Heating the Hot Seat

We are beginning to reach the point in the season where aberrations begin to feel a lot more like trends and slumps become struggles, unfortunately for the Braves the offense is still slumping and the pitching is struggling to carry it. And after last night’s long, long loss in San Diego Fredi Gonzalez’s honeymoon period has come to an abrupt and ugly end. Are the issues that anyone holding a bat while wearing a Braves jersey are currently experiencing all Fredi’s fault? No they aren’t but we heard about the more aggressive approach this Braves line-up was going to take, well the aggression is there, every time Dan Uggla flails away at a slider down and away on a two strike count the aggression is there, but for a team that lead the National League in OBP and Base on Balls last year is aggression really a good thing? For some guys like Nate McLouth who struggles to take his walks but was being way too hesitant at the plate last year being aggressive has actually helped him (and remember all things are relative) to post a .244 average and his .190 mark from last year. However when you see Jason Heyward going up and swinging at a fastball up and away on the first pitch it cannot possibly be a good thing. As if to illustrate my point the Braves rank 15^th of 16 in teams in the National League in OBP (.296) and 14^th of 16 in average (.226) while having the second most at-bats. While watching the sweep of the defending World Champion Giants over the weekend when the Braves drew 16 walks in the 3 games they then conspired to draw no walks in 13 innings. That’s right exactly ZERO walks in three and a half hours of baseball.

The hitting is not what Fredi is catching heat for though, his adventurous (or not) management of the bullpen has drawn criticism from fans using sabermetrics (capitolavenueclub.com) and some applying the good ol’ fashioned eye ball test (talkingchop.com). Whatever the medium of analysis it is being widely accepted that Gonzalez plays Fantasy Baseball and has Craig Kimbrel as his closer and manages his real team to maximise his fantasy success. If only it was that easy to understand what’s going on. One of the fashionable topics being discussed by the talking heads of the statistical baseball world this year has been the management of bullpens and the actual role of a closer; this was further amplified by Ron Washington’s sporadic use of Neftali Feliz in last year’s play-offs. So what opportunities did Gonzalez have to maximise Kimbrels value to the team? The bottom of the 7^th inning was his first chance with Maybin on second and two outs Fredi lifted Eric O’Flaherty in favour of righty Scott Linebrink to face Nick Hundley. Linebrink has been struggling and after the game Chipper recognised as much, Liney quickly gave up an RBI double to tie the game. That was his first chance but in the seventh maybe a little early but certainly plausible. Using Jonny Venters in the ninth inning is a reasonable choice but taking him out after only one inning is an absolute joke, let’s remember that Venters had been a starter all his career before the beginning of 2010 so it’s not like he can’t go longer. The brevity of Jonny’s appearance last night is just a footnote to the bumbling bullpen management. After choosing to take Venters out for the ninth why not let Kembo pitch the ninth to ensure you force extra innings, instead Gonzalez went with right-handed Cory Gearrin making his Major League debut to pitch the bottom of the ninth in a tie game. Gearrin was actually really good but who could have predicted that? In fact Gearrin ended up pitching two perfect innings but having Kimbrel pitch those two would have expanded the ‘pen and maybe allowed Gearrin to pitch the 11^th and 12^th. I am not in any way opposed to using Gearrin in this game, I believe that if you’re having a guy in the bullpen you need to be willing to use him otherwise it is wasting a roster spot so a little credit to Fredi for not being afraid to use him. At the top of the 11^th inning Gearrin (who is wearing my spellchecker on his own) was replaced by Christian Martinez which, again, does not upset me too much. Martinez is designated as our long reliever and two of the worst offensive teams in the league were about to begin the 11^th inning of a 3-3 game so why not throw Martinez in. Christian’s first two innings were uneventful as he pitched both perfectly using Petco Park to the best of his ability recording five of the six outs on fly balls. Then the circus came to town. The pitchers spot in the line-up came up to bat in the top of the 13^th with Nate McLouth on first base, rather than pinch hit David Ross for him and allow Mac to rest Gonzalez allowed Martinez to try and bunt the runner up. Christian bunted into a force out of McLouth at second and nearly had himself doubled off but made it to first in time. The very next hitter Martinez completed his goal to be involved in a double play as he wandered to far from first on a Martin Prado fly out to right field and Chris Denorfia took great pleasure in doubling off the Braves pitcher. This lead to Martinez pitching the bottom of the 13^th where he recorded one out before walking Nick Hundley and receiving a visit on the mound. You would have thought this would be a visit to replace him and use Kimbrel or even Jairo Asencio but no, I don’t know whether the visit to see if Martinez was having fun or what he would like for dinner but he stayed in the game to pitch to Ryan Ludwick who quickly deposited the ball over the left field wall.

At my count that’s at least five times that using Kimbrel would have been a better choice that the one the was actually made, unfortunately Kembo got to enjoy an evening reclining in the bullpen seats rather than do anything quite as exerting as his job. If the bullpen is managed like this the rest of the season Kimbrel might not get all that many save opportunities.

Dress Down Day

It’s Friday and everyone’s loosened their ties a little, maybe even worn jeans instead of dress pants into the office and, when I sat down to write this little old blog, I kind of had that Friday feeling and thought I’d just go with. This might end up being purely stream of conscious and might not even make that much sense but I just fancied writing something a little more relaxed, so here we go.

Imagine if there were a 21-year-old guy at a premium offensive position in his second big league season who hit exactly .300 in his rookie season and was now hitting .375 with a .398 OBP and a .513 slugging percentage while playing improved defense at one of the most important defensive positions. Wouldn’t you think there would be regular tributes to his immense talents and his incredible long term potential? Well we have the player in the Cubs Starlin Castro but, as yet, he hasn’t been getting the kind of pub his numbers deserve and it seems somewhat mystifying. In his rookie season Castro had 506 plate appearances and put up a line of .300/.347/.408 while the NL Rookie of the Year, the Giants Buster Posey, had a slash line that read .305/.357/.505. As you can see the only drastically distinguishable talent is Posey’s power while the San Francisco catcher had 63 less plate appearances than Chicago shortstop. The intriguing thing to begin this season is that, although it is around 20 games into the season, Castro has not had a precipitous drop in production like other players that started hot (see Adam Lind). Looking at the advanced stats Castro’s BABIP is inflated which would usually indicate an impending offensive recession, the difference with the 21 year old is his career BABIP, including the Minor Leagues, is about 50 points above league average meaning that this might just be the way he hits. I just thought it was really weird that Castro isn’t being touted for all kinds of accolades but, whether it’s because he’s playing for an unreadable Cubs team or not, there doesn’t seem to be much hype around a projectable young player.

There are three very interesting young pitchers in the AL (I’m not including the Oakland A’s who have three on their own) who all profile as front of the rotation starters but have very different profiles. Michael Pineda has built up a lot of hype for himself with his power stuff and gigantic frame and has been equally dynamic in his first taste of the Major League mound. His mid to upper 90’s fastball has generated a 7.45 strikeout per nine innings rate which is interestingly the lowest it has been in his career, in fact in three minor league seasons this never dipped below 8 K/9 and peaked at 10.97 in any substantial sample size. The problem is that thanks to the Mariners bringing Pineda up early this year they denied him a chance to develop a genuine off speed pitch to get out the tough lefties he will face. Because of this lack of top notch secondary stuff Pineda could get shelled a couple of time with lefty heavy line-ups sitting on his fastball, and this brings about all kind of questions about the Seattle organisation and the real need to have Pineda up now but that’s for an entire different book...sorry...blog. The most experienced of the three (meaning he pitched in the big leagues last year) is the Blue Jays Kyle Drabek, the son of former Pirate Doug. Drabek moved north of the border as the centrepiece in the Roy Halladay deal and is a genuine centrepiece prospect. In 3 starts last season Drabek put up a 4.76 ERA but with a 3.48 xFIP, relying on his tailing fastball and sharp breaking ball he has improved his stirkeouts per nine innings and has a respectable 3.00 ERA accompanied by a worrying 4.35 xFIP. I have tried to see as much of Drabek as possible despite his best efforts to evade me, a lot of the time he looks like a young pitcher building up his durability as, for the first five or six innings, he looks dominant but when he tires he tires very quickly and gets fly ball happy. Whether Drabek becomes a decent Halladay impersonator is unlikely but if he can keep up his early season form his calling card could be his consistency. After thinking about it a little I actually think that, of this trio, Orioles lefty Zach Britton could have the best career because, at 23, he has a well developed arsenal including a devastating sinker that has produced 56.7% ground ball outs. He also has good secondary stuff including a slider that, when it’s working, can really throw hitter but his sinker will be his money maker. It is a sustainable pitch that really only improves the more he will throw it and more he learns about the art of pitching. While he doesn’t have the workhorse build of Derek Lowe his repertoire is incredibly similar and he is in a rotation a lot earlier in his career than D-Lowe and has landed in a good educational environment. It’s not like Lowe has a bad career either.

Quick Braves footnote about last night’s disheartening walk off loss to the Dodgers. I felt sick watching it and hope that Craig Kimbrel was taken to the metaphorical woodshed for not backing up home plate in the bottom of the ninth.

High Performance

Braves Beat- I will be the first person to admit that Brian McCann is one of my favourite players in baseball, although I feel a slight pang of disappointment every time he swings over the top of a breaking ball on a 2 strike count. Prior to the season there was a rush of writers scrambling to write the next piece about how this was now Brian’s team, how he was now the leader and his intangibles were an unappreciated part of Mac’s game, well maybe all that ink had a point. McCann has exploded these first two weeks of the season in a way that no one expected, in the 17 games Heap has played he has put up a monstrous .356 average with a .433 OBP while only hitting two home runs. His BABIP of .422 suggests that he is going to recede very soon to a more human level of performance but what his first 67 plate appearances has given us is the opportunity to really appreciate how good the Braves catcher is. McCann was projected to hit between .280 and .295 this season with around 20 home runs and will probably do just that but, especially with Joe Mauer heading to the DL with bizarre leg problems, Braves fans should always keep in mind how lucky we’ve all been having Mac behind the plate for the last six years and at least the next three.

So Fredi made his line-up change and moved Jason Heyward up to the second spot and dropped Nate McLouth all the way down to eighth in the order and it has worked to perfection...almost. Since he made the move one outfielder has gone 4-for-8 with a walk while the other has gone 0-for-9 with no walks. Little guessing game which is Jason Heyward and which is Nate McLouth? Well apparently McLouth is a .500 hitter when in the eighth hole while Heyward is barely a Major League player in the 2 hole. The ironic thing is that at the bottom of the order McLouth should see less hittable pitches than hitting in front of Chipper but he seems to be doing more with worse pitches. Two games is almost impossible to call a sample size but the unusual immediate effect caught my eye.

The Braves scored eight runs in the ninth inning last night against the Dodgers to make a pitching duel into a laugher, however the question I found myself asking was what is the worth of that kind of outburst in a game like that? Probably not a whole lot in the grand scheme of things unless the Braves can make this kind of offense on a more consistent basis. Hopefully that ninth inning will spark the bats the way the offensive surge unlike the 10 runs in Washington did.

Derek Lowe looks to back up last night’s 10-1 win tonight and get the West Coast trip really going in the Braves favour, however Lowe will be going on short rest in another display of his unselfishness and value to the team. Because of the rain out on Friday night Lowe pitched Sunday and it was him or Jair Jurrjens going on short rest or some roster fiddling would have to take place. Much like the end of last year Lowe bit the bullet and actually seemed to relish the opportunity, something refreshing to see in a supposed ace. The only real reason I mention this is because I, like most other fans, gave D-Lowe no end of criticism when he was struggling last year and feel I only have to be fair now he’s finding success.

Ball Four

1. 1. Josh Johnson is stupid good! It seems that Johnson carries a no-hit bid into the later innings of almost every start he is making this year going closest in Atlanta when Freddie Freeman broke up a no-no effort with a double in the eighth. In his four starts this season Johnson is 3-0 with a 1.00 ERA, he has pitched 27 innings across those four starts giving up only 10 hits, 3 earned runs while striking out 27 and posting a WHIP of 0.59. JJ was one of the trendy picks to win the Cy Young at the beginning of the year and is already putting up the second best ERA in the Majors behind only Gio Gonzalez of the A’s. He also happens to be one of the most enjoyable pitchers to watch in the big leagues thanks to the speed he works and his power strikeout stuff.

2. 2. In the wake of Johnson’s 2-hit 7 inning effort Brett Anderson gave an late night cap against the Boston Red Sox that could very possibly be even better than JJ’s. In 8 innings against the BoSox Anderson gave up only four hits and one walk while allowing no runs and striking out 8 Sox. There was a lot of press given to his team mates Trevor Cahill and Gio Gonzalez and, mainly because of the occasional injury Anderson was somehow overlooked in the A’s rotation. Let’s remember quickly he is a 23-year-old in his third year in the big leagues who has a career ERA of 3.40 and put up a 2.80 mark in 19 starts last year. Like Johnson the A’s lefty is a thrill to watch pitch and should front this very good young rotation.

3. 3. I don’t expect the Royals or Indians to win anything close to 50% of their games but, despite this being April, this could be the two teams moment in the sun and they should get the coverage they might not get later in the year. They are currently in the midst of a series for the top spot in the AL central and it has so far been a wonderful series. Monday night saw a 10 inning game that the Indians managed to steal 7-3 thanks to a four run tenth. Last night the teams played out a dramatic 5-4 game in which both teams raked up 9 hits apiece. They currently have a combined record of 23-11 and are currently two of the most entertaining teams to watch in the league and could remain interesting as their respective influx of top prospects arrive. Credit to Alex Gordon who is hitting .361 and has a 13 game hit streak going after many began speculating he had become a Brandon Wood sized bust.

4. 4. Jake Peavy left a rehab start at Double-A Birmingham after throwing only 15 pitches complaining of irritation in his shoulder, an MRI back in Chicago proved there was nothing serious to worry about and he will not begin a program of anti-inflammatory drugs with a view to throwing again three days into the six day program. Any issue with Jake Peavy’s shoulder is a shame for any baseball fan, especially me with my strange obsession with pitching (more on that at a later date), is that we are being deprived the opportunity to see one of the premier pitches of our time in his peak years. A real shame.

What to Watch: Derek Lowe on short rest could either be a triumph or an adventure. Also any chance to see Jered Weaver pitch at the moment is worth taking especially in a divisional rubber game against the Texas Rangers.

A Start, An End and All the In Betweens

Braves Beat- Like team mate Tommy Hanson the Braves ace Tim Hudson has also struggled in the early innings of games this year but, unlike Hanson, more often than not Hudson has steadied the ship and produced highly effective and even brilliant outings. Unfortunately for Huddy his stretch of survival ended late last night (well actually I was waking up when Jonathon Broxton was trying to give up a second Dodger game in a row, one of the bi-products of following baseball in England). Hudson did last 6 innings, continuing his streak in 2011 of lasting 6 in all of his starts, but gave up four runs on six hits and two walks. This is the second start in a row Hudson has given up more than four runs, something he did only once last year. There was widespread acceptance that Hudson would regress this year given that his FIP and xFIP were both nearly a run higher than his ERA, this means that several starts like this shouldn’t come as a surprise or of concern to Braves fans.

Reassuringly for those Braves fans was the two hit performance of Dan Uggla last night who went 2-for-4 with a double, stolen base and a run scored. This raised the Braves new slugger’s batting average to a monstrous .197. All joking aside this could be a huge breakthrough for Dan who only had one multi-hit game previous to last night and his only previous stolen base attempt saw him bounce off the bag and be tagged out. Hopefully a couple of hits for Dan last night will get him on the kind of role a successful Braves team needs. The other big note from last night’s line-up was Fredi sticking with Jason Heyward hitting second in the order even with Nate McLouth in the order. Heyward didn’t have the kind of explosion his supporters were hoping for but hopefully the order with Martin hitting lead off, Heyward second and McLouth eighth will be will get the sputtering offence into the rhythm it has so far lacked.

Peter Moylan landed on the 15-Day DL with what has been discovered to be a bulging disc in his back, a similar problem to the one he experienced in 2001 and 2003 although Moylan feels this time it is less serious to the previous pains that resulted in surgery in ’03. The Braves medical staff will reassess the right-hander in two weeks and see how his back is then; until he is able to be revaluated the Braves are unsure as what Moylan will be able to do. Peter’s 4.15 ERA belied his importance in the early part of the season to the Braves bullpen but anyone who saw his two strikeouts on Thursday night against the Marlins should appreciate the role the Aussie plays.

Ball Four

1. The battles of the West were both somewhat less competitive than I and the rest of the baseball watching world were hoping for them to be but they produced two very different types of pitching performances that were equally effective. In the launching pad of Coors Field the Giants ace Tim Lincecum dominated one of the hottest line-ups in baseball in a performance to match ‘The Freak’s’ best. In 7.2 innings Lincecum gave up three hits and one run after carrying a no-hitter into the seventh while striking out 10 Rockies. With all the talk of the Phillies Fab Four people seemed to somehow forget the brilliance of the Giants Championship winning rotation that Lincecum fronts and led his team to an 8-1 victory. While Lincecum was spinning a mile high masterpiece CJ Wilson was pitching a similarly effective game while missing far fewer bats. Wilson lasted seven innings against the hot Angels and gave up ten hits somehow allowing only one run. The 9 strikeouts Wilson piled up helped him survive what could have been a rough outing while the Angels going 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position. The 7-1 win the Rangers produced against the Angels broke LA’s five game winning streak and gets the Rangers back to winning ways after losing their series in New York.

2. The AL East produced two outstanding pitching performances yesterday that reminded me why I had both the Rays and Red Sox winning more than 90 games. Those lucky enough to live in LA, San Francisco or anywhere West of the Rocky mountains were about to enjoy some Patriots Day baseball with breakfast while 11 Eastern Time is the most accessible time I have ever experienced watching a game here. It appears that Daisuke Matsuzaka also enjoys an early matinee as he produced his best performance of the year, maybe even longer. Dice-K went 7 innings against the Blue Jays giving up only 1 hit and no runs while throwing only 89 pitches, a sharp comparison to his two earlier starts when he took 96 pitches to get through 5 innings in his first start and 47 to get through 2 in his second. The performance of the Japanese righty combined with the offensive surge of Jed Lowrie has moved the Sox back to 5-10 and saw them win consecutive games for the first time this year. In Tampa David Price was even better than his Bostonian counterpart. Price pitched 8 innings against the Chicago White Sox allowing only six base runners on four hits and two walks while striking out nine Sox. Price has been quietly improving since his rocky beginning to the season and with last night’s performance levelled his record at 2-2 and lowered his ERA to an impressive 2.83 mark. The difference between these two performances to me is that this should be an admired one-off by Dice-K and something closer to Price’s true level of performance.

3. Tonight sees the return to the mound of Ubaldo Jimenez who, thanks to a cut cuticle has not pitched since giving up six runs in six innings on Opening Day. Whilst 2011 has begun significantly led impressively for Ubaldo than 2010 when he went 5-0 with a 0.79 ERA in his first five starts he is re-joining a team that currently shares the best record in the early stages of the season. Jimenez will face the San Francisco Giants who he has tangled with intermittently at important stages of his career. He currently sports a 5-5 record against the defending World Series champions with an impressive 3.13 ERA. He hooks up tonight with Jonathon Sanchez who, like Ubaldo, also has a no-hitter in his not so distant past.

4. One of the best stories coming out of Spring Training was Rule 5 draft pick Brad Emaus winning the second base job for the New York Mets. After 14 games and 37 At-Bats the feel good story seems to be over. Today the Mets announced they were designating Emaus for assignment after he hit .162 in the two weeks he lasted in the New York line-up before seemingly being replaced by Daniel Murphy. Thanks to the complexities of some of baseballs inner workings Emaus shouldn’t go investing in any real estate anywhere any time soon. The Mets must first pass him through Rule 5 waivers before offering him back to Toronto for half the amount they paid for him, if they wish to keep him they must work out a trade with Jays although that seems unlikely. I was personally really happy to see a guy like Emaus getting a shot at the big leagues and I will be a little sad to see him go wherever he goes and hopefully he can build a Major League career for himself.

Ball Four: Pitching and Equality

Braves Beat- The Braves wrapped up the recent home stand with a series win over the New York Mets behind the strong pitching during Saturdays double header. Derek Lowe was good once again throwing 6 innings while giving up 5 hits and 2 runs, D-Lowe levelled his season record at 2-2 and further solidified his 1.82 ERA. The Braves rode that outing and four solo home runs by Alex Gonzalez (2) Chipper and Freddie Freeman to a 4-2 win capped by Craig Kimbrel’s fourth save of the season. The performance Lowe gave to the Turner Field crowd was better later in the same evening by the returning Jair Jurrjens circa 2009. After spending a year tearing the entire right side of his body JJ returned the Turner Field mound after giving everyone a fright with another trip to the DL to protect his strained oblique muscle, an injury that seems to be already forgotten. Jurrjens spun a 7 inning, 2 hit gem throwing exactly 100 pitches and walked only 1 batter. Multi-hit games from Martin Prado, Chipper and Eric Hinske gave JJ and the ‘pen all the support they needed as George Sherrill and Scott Linebrink struck out 5 of the 6 batter they faced.

Unfortunately for the Bravos Tommy Hanson couldn’t finish off the teams first sweep of the year as he continued his early game struggles, giving up two runs on three hits in the first innings. When that first inning finally finished Hanson was dominant despite only working five innings Tommy struck out nine Mets. The three runs Hanson gave up proved enough for the Mets to snap their seven game losing streak and see the Braves offense sleep its way through another Sunday afternoon. Worryingly for Braves fans we may have another elite pitcher named Tom that struggles in the early innings, the big challenge for Tommy Hanson will be to improve his efficiency. The 3.2 innings against the Nationals took him 68 pitches, the 5.1 innings against the Brewers took 89 and after 5 innings on Sunday he was 97. Whether or not Tommy can improve his efficiency will ultimately prove how intelligent a pitcher he is and will be.

Ball Four

1. The Oakland A’s and their young ace Trevor Cahill are positioning themselves for the kind of pitching-led challenge they planned all winter. Cahill turned in his best performance of the young season yesterday striking out 9 Detroit Tigers over 8 innings that included only 4 hits and a single run. The Athletics pitching staff is already setting the best ERA mark in the majors with a team 2.59 mark. The need to place Dallas Braden on the DL today will cause a slight weakness but could open up a starting spot for righty prospect Tyson Ross to make Braden’s next scheduled start. Another interesting note is that four of the top five ERA’s in the Major’s a being set by American League teams and the top three marks by three AL West teams in the A’s, Angels and Rangers.

2. Felix Hernandez suffered his second consecutive poor start and now has a 4.33 ERA in his four starts. There a plenty of reasons for Felix to be struggling mentally but almost none for him to be struggling physically. The losing mentality in Seattle and ineptness of his offense would bore and frustrate the best human being and with the promotion of Michael Pineda he suddenly has a challenger to his crown. There have been whisperings that the time may be coming for the Mariners to trade the 2010 AL Cy Young winner and the team’s trading of Cliff Lee proves they are will to deal a quality pitcher but the question is how tradable is King Felix? His current contract has him tied in until 2014 with salaries of $10 million this year, $18.5 million in 2012, $19.5 million in 2013 and finally $20 million in 2014. There are maybe only 3 or 4 teams in baseball that could afford the contract but of those teams maybe only 1 or 2 have the pieces to make the trade happen. Of course it is only two starts.

3. The NL West was widely predicted to be one of the tightest races in baseball with three very good teams as well as the wild-card Padres, Sunday proved how close the division truly could be. All five teams were involved in games decided in the eighth inning or later Sunday in all kinds of games ranging from slugfests to pitching duals. The most entertaining game was between two division rivals in the Arizona Diamondbacks and the San Francisco Giants who tangled in a 12 inning battle that ended when Stephen Drew singled in Justin Upton to give the D’Backs a deserved win. The importance of Upton and Drew to the Arizona team was on full display in this win as they combined for four of the D’Backs 11 hits including Drew’s game winner. The Padres, despite being the worst hitting team in the National League they managed to piece together a four run eighth inning against the Houston Astros to record an 8-6 win. The lack of production from the Padres line-up should mean that there are plenty of close games in the Padres future but most probably won’t turner out as well as this one. The Dodgers got an outstanding performance from Chad Billingsley who pitched 8 innings, giving up only 2 hits and striking out 11. This performance only makes Billingsley inconsistencies even more frustrating knowing how great he came be. It did look like the Dodgers would waste this effort as Jonathon Broxton gave up the go ahead run the top ninth setting up the Cardinals for an unlikely win. The two best hitters in the LA line-up had different ideas; Andre Ethier led off the ninth with a double before Matt Kemp sent a Ryan Franklin offering over the center field fence for a thrilling Dodger win. Whilst all this was going on the Rockies were continuing their Major League best start to the season with an eighth inning charge over the Chicago Cubs as, like the Padres, the Rockies put up four runs in the eighth and rode it to their 12^th victory. This division seems to be even tighter and balanced than anyone imagined

4. Let’s do a little bit of college ball to round out today given some huge series this weekend. The defending national champion South Carolina Gamecocks knocked off the number 1 Vanderbilt Commodores winning 2 of the 3 games in Columbia this weekend. The big draft names in the series were Vandy RHP Sonny Gray who gave up three runs and 11 hits in 7.2 innings while striking out 7 including Gamecock outfielder Jackie Bradley jr who went 3-for-14 this weekend and now has a .278 average on the year. Rice third baseman Anthony Rendon went 2-9 and now has a .349 average and is re-establishing himself as a top draft prospect while UCLA’s Gerrit Cole struggled a little pitching 8 innings, giving up 5 runs but striking out 11. Once again he was outperformed by teammate Trevor Bauer who threw a complete game four-hit shut-out while striking out 13 and lowering his ERA to 1.47. This is a deep draft and with some performances it is getting deeper.

What to Watch

The beginning of two huge series on the West coast with the Giants going to Colorado with both teams looking to make an early statement while the Angels visit the Texas Rangers as both attempt to make their mark of the AL West.

Ball Four: Second Sunday

The second Sunday in the baseball felt very like a Sunday with a lot of the fireworks being used up Saturday. I watched two full games and neither was particularly inspiring unfortunately but having spent the better part of my Sunday evening staring at them it’s only far I write them up.

Phillies @ Braves

The two teams predicted by many to compete for the NL East crown concluded their early season series in Atlanta with a 3-0 Philadelphia win meaning they take the first series from the Braves and pushed their record to a National League best 7-2. After the Braves got off to a fast start Friday night beating up on Cliff Lee for a 6-3 win behind Tim Hudson and Chipper Jones, Saturday was less successful for the Braves as the Philly offense teed off on Brandon Beachy and the Braves bullpen for a convincing 10-2 victory that set up the Sunday game as a compelling rubber match. Nobody thought to inform the Braves offense that, in order to be competitive, they needed to score runs, a worrying problem that was on display too often in 2010. Shane Victorino continued to swing the bat well finishing the Braves series 7-for-13 with 5 runs scored; he showed how important he is leading off for this Philadelphia team whose offense was questioned in the offseason. After the Phil’s scored in the first inning of each of the two previous games the Braves kept them off the board this time thanks to a trademark Derek Lowe double play ball and then another nice play to get Jimmy Rollins by Alex Gonzalez.

The Philadelphia line-up provided one interesting titbit by starting Michael Martinez at second base they increased the number of Rule 5 Draft picks playing second base in the NL East to three. Dan Uggla was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2001 before they didn’t add him to their 40-man roster in 2005 when he was subsequently chosen in the Rule 5 draft by the Florida Marlins. Uggla is obviously now with the Braves. Brad Emaus was drafted by the Toronto Blue Jays in 2007 before the New York Mets drafted him in the 2010 Rule 5 and giving him the starting job on Opening Day. They were then joined by Martinez who the Phillies chose in the same draft the Mets took Emaus, Martinez signed with the Nationals organisation in 2006.

After being beaten around by Emaus’ Mets in his first start of the season Cole Hamels bounced back and was absolutely filthy in his second outing, not allowing a hit until the fourth inning and finishing his seven innings of work only giving up four hits while striking out seven. Tom Glavine, who was calling the game for Fox Sports South, pointed out that Hamels was hitting 95 in the first inning which gave him confidence in it while being able to use his other pitched as well. Hamels made the Braves best hitter in Martin Prado look very bad on two occasions, striking him out in the fourth and sixth and leaving Martin looking really overmatched on both occasions.

Victorino scored the first two runs for the Phillies as he manufactured the first run in the fourth inning, hitting a single before going first to third on a Placido Polanco single and scoring on Jimmy Rollins’ double play ground out. He then used his power to score the second run in the seventh when he crushed an inside fastball deep into the right field seats. After the abuse the Braves bullpen took on Saturday Fredi Gonzalez went to young reliable on Sunday pitching Jonny Venters and Craig Kimbrel in the 8^th and 9^th innings. Venters looked dominant recording three ground ball outs in his inning of work before Kimbrel and Jason Heyward combined to allow Jimmy Rollins to score an unearned run in the ninth inning.

It just felt too much like a lazy Sunday for the Braves as they just never got anything going and looked unfocused at the plate recording first pitch outs with runners in scoring position far too often. The Phillies gave us a preview of what could be with the quality pitching and getting enough offense for the win. This series is not a sign of things to come or even an early season measuring stick just the first round of what will be a slugfest.

Indians @ Mariners

With the Indians currently leading their division and the Mariners poised to begin their annual decline into insignificance I thought it would be a good time to see these two teams. The pitching match-up was hardly marquee with Eric Bedard going for the Mariners against the Indians Josh Tomlin, who had made a very good start against the Boston Red Sox earlier in the week. Eric Bedard was truly horrible in the four innings he ended up working, he lacked control in all four but not to the point of walking people. For someone who was throwing in the high eighties and low nineties Bedard needed to work the bottom of the strike zone and hit the corners, it simply wasn’t happening as he gave up a first inning home run to Asdrubal Cabrera followed by a squib single to Shin-Soo Choo and a towering double to Shelly Duncan on a 75 mph breaking ball left at the letters that would have been a home run in any other ballpark. In the second inning it looked like Bedard might actually get things under control as he found some sink on his change-up and looked a lot better against Matt LaPorta and Jack Hannahan before giving up consecutive double to Lou Marson and Michael Brantley that scored Marson. Brantley then scored when Asdrubal Cabrera singled but ended up being out at second base on a good heads up play by Mariners catcher Chris Gimenez.

Gimenez is a perfect example of where the Mariners currently are. The position of catcher is currently filled out on the M’s depth chart by Gimenez and Miguel Olivo, the former has a .163 career average while Olivo is nearly 33 years-old but coming off a career year at the Rockies paradise last year. When the Mariners traded Cliff Lee last year they had to choose between the Rangers package that had Justin Smoak as the centrepiece and the New York Yankees and their top prospect, catcher Jesus Montero. The Mariners chose Smoak at a position that was already filled by Major League average Casey Kotchman. Even if the Mariners had received Gary Sanchez or Austin Romine instead of Montero they could have quality offense at a premium position, they don’t and seeing Gimenez come in the lack of offense at that position in such a weak line-up is just much more pronounced.

Bedard left the game after four innings in which he gave up six runs and threw 83 pitches, is the Mariners are going to do anything like compete they need more from their starting pitching because the bullpen they have isn’t deep or strong enough to make up the deficiency like it did yesterday. Of the 10 hits Bedard gave up 6 were for extra bases including 2 home runs in as ineffective a start as you’re likely to see. Tomlin on the other hand continued his good start to the season with 6.2 strong innings allowing only 3 hits and 3 runs, a number somewhat skewed by one bad pitch to Ryan Langerhans that resulted in a two run homer. Chad Durbin was awful allowing a home run and a single to the two hitters he faced without getting anyone out. Despite the small offensive surge that saw the Mariners score three runs in two batters it never felt like they were actually going to come back and were eventually shut down by a good back end of the Indians bullpen.

Neither of these teams seems set to compete, despite the Indians good start they just don’t match up to the White Sox, Twins or Tigers and will fall off quite quickly one would expect. However they still have some potential excitement with Choo and Carlos Santana as well as some intriguing prospects. The Mariners on the other hand have so little to get excited about outside of Felix Hernandez. They still have good players in Ichiro and Franklin Gutierrez but, especially for Ichiro, they are models of consistency and that isn’t sexy. Ichiro is one of the best players in the game still but he has become something of a classic painting, you go to admire and appreciate and rarely get excited about.

Ball Four

1. Gordon Beckham is going to have a great season. The first week of the season has given White Sox fans and the wider baseball public a glimpse into what Beckham should become. He is hitting .333 with two home runs and a .400 OBP and made two dazzling defensive plays yesterday that show his improvement in the field. Beckham could be on the cusp of establishing himself as the All-Star calibre player the White Sox imagined.

2. Jered Weaver continued his dominant start to the year Sunday as he moved to 3-0 with a career high 15 strikeouts. He has compiled 20.2 innings in 3 starts, given up 9 hits and 9 walks while striking out 27 and putting up a 0.87 ERA.

3. The retirement of Manny Ramierez and conclusion of the Barry Bonds trial will hopefully begin to bring to an end the sordid steroid stories in baseball. Manny was the last high profile player to serve a ban, serving 50 games last year, and may have been headed for more bench time that resulted in his retirement. The lack of fanfare that Manny has received as he slinks off into the shadows seems to reflect baseballs attitude to steroid users.

4. The Red Sox and Rays recorded their first wins of the season amid reports the world was ending in Massachusetts. The Sox even saw fit to add to their win total last night beating the Yankees for the second time in three days last night thanks to Josh Beckett going all 2007 on the Yanks. The Red Sox will most likely push on from this point and make the charge to October everyone has predicted; the Rays need to be more concerned especially with Evan Longoria on the DL. A weak line-up has been exposed even more by a rotation that appears to have regressed and an underachieving bullpen. This is simply not the same Rays team in spirit, mentality or achievement.

Ball Four

The first full weekend of Major League Baseball is over and it was about as good as could have possibly been hoped. There has been a good mix of great pitching, great hitting and great defence and we have seen some genuinely great games and interesting series. In true baseball spirit I thought it would only be right to begin a clichéd weekly piece looking back at the previous week and finding the four things I found most interesting it will probably change, as with everything on here I’m still trying stuff and finding out what works so bear with me for the first couple of weeks as I work out the best way to do this. Anyway let the umpire send you down to first as we look at ball four:

1. 1. Two of the premier pitching prospects in baseball made their debuts on back-to-back days over the weekend and turned in consecutive gems as Kyle Drabek and Zach Britton both earned their first Major League win. Drabek pitched seven innings of 1 hit 1 run ball against the Twins on Saturday after he carried a no-hitter into the sixth inning. He maintained good velocity on his fastball between 89-94 mph and good control while issuing only three walks. Britton also only gave up one run while pitching six innings in an emergency start after Brian Matusz went down with a side strain. Britton gave up three hits and three walks while striking out six.

2. 2. It began on Opening Day and has continued through the rest of the weekend with close games in almost every series. On Opening Day itself all five games played were decided by three runs or less with the Reds providing the most dramatic with a walk-off win in the ninth inning courtesy of Ramon Hernandez’s three-run homer. The second day of the season on Friday saw six of the eleven games decided by three runs or less. This pattern continued for the remainder of the weekend proving the Major League Baseball is indeed very competitive even at this point of the year.

3. 3. It’s way too early to worry about records for some of the more fancied teams. Mainly two of the three big guns in the AL East in the Boston Red Sox and Tampa Bay Rays are both 0-3 after being swept in their opening series’. The Red Sox were hammered down in Arlington by the Rangers thanks in large part because of some bad pitching while the Rays offense was shut down by the Baltimore Orioles in Tampa. The Milwaukee Brewers, many people’s pick to win the NL Central are also winless with a 0-4 record however 3 of those 4 games have been decided by two runs or fewer. The point is both teams have new additions and are still figuring out their new identities both teams will win lots of games, after all they still have 159 and 158 game left to play respectively. No time to reach for the red button.

4. 4. After the year of the pitcher in 2010 we have seen a power output of epic proportions with over 100 home runs being hit over the first five days of the season. Leading the way is the Texas Rangers with 13 and the New York Yankees with 11. The offensive output hasn’t however affected the quality of the games mainly due to their competitive nature. Expect to see the power reduce as teams adjust and pitchers get into the swing of pitching.

We are under a week into the season and already it feels like a lot has happened with a lot of young players producing and MVP calibre players living up to their billing. We’ve got six months of this to enjoy just think on that!