for Denny Bautista in your typical "I got a great arm who doesn't get it and you do too. Let's swap~!" It was not that long ago that Cappy was running neck-and-neck with the Andy Marte's of the world as top dog in the Braves organization. But he is already in his third organization since those Brave days.
-The other more noticable former Brave to find a new employer is Andruw Jones. Did you hear he signed with the Dodgers...or, the Braves West. In recent years, they have targetted Jason Schmidt, Rudy Seanez, Rafael Furcal, Wilson Betemit, and even Roberto Boom-Boom Hernandez. Now they add Andruw, though for a nice paycheck of $36M over the next two years, hardly the 5-7 years Scott Boras wanted. Andruw is paired with Furcal and gives the Dodgers some legitimate power for a team that finished near the bottom in the NL in homers and SLG. I actually think this is a good deal for the Dodgers. J.C. believes Andruw was worth $40M for the next two seasons and I have stated that he is clearly better than Torri Hunter, who got the big deal. Win, win.
-Anywho, the Braves had a slightly busy week. They traded a young arm for two players, DFA'd half of their starting LF platoon, released a shitty player, lost another shitty player in the Rule 5 draft, and announced who will be making sure our kids is learning next year. Let's get to it.
-First, the trade. Jose Ascanio, a guy I really liked, was traded to the Cubs for Will Ohman and Omar Infante. The latter was picked up in the Jacque Jones deal last month so his time as a Cubbie was pretty short. I will go more into each player in my meet and greets over the next day or so, but suffice it to say I am indifferent. Ohman can get lefties out, important when facing the Phillies, but you also lose a young power arm.
-To make room for the players acquired, Willie Harris joined Peterson Orr and Lance Cormier on the DFA'd list. Unlike Orr and Cormier, Harris could still possibly stick in the organization, but here is hoping the Braves can find someone willing to pass along a high-reward prospect our way. By the way, Cormier was the shitty player released spoke of earlier. The Braves decided to not even attempt to keep him around.
-The Rule 5 draft passed with the tragic loss of Sergio Valenzuela to the Reds. Why the Reds felt it incumbant on themselves to pick up Valenzuela is beyond me. In four years stateside, Valenzuela had yet to make it out of A-ball, though he was on the Richmond roster (probably to protect him from the AAA and AA portions of the Rule 5 draft). He has not pitched often in four years, but has pretty well sucked either way. Last year, he pitched for both Rome and Myrtle Beach and posted a 7.00 ERA and a 1.93 WHIP. The Reds pissed away $50K they could have given me.
-The Braves have announced their 2008 coaching staffs for the minors. Chris Chambliss returns to the organization as the R-Braves hitting coach. The rest of the R-Braves staff remains the same. Crazy ass Rocket Wheeler is back with Mississippi and the M-Braves and Pelicans staff remain the same. Rome's staff was bolstered with promotions from Danville. Carlos Mendez, a former Braves farmhand, joins the Danville coaching staff as a hitting coach. Danville also includes Derrick Lewis, another former Braves farmhand who was GCL's pitching coach last year. Lewis last played in the Braves organization in 2003.
-A couple of former Braves joined new organizations. The lesser known one, Jose Capellan, was traded by the Tigers to the Rockies for Denny Bautista in your typical "I got a great arm who doesn't get it and you do too. Let's swap~!" It was not that long ago that Cappy was running neck-and-neck with the Andy Marte's of the world as top dog in the Braves organization. But he is already in his third organization since those Brave days.
-The other more noticable former Brave to find a new employer is Andruw Jones. Did you hear he signed with the Dodgers...or, the Braves West. In recent years, they have targetted Jason Schmidt, Rudy Seanez, Rafael Furcal, Wilson Betemit, and even Roberto Boom-Boom Hernandez. Now they add Andruw, though for a nice paycheck of $36M over the next two years, hardly the 5-7 years Scott Boras wanted. Andruw is paired with Furcal and gives the Dodgers some legitimate power for a team that finished near the bottom in the NL in homers and SLG. I actually think this is a good deal for the Dodgers. J.C. believes Andruw was worth $40M for the next two seasons and I have stated that he is clearly better than Torri Hunter, who got the big deal. Win, win.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
A-Z Reviews: H
Willie Harris-He went by a few names at Chopnation. Willie Mays Hays Harris. "The Truth." But to me, he was the guy who replaced Ryan Langerhans and that did not make me very happy. Langer was one of my personal favorites, not this random addition to the team who was hitting at Richmond. But then, Willie kept hitting. In his first 36 games, he was hitting .412/.477/.546. 8 steals and caught just twice with a solid 12/16 BB/SO clip. I mean, I could hate on his fairly weak defense, but that offense was amazing. Then, on June 13th, the clock struck midnight and whatever pumpkin the fairy turned into a magic bat turned back and Willie was the Willie who hit .204 for the ChiSox in 2003. From June 13th until the end of the year, Harris batted .215. He couldn't even steal anymore and was caught in half of his attempts. He OPS'd .631. And yet, Bobby was iffy on taking him out of a platoon with Matt Diaz. Sometimes, I'm pretty harsh on Bobby, but I was really questioning if he was betting on the Braves _not_ making the playoffs.
2008 Outlook: Willie is arbitration eligible and his overall numbers of .272/.349/.392 might get him in the $1.5M range. If that's possible, Braves need to move on. Willie's not worth that much. Hopefully, JS non-tenders him, signs him to a much smaller deal with incentives, or finds some Southeast Australian team willing to overspend for him.
Tim Hudson-You are not going to find someone who was more ardent about trading Hudson than me. Through two years in Atlanta, he continued a trend that was becoming disconcerting. Less strikeouts, lots of homers, too many damn walks. Yes, Billy Beane didn't get a lot for him, but then, he wasn't playing that well either. However, he turned it around somewhat in 2007. He posted the fourth best Defensive ERA of his career at 3.60, and while the strikeouts still haven't returned, he struck out enough and walked less.
2008 Outlook: Hudson is exactly what you look for when you start thinking "who can be a good #2 pitcher?" I tend to not care much for the labels #1, #2, etc., but Huddy is that. In many ways, he is better than most team's aces, though he himself is not great. He's just really, really good. If he can continue the success he reached in 2007, he will be a big reason why the Braves are in playoff contention. If he is only the innings-eater of 2006, well...
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