Braves Report

As the old adage goes, you can never have too much pitching. That is the philosphpy the Braves took into the draft on Tuesday. Holding the 7th overall pick, the highest since the team took Roberto Kelly second overall in 1991, the Braves hoped to select local product Zach Wheeler but he was snatched away by the Giants with the pick before. The Braves selected Vanderbilt lefty Mike Minor with the pick.
Minor profiles as a guy with little upside. He currently projects as a number 4 starter. Minor’s stuff is average, he gets by with pitch ability. His fastball sits anywhere from 86 MPH to 89 MPH. His best pitch is a plus change up.  He has  solid curve and uses a slider for his primary breaking ball. The slider does have good depth on it. His pick off move is probably the best in this year’s draft.  Minor is a low risk, low reward guy. What you see is basically what you get.  The Braves in my opinion would have been better suited  taking a high upside guy here rather than selecting Minor.
The only other pick the Braves had today was the 87th pick. With that pick they turned their attention to the Ivy League and selected Princeton’s David Hale. Hale projects as a power reliever in the pros.  His fastball routinely sits at 92-93 but he can dial it up a notch to 95-96 when he needs to and has topped out at 97. He has flashed a plus slider at times and has shown some feel for a change up. He played two ways at Princeton so having him focus on pitching should help him progress more.
The Braves hold the 7th pick in each round the rest of the way. I expect the Braves to return more towards their roots and start to pick more high school kids with high upsides. A few names to keep an eye on for Wedsnday’s rounds: Austin Adams, Luke Bailey, Colton Cain, Brody Colvin, Matt Grahm, David Nick, Jonathan Singleton, and Zach Von Rosenburg. I will have a write up on the draft when it is complete.

Well, well, well. I guess I have some explaining to do about the lack of updates on this blog. As I’ve mentioned before, life is busy. I’ve been going through some major changes in my life recently, and honestly, I haven’t had the time or energy to write anything. So, for that, I apologize. I promise, however, that I’ll try to be better about it in the future. This means recaps for the following games, and maybe old recaps for the ones I missed. It really depends how my schedule works out. Bear with me, though, I promise you no long hiatuses like this anymore.

Now, enough of that, onto the game. The Braves played the Cubs on Wednesday night after coming off a huge walk-off win the day before. Unfortunately, they couldn’t replicate their success once again. This extra-inning loss lowered their record to 26-26, further continuing the .500 trend.

Derek Lowe started the game and had a decent outing: 7 innings, 5 hits, 2 earned runs, 2 walks, and 4 strikeouts. Unfortunately for him, the offense didn’t provide him with much run support, so he couldn’t earn a win when he left the game.

[Image: Yahoo! Sports]

Moylan followed him, giving up a hit and striking out 2 in his inning of work. Gonzalez pitched the next scoreless inning, allowing a hit and a walk. Bennett would be charged with the go-ahead run in the 11th inning, who scored after O’Flaherty gave up a single. Overall, not really a horrid night for the pitching staff, but apparently only perfection would have sufficed.

The offense, alas, wasn’t nearly quite up to the same speed. Leading the offensive charge on the night was McCann and Chipper, who each plated a run. Chipper had a pinch-hit double, scoring the Braves’ second and final run of the night in the 7th inning. Other notables were Kelly Johnson, who had a double and a single. Escobar, Prado, and Francoeur also each had singles. That was about it for the offense. As I’ve said many times before, just not enough.

Braves lose in 11, 3 – 2.

The final game of the series (today) got rained out and was postponed until the 22nd.

Next game: Friday vs. Brewers.

7:30 PM EST. Gallardo vs. Jurrjens.