We finish our roundup with an examination of the pitchers, which I’ve divided into appropriate categories. Enjoy.

The Infirmary
All players in this section are on the Disabled List as of July 16.
Tom Glavine (SP)
As BP noted when discussing (ugh) Lance Cormier, the Braves did not resign Glavine for “his vivid memories of the Civil War.” He made 12 starts before being shut down over a month ago, going 2-3 (5 QS) with a 4.85 ERA. He wasn’t exactly lighting up the world, but he is better than some of his replacements. At the time, it is unknown if he will return for this season, and there are rumors that he was planning on retiring after this season.

John Smoltz (SP)
Smoltz is also mentioned in those retirement rumors. He had massive damage in his shoulder that required surgery and is out for the year. Statistically, he was wonderful in his first 4 starts: 3-1, 0.78 ERA, .179 batting average against, 495 OPS against. His 5th start on April 27th went poorly: 4 IP, 4 ER and a loss. He went on the DL after this with shoulder pain and was shut down for the rest of May. He attempted to make another come back as a reliever, being brought in to close against the Marlins on June 2nd. He was one out away from getting the save but blew when on a single to left. (The Braves managed to salvage the game, tying in the 9th and winning in the 10th.) The next day, Smoltz woke up and the pain in his shoulder was too much – had surgery a week or two later and was shut down for the season.
I’d said to anyone who’d listen at the beginning of the year that Smoltz’s arm is like that ex-police car in the original Blues Brothers movie – it’s just waiting to fall completely apart. I think Smoltz wants to pitch again, but it may ultimately be time for him to end his career.

Mike Hampton (SP)
Many are looking, for some reason, to Hampton to solve the Braves’ pitching issues. (Note: the Braves largely don’t have pitching issues – they have some bullpen issues, but it’s safe to say that with the 2nd best ERA in the National League the Braves are not hurting for pitching – they are hurting for an outfield bat of some sort.) At any rate, he almost got back to the bigs earlier in the year but was scratched from his start with yet another injury. He started last night in the minors but was scratched after two innings. He was hoping to come back after the break, but who knows if that will ever happen at this point.

Rafael Soriano (RP)
The closer coming into the season, but has been something of an enigma injury-wise. He’s got issues with his elbow, but repeated examinations have failed to find any actual damage. His appearances have been shakey, but he did garner 2 saves before having to go back to the DL again. No one knows when he will be able to return.

Peter Moylan (RP)
The loss of Moylan is probably bigger than the loss of any other Braves pitcher, excepting Smoltz. He’s the kind of set-up man most teams drool over – super reliable, doesn’t let inherited runners score, and doesn’t let very many runners on (1.06 WHIP last year, .208 average against). The Braves continued to use him in this fashion and he even picked up his first save of the year in his last appearance on April 11. The next morning his elbow hurt and within a week he was out for the year.

Manny Acosta (RP)
This is one guy I don’t particularly mind being on the DL. I have very little tolerance for bad relief pitchers (ask me about Chris Reitsma sometime … actually, on second thought, don’t—unless you want to be covered in spittle and bile). He was actually relatively good in April and May, with an ERA of 1.30 in 27 and 2/3 IP (with a .198 average against). Then the wheels came off. From May 31 to June 6, he made 4 appearances and couldn’t do anything right. He ended up with 7 hits, 7 earned runs, 3 homers and a .583 average against in 2 IP. He got the loss 3 times in that stretch and in the game he didn’t lose he did blow the save. Since then, he hasn’t been as bad (13 and 2/3 IP, .265 average, 6 earned runs, but an alarming 10 walks to only 3 strikeouts), but those totals aren’t great, or really even very good either. I don’t really remember why he’s on the DL, but again I don’t exactly miss him.

Too Early To Tell
Julian Tavarez (RP)
I guess signing this guy is just the cool thing to do in baseball right now, or he really just wanted to go on the Braves history tour (his prior stops this season being Boston and Milwaukee). He made his only appearance July 8th in Los Angeles, allowing 2 walks, 2 hits, and a run in a third of an inning. The trigger was quickly pulled, but for the time being he’s still with the team.

Charlie Morton (SP)
Morton hasn’t pitched that badly, but he hasn’t been great either. He’s had two really bad games, but outside of that pitched relatively well in his other 4 starts and has gotten to 2-2 for his efforts. He’s the Braves’ 5th starter for the time being and this probably won’t change unless Glavine or Hampton come back.

Vladimir Nunez (RP)
I don’t have anything to say about this guy really. He made an appearance July 7 and got the Dodgers 1-2-3 in the 8th. He’s been made the last couple of seasons, for what that’s worth.

Jeff Ridgway (RP)
Same here. He made 4 appearances in June, pitched okay in a couple and badly in the other two, including a blown save on June 19. He hasn’t made an appearance since then and was optioned to Richmond on June 21.

Phil Stockman (RP)
This guy’s been up and down from Richmond a few times this year and last. The big Aussie righty throws hard but lacks control and has been unable to break into the regular bullpen rotation, appearing mostly in mop up duty. His stats aren’t bad: 7 and 1/3 IP, 9 K, 4 walks, and a couple hits, no runs, and a great looking .087 average against. Guess Bobby Cox just doesn’t like him, as he was sent down to Richmond on June 18th.

Mike Gonzalez (RP)
Made his first appearance of the year on June 18, where he got a save against the Rangers. Basically the Braves’ closer now, though they haven’t had much to close as of late. He’s pitched 10 and 2/3 innings and has the kind of stats you like from a late inning guy: 6 hits and no walks (0.56 WHIP), 16 K and a .153 average against, though the 2 homers are worrying. Nonetheless, he seems healthy and made two consecutive appearances going into the break.

The Bad
Chuck James (SP)
Started off the year on the DL and went downhill from there. He made 6 starts, and allowed less than 4 earned runs only once. After a bad start on May 15 in Philadelphia he was optioned to Richmond to get his head on straight, and I haven’t heard any talk of him coming back any time soon.

Chris Resop (RP)
A 1.4 WHIP is not very good. Resop made a lot of appearances in April and May (16) and allowed 16 hits, 10 walks, and 12 runs. He was designated for assignment in late May and hasn’t been heard from since.

Blaine Boyer (RP)
I think Bobby Cox has been a pretty good manager over the years, but one thing that drives me crazy is how he sometimes gets attached to relievers. (Again, if you like hearing angry rants, ask me about Chris Reitsma sometime.) His path is pretty Acosta like, actually. He started off the year strong, and through June 4 he had a sub-1.00 WHIP and a .205 average against. Then he blew a save on June 6th and in 18 and 1/3 IP since then has a 4.91 ERA, 10 runs, and a .284 average against. He’s been a little better in over the past week, but that’s not saying much.

Jo-Jo Reyes (SP)
Jo-Jo is one of the handful of pitching enigmas on this team. On June 29, he pitched 7 innings in Toronto and only allowed a run and the Braves ended up losing 6-3. The start before, he went 2 and a third innings and allowed 4 runs. He hasn’t been great, but he’s probably not quite as bad as his record, either. Would probably be the 5th starter if the rest of the rotation were healthy.

The Decent
Will Ohman (RP)
As much as I like to use his last name for the bad pun lamenting his entering the game, he’s actually been pretty good. He’s also currently the only lefty in the bullpen (besides Mike Gonzales), and he’s good against them (.141 average against with 21 strikeouts). Except for a June 20th disaster against Seattle, he’s been pretty good as a setup guy as well and has made many appearances to that effect (as opposed to a situational guy).

Jeff Bennett (RP)
Long reliever from the pen and has also made 3 starts this year, though let’s just not talk about those. He’s been mostly decent from the pen but hasn’t seen action since surrendering a couple of runs a couple weeks ago.

Buddy Carlyle (RP)
Mercifully not starting anymore and is also a long reliever. Hasn’t had any major implosions so far this year – which is something you generally want when you’re coming into the game in such situations. In 29 innings he’s allowed 5 runs and no homers and might start seeing more work in the second half.

The Good
Tim Hudson (SP)
Hudson has been very good this year and deserves a lot better than 9-7. He has only what I would call two bad starts on the year. In 7 quality starts that resulted in losses or no decisions he pitched 47 and 1/3 innings, allowing 16 runs for a 3.04 ERA. The Braves scored more than 2 runs only twice in those 7 starts – converting the losses into wins over that span gets him to 12-4 before we even start talking about the no decisions. On the year, he’s 8th in the NL with a 3.13 ERA, right behind…

Jair Jurrjens (SP)
Part of the Edgar Renteria trade with the Tigers, Jair has been better than expected, to say the least. He’s got a 3.00 ERA and a 9-4 record, and has only 3 bad starts. (He escaped with two no decisions and a win, though.) The feather in his cap so far is the 8 inning gem he pitched in Toronto, where he allowed 3 hits and a walk.

Jorge Campillo (SP)
Jorge’s been a pretty pleasant surprise this year. He got drafted into starting duty for a double header and May and has done reasonably well for himself since then. He’s been slightly shakier on occasion, as he loves his big 12-to-6 curveball that he can sometimes leaves up in the strike zone. Considering the circumstances, there’s little room to complain, though.

Conclusion
Well, this wraps out our look at the Braves through their first 95 games. I realize the look at the pitchers was somewhat less analytical, but we’ve been through a lot of them this year and I wanted to get this done before the second half actually started. Overall, I’ll stick to what I said for the hitters – the Braves have scored a lot of runs, but they lack luck with their horrendous one-run records dating back to late last year. This can be attributed to several factors – shaky end-of-the-game solutions in the bullpen or shaky late-game hitting, but it does make one wonder when, exactly, the whole thing stop being attributed to merely luck.

Anyway, I’ll be back soon with my final thoughts on college football schedules, most likely a couple weeks before the season starts. Later.

In this series, the plan is to take a look at the Braves and their players at the All-Star Break here at slightly past halfway in the season.

The Team
Overall record: 45-50 (.474)
Runs scored/allowed: 421/383
Expected record: 52-43 (-7)

Overall, this is has been a disappointing first half for Los Bravos. While suffering a litany on injuries to their starters, their main problem has been offense and bad luck. They should be well above .500 according to their runs scored/allowed and a few games closer to the top of the division. Their lineup, as we’ll examine next, is not hitting that well as a whole, though, and especially in the outfield. The Braves have suffered some really bad luck – their record in one run games is astoundingly bad, and they have not won a one-run game on the road since last August.

For the examination of the individual players, we’ll compare their current stats with Baseball Prospectus’s PECOTA projections that were published at the beginning of the year. (Note: PECOTA adjusts for park factors and whatnot, and so may be incorrect for players that were not projected to be with the Braves back in January, though this mostly affects the utility players.)

Before we begin, “VORP” is “Value Over Replacement Player”, that is, how many more runs valuable a player is over an replacement-level player at the same position. So Brian McCann is 36.2 runs more valuable than a replacement level catcher with the same percentage of the Braves’ plate appearances. Since VORP is a counting stat, I’ve adjusted the projections for 95 games.

Position Players (starters listed first):

Brian McCann (C)
Projected: .281 AVG/.344OBP/.471 SLG (815 OPS), 19 HR, 17.4 VORP
Actual: .302/.377/.563 (940), 18, 36.2
McCann should have been a starter for the National League in the All-Star Game, but he lost out to the Chicago ticket. Nonetheless, he got the spot he deserved and will make his 3rd straight ASG. He’s been one of the few bright spots offensively for the Braves and is exceedingly durable, especially for a catcher. Of course, the latter may have a lot to do with the former; his backup is the very bad Corky Miller (.093/.170/.163). McCann is especially doing well in terms of his power numbers – he almost has as many home runs at the break as he was projected to have all year. Not bad.

Mark Texeira (1B)
Projected: .295/.394/.547 (941), 32, 28.6
Actual: .271/.373/.484 (857), 17, 23.0
Everybody and their brother knows the Braves won’t be able to afford the Boras-represented Texeira after this season, and so he’s been at the center for many a trade rumor as the Braves continue to flounder in the division. He got off to a slow start, but this is not unusual for Tiexeira. He got traded roughly halfway through the year last year, which gives us a good comparison. With Texas he hit .297/.397/.524 with 13 HR. After the trade, he hit 17 HR and hit .317/.404/.615. The Braves, who whichever team he gets traded to, expect roughly the same kind of turnaround.

Kelly Johnson (2B)
Projected: .279/.375/.466 (841), 17, 21.1
Actual: .272/.346/.431 (777), 8, 14.3
Kelly continues to play a good second base, but his offense isn’t where he or the Braves probably want it to be. Thankfully, the Great Kelly Johnson Leadoff Experiment is over – I maintained all along that he was not suited for this role, considering his low OBP for a lead-off man and good power potential. To give you an idea of what the Braves were expecting, though, his 14.3 VORP is still 4th highest on the team, but no where near the 33.1 he achieved last year.

Chipper Jones (3B)
Projected: .315/.410/.547 (957), 24, 33.5
Actual: .376/.472/.614 (1086), 18, 55.5
There’s little I can say here that hasn’t been said already. Though he’s not above .400 anymore and has had a rough two weeks, he’s still the best hitter in baseball so far this year. He will rightfully start at third in New York on Tuesday. Amazingly, he’s actually slightly worse in terms of VORP than he was last year. Guess the rest of the NL got better third basemen, as the rest of his independent stats are still up.

Yunel Escobar (SS)
Projected: .287/.348/.402 (750), 7, 11.0
Actual: .286/.355/.383 (738), 6, 13.7
Escobar has been hampered over the last month by a shoulder injury, which is unfortunate for the Braves. While he hasn’t been hitting like he did last year (not a surprise), he’s still better than the cast of utility men tasked to take his spot. The Prospectus said that he should watch out for Brent Lillibridge, who struggled at the start of the year at AAA and has been filling in for Escobar the last couple weeks at short. (Of course, as I type this, Lillibridge hit his first big league home run Saturay night and was 2-4 on Sunday. Nonetheless, he really does need to finish the year in AAA.) They were right about his average probably falling off, though, has his batting average on balls in play (BAbip) is down by 50 points so far this year, to .314. (In other words, less of the balls he hits are falling in for singles.)

Matt Diaz (LF)
Projected: .297/.338/.466 (804), 11, 9.0
Actual: .250/.270/.311 (581), 2, -5.2
Diaz is not the greatest LF to walk the Earth. It was hoped he’d improved enough last year to break out of the platoon the Braves had been employing in left, but the evidence before he got hurt was not in his favor. He was 3-16 before he hurt himself sliding into a wall in foul territory in Milwaukee on May 27, and is expected to be back after the break.

Mark Kotsay (CF)
Projected: .258/.325/.358 (683), 15, 6.2
Actual: .279/.329/.394 (723), 4, 5.1
The Braves needed a new center fielder with the departure of Andruw, and they got one from the A’s in exchange for head-case Joey Divine. The trade worked out for both clubs, as Devine has his head back in straight with the A’s and Kotsay’s doing about what the Braves expected him to. The thing is, the corner outfielders aren’t doing a lot to make up for the lack of power in Kotsay’s bat. He’s fine defensively, but his back acted up again a few weeks ago and he missed a whole bunch of games, which the Braves expected but didn’t really have an adequate answer for – Blanco moved from covering left to play center, and they forced former 1B/DH to play left. None of this helps the offense at all.

Jeff Francoeur (RF)
Projected: .284/.331/.474 (805), 22, 10.7
Actual: .234/.285/.375 (660), 9, -9.0
Francoeur has been struggling mightily at the plate this year, so badly that the Braves sent him down last week. Of course, the Monday after they did that they had to put 3 guys in the DL and so they recalled Jeff. Since being recalled he’s played a little better, but it’s too early to tell if he’ll get back to form. Also, he’s been hitting into some bad luck. His batting average on balls in play (BAbip) for his career is .305, .337 last year, and an astoundingly unlucky .262 this year. He’s on pace to walk as many times this year as he did last year (and more than he did in 2006), and his home runs aren’t that far off last year’s total (neither are his doubles). That said, his slugging percentage his way off his career pace, which should be less affected by his BAbip than his OBP. As a result, his OPS+ is 76 right now (that is, he’s 24% worse than an average RF), and he has a -9.0 VORP.

Gregor Blanco (OF)
Projected: .264/.355/.352 (707), 4, 5.5, 506 PA
Actual: .257/.356/.314 (670), 1, 2.4, 307 PA
As mentioned above, with all the outfield injuries Blanco has been playing more than expected for the Braves, filling in for both Diaz and Kotsay. He’s hitting .271/.372/.684 versus RHP, which isn’t great but will probably earn him continued playing time in a platoon with Matt Diaz once he returns. Overall, he’s actually playing better than Diaz so far this year, and has played more, which makes the value of Diaz’s return highly questionable unless he has a brilliant second half.

Ruben Gotay (PH/IF)
Projected: .261/.329/.408 (737), 5, 5.6, 228
Actual: .216/.310/.324 (634), 2, -1.6, 86
Ruben’s mostly been used as a pinch hitter, something he doesn’t do particularly well. Of course, his splits as a starter (9 games, .212/.278/.333) aren’t much better. But that’s sort of the breaks with light-hitting utility infielders, I suppose.

Greg Norton (PH/LF)
Projected: .242/.341/.394 (735), 6, 2.8, 223
Actual: .202/.298/.330 (628), 2, -3.0, 124
Greg Norton began the year with the Mariners. After appearing in 6 games as mostly a DH or a pinch hitter, the Mariners cut him despite him being 7/16 with 2 walks. Of course, in terms of percentages that looks great, which created the initial impression that the Braves were getting a good deal. He saw limited action in May, mostly as a pinch hitter and occasional first baseman, but Diaz’s injury caused someone to think he should play in the outfield, which he had done 76 times previously in his 12 years. Depending on which defensive stats you like, he hasn’t embarrassed himself, except at the plate. Since coming to Atlanta, he’s had 226 plate appearances and has hit .202/.298/.330, which is bad no matter what position you play. He’s actually on a bit of an upswing for the past few weeks – in his first 35 games (84 PA) he hit .178/.286/.288 but is .250/.325/.417 since then. Still no homers, though. I suppose this is the real utility of Diaz coming back – by any measure, we’d expect him to be better than Norton, and we can go back to having him be a questionably okay pinch hitting specialist.

Omar Infante (3B/LF)
Projected: .261/ .315/.401 (716), 6, 3.4, 252
Actual: .282/.344/.427 (771), 1, 4.6, 124
Infante, unlike the other Braves utilitymen, hasn’t been forced into service as much this year. Unfortunately, he fills in for Chipper, which is a decided loss in run production for the Braves. They’ve also put in him the outfield a few (or rather, 14) times but it’s not really his natural position, but he’ll go back to being a pinch hitter/utility guy after the break for the reasons stated above.

Hopefully tomorrow, we’ll take a look at the pitchers and wrap this thing up. Later.

I’ve been saying since the beginning of the year that Yunel Escobar should be leading off, since it was generally the only thing Escobar did better than Kelly Johnson last year.

So finally Escobar is leading off for the first time all season while Johnson is in the lineup. And lo and behold, he singled, stole second, and advanced home on another hit by Chipper. I don’t really know about Mark Kotsay hitting second, but he has the hot hand right now and Johnson isn’t, so I’ll allow it.