On Monday morning, the Atlanta Braves made their first major move of the offseason, signing left-handed pitcher Drew Smyly to a one-year contract worth $11 million. It’s a nice little payday for Smyly, who has a long and ugly injury history and posted an ERA and FIP over six as recently as 2019. Ranked 25th among Craig Edwards’s Top 50 Free Agents, Smyly was estimated to command an AAV of $8.5 million by Edwards and just $5.0 million by the crowd. Those low salary estimates are likely directly tied to Smyly’s spotty history. But the reason why he was able to command such a surprisingly high salary boils down to one chart:

In 2020, Smyly was able to add 2.6 mph to each of his pitches in his arsenal, pushing his average fastball up to 93.8 mph. That added velocity helped him post the highest strikeout rate of his career paired with the lowest FIP of his career, though it came in just 26.1 innings. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s impossible for a single play in the fourth inning to decide the outcome of a baseball game. There are simply too many at-bats left, too much time for something else to happen that invalidates whatever occurred so early in the action. Consider a bases loaded, two out situation, down two runs in the top of the fourth, for a random example: hit a grand slam, and our WPA Inquirer will tell you that the away team wins 70.3% of the time. Strike out, and it’s 21.1%. In neither case is the game over.

Don’t tell Atlanta that, though. In the top of the fourth inning, the Braves were ready to hit the turbo button. With a one-run lead already in their pocket, they had an enviable situation: runners on second and third with no one out. A single could make it a three-run game; heck, a grounder to the right side and then a sac fly would suffice. Nick Markakis, the batter, almost never strikes out; he’s the exact kind of player the Braves wanted at the plate in this moment.

Markakis put the ball in play. Dansby Swanson broke on contact, and well, yeah, he probably wishes he could take that decision back:

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Everett Scott holds the Red Sox franchise record for games played at shortstop. A part of three World Series-winning clubs in Boston, he manned the position in 1,093 regular-season games from 1914-1921. Right behind Scott are Rick Burleson (1,004), Nomar Garciaparra (956), Freddy Parent (909), and Xander Bogaerts (908).

The last of those names stands out, and not just because he’s current. It also stands out because myriad prospect prognosticators didn’t expect him to stick at the position. To some it was barely even a question. I was once told by a name-you’d-recognize prospect guru — in a condescending manner, no less — that “Xander Bogaerts will never play shortstop in the major leagues.”

He was wrong. Moreover, had this been a normal 162-game season — and assuming Bogaerts had stayed healthy — the 28-year-old native of Aruba would already be within 100 games of Scott’s total. As it is, he’s in line to eclipse the century-old record by the midway point of the 2022 season.

Called up in August 2013, Bogaerts did play nine of his first 17 big-league games as a third baseman — the position he was earmarked for by his doubters. But that was circumstance as opposed to choreography. With Stephen Drew etched in at short, and Will Middlebrooks scuffling at the hot corner, the Red Sox were looking for a way to slot their top-rated prospect into the lineup.

According to Bogaerts, a permanent switch was never in the plans. Read the rest of this entry »

The first game of this NLCS was a tense thriller, carrying a score of 1-1 into the top of the ninth thanks to the performances of starters Walker Buehler and Max Fried. With a burst of offense in the ninth, the Braves took that game, 5-1. Five days later — doesn’t it feel like it’s been longer? — Atlanta entered Game 6, a repeat of that starting pitching matchup, with a chance to walk away with the pennant. And while the two games had many features in common — low scores, great starting pitching, and missed opportunities on the offensive side — it was the Dodgers, this time, who came out on top. After a 3-1 Los Angeles victory, the series is now tied at 3-3, with a decisive seventh game coming tomorrow.

Buehler set the tone by retiring Ronald Acuña Jr., Freddie Freeman, and Marcell Ozuna on only seven pitches in the top of the first. Fried, who outpitched Buehler in Game 1, did not have the same success. He retired Mookie Betts without incident, but Corey Seager turned on a curveball on the inner half, sending it into the seats in right field. Two batters into the game, the Dodgers already had the lead — and one batter later, they added to it, as Justin Turner shot a sinker just over the outstretched arm of Cristian Pache in center. Read the rest of this entry »

In a matchup that spawned 1,000 memes, Will Smith — the Braves left-handed reliever — finally faced off against Will Smith — the Dodgers catcher — in Game 5 of the NLCS. With two men on, two outs, and down by a run, the only thing out of place in this Hollywood script was the inning — it was the bottom of the sixth inning rather than the ninth. But destiny would not be denied. Smith the Pitcher had been brought in to face Max Muncy in the previous at-bat. In a fantastic display of discipline, Muncy worked a walk, ensuring the showdown between the two Wills Smith. That moment would prove to be the turning point in the game.

Up to that point, Braves pitching had stymied the Dodgers’ hitters. A.J. Minter had been selected as the starter for Brian Snitker’s club in what promised to be a bullpen game. A reliever for his entire professional career, he was the first pitcher to ever make his first career start in the postseason. He wound up going three innings — his longest professional appearance — and struck out seven. The only blemish against him was a two-out double in the first inning. The red hot Corey Seager snuck a solo home run just over the center field wall to lead off the fourth but Tyler Matzek and Shane Greene stood firm and got the team through the fifth inning with a 2-1 lead.

Greene was sent back out to start the sixth and allowed Mookie Betts to reach on a leadoff infield single. A harmless fly out from Seager followed, forcing Betts to get aggressive on the basepaths to try to get a rally started. He stole second but was erased on a fielder’s choice off Justin Turner’s bat. Some heads up baserunning got Turner to second during Betts’ rundown, leaving first base open for Muncy. Smith the Pitcher started Muncy off with five straight sliders. The first three were off the plate away; the next two were called strikes over the plate. Muncy spat on all five. The sixth pitch of the at-bat was a fastball just off the outer edge of the plate; Muncy refused to move his bat. It was a bold take to cap off a fantastic exercise in discipline. Read the rest of this entry »

On a Braves team that’s now one win away from its first trip to the World Series since 1999, Freddie Freeman has gotten the lion’s share of the attention, at least on the offensive side. This is quite understandable given his MVP-caliber season as well as the big hits he’s come up with thus far in the playoffs, including his homers in Games 1 and 2 of the NLCS against the Dodgers. While Marcell Ozuna’s bat spoke nearly as loudly during the regular season, the 29-year-old slugger had scuffled in the postseason prior to Thursday night’s Game 4, when he snapped out of an 0-for-9 skid with a four-hit, four-RBI night that included a trio of timely extra-base hits, two of them homers.

Ozuna’s first home run came in the fourth inning at a time when the Braves trailed 1-0. Dodgers starter Clayton Kershaw had given up some loud contact to that point, but the four hard-hit balls he’d surrendered (exit velocities of 95 mph or higher) all had launch angles of 11 degrees or lower, including the 104.4-mph grounder that Ozuna hit for an inning-ending double play and a 101.1-mph Freeman liner that preceded Ozuna’s second turn at the plate. This time, Ozuna elevated a slider for a towering blast that left the bat at 108.6 mph and traveled an estimated 422 feet:

Whew. The down-and-in slider wasn’t a horrible pitch from Kershaw; in just about every Statcast zone-based breakdown for this season, Ozuna’s actual and expected stats for that area (zone 7) were his lowest. For example: Read the rest of this entry »

If you watch a lot of scary movies, you learn to anticipate when the big jump-scare is about to happen. The music, after ominously trickling along throughout the scene, suddenly stops. The camera does a painfully slow pan around a corner or abruptly whips across the room. You learn to brace yourself when a woman is quietly observing her reflection in a mirror, or when a child peeks through around the door of his clearly-haunted wardrobe. There is a rhythm to these movies, and it mirrors that of Dodgers postseason baseball.

Game 4 of their National League Championship Series against the Atlanta Braves had all the familiar cues. There was Clayton Kershaw, heading out for the sixth inning of what had been a perfectly solid postseason start. There was manager Dave Roberts, leaving Kershaw in to face the toughest lefty in the opponents’ lineup. There was Roberts — gulp — leaving him in to face another hitter, even after he failed to get the first two out. And there was the Dodgers’ bullpen, searching for water to douse the flames but finding only gasoline, until yet another incredible season was just a game away from turning to ash.

The Braves defeated the Dodgers, 10-2, at Globe Life Field on Thursday to take a 3-1 lead in the NLCS. Atlanta is one win away from clinching its first World Series appearance since 1999, and a shot at winning its first title since 1995. Los Angeles, meanwhile, is on the verge of failing to reach the World Series despite owning the NL’s best regular-season record for a second-straight year and continuing a championship drought that has persisted since 1988.

Braves right-hander Bryse Wilson turned in the best game of his young career, tossing six innings of one-run ball while allowing just one walk and striking out five. The one hit he yielded came on a solo home run by Dodgers designated hitter Edwin Ríos in the third. Despite being a rookie who started just twice during the regular season, Wilson made it difficult for the future Hall of Famer in the other dugout to keep up. For five innings, though, Kershaw did just that. He allowed just one run on a solo homer by Marcell Ozuna, who was DHing, and otherwise scattered three hits and a walk while striking out four. He’d thrown just 71 pitches, making Roberts’ decision to send him back to the mound for the sixth inning a seemingly easy one, even if the Braves were turning the order over for a third time. Read the rest of this entry »

I submit that we are never more keenly aware of our own physical state than when we are embarrassed. Other emotions make themselves felt in the body, of course; the soft, spreading warmth of love, the acute pops and pains of joints as fear inspires flight. To be chased by a tiger is to be gripped by terror and also remember that bad knee of yours. Embarrassment works a little differently; it makes our person its accomplice. Embarrassment is an ampersand, tacking on an emphatic “and like so” to your flubbed expense report. I’m embarrassed and rain-soaked. I’m embarrassed and without pants! Perhaps because I’m without pants, but most definitely embarrassed and without them. Many of our embarrassments these days are private, hidden behind so many masks and closed front doors. But some of us are not so lucky. Some of us are made fools at work, even now, and with everyone watching.

For instance, sometimes you’re a member of the Atlanta Braves. You’re a member of the Atlanta Braves and you’re on the mound, down a run. That’s ok! It’s just a run, and there are two outs. You’ve only thrown nine pitches. And you’re you, Kyle Wright, and your seven strikeouts and six innings of scoreless NLDS baseball are on the mound with you.

Only now it’s two runs…

… and then 17 pitches. And also, you’ve walked Cody Bellinger.

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Well that got out of hand quickly, eh?

It took all of two pitches for the Dodgers to stake an early lead in Wednesday’s NLCS Game 3. Mookie Betts legged out an infield single (replay correctly overturned a bang-bang play at first) and then Corey Seager continued his torrid hitting with a double in the left center field gap to plate the leadoff man. After two quick outs, it looked like Braves starter Kyle Wright would be able to wriggle out of the inning with minimal damage.

Then the barrage began in earnest: A double and a walk preceded back-to-back jacks from Joc Pederson and Edwin Ríos. Another walk chased Wright, but all Grant Dayton could do was throw more fuel on the fire: Walk, double, HBP, grand slam. Just like that, the Dodgers — who were an overturned call at first from getting nothing in the frame — had an 11-0 lead, and a new record for runs in a single postseason inning.

From there, it was academic. Los Angeles added in the second and third and Atlanta managed a few runs of their own. The only real remaining highlight was Cristian Pache’s first major league home run, a no-doubter that stayed just fair on its way past the foul pole.

The obvious parallel here is Game 5 of the 2019 NLDS, when St. Louis’s 10-run first inning explosion all but ended Atlanta’s season eight and a half innings before it became official. But tonight’s lopsided contest actually reminds me of a game from all the way back in 2001. Read the rest of this entry »

In the top of the ninth of this second game of the NLCS, Mark Melancon caught his second home run in two days. It was a rare feat for a closer, made all the rarer by the fact that both homers were hit by the same player, Ozzie Albies, and that both had come in the top of the ninth. But the unlikely catches were not entirely symmetrical. The home run in Game 1, a two-run shot, had put the Braves ahead 5-1, capping off a late rally that broke a tense 1-1 tie; the ball carried, as if placed by an unseen hand, directly into Melancon’s glove. He seemed more shocked than anything — with the game still fairly close, he was more concerned with preparing to close out the bottom of the ninth.

The home run in Game 2, though, was the cherry on top of a long day of scoring. It took a comfortable lead and made it that much more comfortable. When Albies made contact on a sinker from Adam Kolarek, Melancon saw his chance; he jogged over, made the catch, and broke into a celebratory trot around the bullpen.

.@ozzie to @Mark_Melancon_ has become the greatest tag team in Major League Baseball.#MixItUp pic.twitter.com/kjIe1crmjO

— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) October 14, 2020

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