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I know, man. How long can he keep this up? How many at-bats should we give Pagan the rest of the season? How much should we play him in order to find out what we have?

Well, we decided to pinch-hit for Ohman the previous inning-that's why he was taken out. Oops. Thanks. Sorry. I'm trying to follow along on Gameday today, and its really slow. It stops for several minutes and then jumps ahead. If you don't go back to read what happened, you wind up asking stupid questions like that one... No problem..I certainly know how Gameday can be..yesterday I was happy when the Pirates had gotten a third out, and then Gameday changed its mind and the Pirates went on to score 2 or 3 runs. So it can be easily confusing sometimes.

Well, we decided to pinch-hit for Ohman the previous inning-that's why he was taken out.

We seem to always do that..even when we make the right move and start the runner we still hit it hard enough to get a ground ball double play.

Pat and Ron were just raving over a play made by Izturis..was it really anything to get excited about?

Pagan has quietly had a pretty good season in very limited at bats: 81 AB's-.287/.337/.438 And of course he gets picked off as soon as I try to make a good post about him.

He would have had a lot more value in the past offseason. A lot of smart baseball people thought he had a bright future before this season. He may still have one, but his value is much lower at 2B (where more offense is expected) than SS. The trade for Izturis is awful b/c we've already got Cedeno at 1/10 the price, and it makes Cedeno expendable at a time when his value is lower than it used to be. In short, I expect Hendry to go out and get an Andy Pratt type talent. His trade value will be lower than last season-but if he is traded, I expect it will be for his value as a SS not a 2b..so I don't see that as much of a problem. The best way to get value for Cedeno might be to package him in a deal with another player for a LF/2B.

Really? Pat and Ron said that Dusty came out to argue-at least that's what I thought I heard. They also said it was clear that he came off the bag too early, so that the ump made the right call. I have not seen the play, but when was the last time an ump ruled that the fielder missed the bag on the double play pivot? I've seen it so often where the fielder misses the bag (where it's not really even close), yet he is given credit for the putout. I hate when the umps decide to selectively enforce the rules. The last one I remember is when we lost a game in the 9th because the ump called we missed the bag at 2nd-we did by about 4-5 inches, but like you said, they never call that-anybody remember that game? 2-3 years ago approx.

The one thing I'm confused by that article is the indication that the 2 Aprils were the only months he could hit in those two seasons-when April each year was only his 2nd best month by a good amount. (July 04, May 05 were his best 2 months). Other than that I agree-like they said, Izturis is an upgrade if it means Cedeno does not play 2nd next year. Otherwise, we'll have a pretty good amount of offense to make up next year from other positions.

For those that can see-how does Prior look? It sounds like it has been ground balls and strikeouts so far-any balls hit pretty hard?

That's better than paying your shortstop 4.5 million to do that. Oh, wait... :lol: Well, I agree with this assessment. Get a REALLY good bat for either LF or RF and get a really good SP. And this team could honestly be competitive. I would agree with that-as long as we upgraded the bench as well. We'd be in trouble next year again if we lost one of our 4-5 major bats in that scenario-so a good bench could somewhat alleviate that.

I'd take that from Cedeno as well next year. I'm just not sure he can improve that much for next year-that would be a huge jump for him from this year. I think he can reach those numbers over his career-I'm just not sure we want to wait 2-3 years for those numbers.

Really? Pat and Ron said that Dusty came out to argue-at least that's what I thought I heard.

I'm pretty sure they are trying this out as a last effort with Cedeno..but if he doesn't improve by a pretty good bit by the end of the season, I think he will be gone.

That's the second run Cedeno has cost us on the basepaths this week. I can understand giving up some on defense right now-he's still learning the position, but giving up the 3rd out at 3rd? Oh well-4 runs, 40 pitches for Duke-an excellent start.

Yup..2 K's for Prior and than a 1 pitch out..nice start for him.

Wow..I just looked up that 1991 Braves team-we thought we were worried about our offense next year. Greg Olsen-411 AB's, .241/.316/.345 Sid Bream-265 AB's, .253/.313/.423 Mark Lemke-269 AB's, .234/.305/.312 Rafeal Belliard-353 AB's, .249/.296/.286 Otis Nixon-401 AB's, .279/.371/.327 That's 5 of the listed starters (the other 3 are Pendleton, Gant, Justice) Total Team OBP: .327 Total Team SLG: .393 Total Team OPS: .720 To compare-the 2006 Chicago Cubs Total Team OBP: .320 Total Team SLG: .416 Total Team OPS: .736 Somehow that Braves offense managed to score 749 runs...I'm just not sure exactly how. Edit: Two things: I have another site that lists the Braves OBP as .331 for that season-so I'm not sure which one it is. Also, that .331 was the second best in the National League that year-to compare, it would be tied for 12th in the National League today-although .333 was 5th best last year. It appears that this year is a huge year for OBP-league OBP is way up so far this season.

I don't know the ins and outs of the whole waiver situation, but is it possible he already knew what it would take since Hendry and Schuerholz are pretty good friends? I agree with Ronnie on this one. A quick phone call and you know what the price could be. Hendry has already said on WGN that they are looking toward next year. Hendry would see a claim on A. Jones as a move for a team in the race. It would be very bad form, breaking the unwritten rules, to put in a claim on Jones. That is a bunch of bull. (not towards what you say, but towards hendry if this is the case) Getting a CF like Jones would help you immensely next year and something that you absolutely have to explore. Who cares if it may make some team cry because they wanted him for a stretch run. True, but it's bad faith if you have no chance of getting him. If Hendry has interest in aquiring hima and there is a chance of working out a deal, then he should have put in a claim. If one call is made and Hendry knows that either he does not have the players the Braves want, or he is just not willing to pay the price-then it would be better to just leave it alone, because there is no need hurting your reputation on a player you weren't going to really have a chance to get anyway. I hope Hendry decides that it is probably worth it and makes the deal as long as Atlanta's price is not absurdly high. I wonder if we will get to know what team claimed him if Atlanta decides to pull Jones back?

I think that package may do it..and there is a big difference in Prior and Guzman. They both have the injury history-if healthy, Guzman may dominate on the major league level, while Prior when healthy has dominated on the major league level.

Evidently it's got to be done by 1 p.m. tomorrow (eastern time I think) It was reported that a claim was put in already. However, the team is unknown as off right now. So the question is did someone claim before he fell to the Red Sox chance. Somebody pretty much had to claim him before the Red Sox. Apparently multiple teams claimed Jones, so unless it was the Yankees or Tigers that were the only other team than the Red Sox to claim Jones, the Red Sox did not win the claim.

Well, the DBacks are leading the wild card. However, I'd say 15 of the 16 teams in the NL are pathetic. And the Cubs did split with them.

We actually satisfy two other conditions of that article when it is prudent to steal bases. One is that the player in the 2 spot has been a double play threat most of the season. Second, our lack of power means that for a large part of the season, barely any of our hitters could get somebody home from first base-which makes the stolen base more valuable. So we are prime candidates for 2 of the 3 reasons why a team should run.

Juan Peirre is stealing bases at a 76% clip. He is treading water. Your arbitrary increases seem to be much higher than what actually is occuring. http://www.baseball-analysis.com/article.php?articleid=2607 3 things to that 1) If the loss is only 2.3 times the gain, then it wouldn't take 3 sb's for every caught stealing, just 2.3 steals for every caught stealing-that makes him more productive. 2)Pierre doesn't always steal bases or get caught with nobody out-what are the numbers with 1 out or 2 outs and nobody on? 3)The 80 point increase in slugging was not arbitrary-if all 38 of his sb's were with nobody on or as Pierre being the lead runner, that's what his extra bases would increase his slugging this year. Yes, not all 38 of those were in that situation-but at least 29 of them were.

Z hasn't been good whatsoever, but he probably would have only given up a couple without the defense of Cedeno and Izturis..can't defend their defense today, have given up 3-4 extra outs between them.

It sounds like 3 of the 5 runs could be charged to the middle infield today-just an absolutely terrible day by both of them so far. Let's see if either of them can pick it up.