The corner outfielder often gets lumped into the mix with the first basemen / designated hitter types. You might call that part of the market the ‘last piece saloon.’ But, Raul Ibanez aside, corner outfielders need to be able to run a little bit, too.

Oh, would you look at that, Ibanez is a free agent. But who needs a corner outfielder at all? Depending on how they put their team together, the Braves could maybe use another outfielder. The Red Sox have an opening, but after their last high-priced acquisition in the outfield, and their plethora of in-house options, it might not be a priority. Both Chicago teams are a maybe, with the NL version more probable. Do the Dodgers have any money? The Giants will sign one for sure. The A’s will wait for a bargain, as they always do. The Mariners have to be considered dark horses for any piece of offense. The Nationals could try again. That pretty much defines your market, and it’s a pretty decent one in terms of demand.

What does the supply look like?

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A pitcher even finer than even these two upstanding gents!

Quick! There’s no time to waste!

Name the five best FIP- seasons in the history of MLB. (Minimum, a scant 20 IP.)

I’d imagine your list includes Eric Gagne‘s crazy 2003 and Pedro Martinez’s nutso 1999 season. And you’d be correct. But there’s another modern-day pitcher you’d have only guessed if you had cleverly looked at the title of this post:

1) Ed Cushman, 10 FIP- (1884, year of our lord)
2) Henry Porter, 13 FIP- (1884)
3) Eric Gagne, 20 FIP- (2003)
4) Sergio Romo, 25 FIP- (2011)
5) Pedro Martinez, 30 FIP- (1999)

I imagine there are a number of baseball fans who, like myself, had not even heard of Sergio Romo until they made him their setup man while playing Baseball Mogul 2008.

We’ll learn his name because he might be one of the greatest late-blooming relievers in the history of the game.
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Late last week, I posted a scouting report on Atlanta Braves third-base prospect Edward Salcedo. I received several comments voicing concern over the lack of hitters throughout the organization’s minor-league levels.

But as much as I understand the frustration (I certainly don’t enjoy watching a starting lineup full of non-prospects and organizational players), I’d urge readers to adopt a more big-picture view of the Braves organizational philosophy. And it’s really quite a brilliant strategy: leverage the ability to develop arms better than anybody else to fill needs at the big-league level. After all, ultimately it’s about World Series rings and not how many sluggers an organization has on its Double-A roster, isn’t it?

At the trade deadline, I was shocked that the Braves were able to acquire Michael Bourn without dealing a single “key” prospect. Sure, Paul Clemens (SP), Brett Oberholtzer (SP), Juan Abreu (RP) and Jordan Schafer (CF) might all wind up being big-leaguers in some capacity. but Michael Bourn is a top-flight center fielder who posted the second-highest WAR at the position between 2009 to 2011. For me, the sum of the parts who were dealt for Bourn didn’t equal one of the better center fielders in baseball.

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We know this much: The NL will send a team from its Central Division to the World Series. Who? We do not yet know. But: The fact remains that this circumstance is no less a surprise to many prognosticators, forecasting systems, and blathering media faces. I cannot recall any one credible source projecting the the NL Central as the team to send a World Series team into the fray — much less to two playoff-teams to the tourney.

Nonetheless, here we sit on the cold stone of pondering, staring into the abyss of unpredictability, the majestic, mysterious abyss of this:

A moon ago, we heard news of the impending Astro’s sale, which comes with a DH apparently, as the proud once-Colt .45s intend to move AL-wise.

This is bad news for the top chihuahuas of the NL Central who feasted on their weak division, and produced perhaps the two least-qualified World Series contenders in a long… long… long time.
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The thought of Atlanta Braves third base prospect Edward Salcedo forces me to think of a popular Dave Matthews Band song titled, “The Best of What’s Around“. Maybe the lyrics don’t fit exactly, but the title is perfect when discussing the bats, or lack thereof, in the Braves minor league system. On a humid evening in July, I wound up sitting next to a scout I had met two seasons earlier in Savannah and spent much of the game discussing the Braves system. After talking through the top-flight pitching prospects in the organization, the conversation turned to potential big league hitters to which the scout commented, “Salcedo is the only bat in the entire system.” Having scouted Braves affiliates including Rome, Mississippi and Gwinnett in person, I don’t completely agree, but do concede the fact Salcedo is the only prospect system-wide with a middle-of-the-order ceiling.

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Episode Eighty-Six
In which baseball sells itself.

Headlines
The Events of September 28th — Recapitulated!
The Saddest Story Ever — Told Briefly!
The 2011 Playoffs — Super-Previewed!

Featuring
Dave Cameron, Full-Time Employee

Finally, you can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or other feeder things.

Audio on the flip-flop. (Approximately 45 min. play time.)

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Several reasons have floated around for the cause of the Braves’ historic collapse. Many people point to the horrible September that the Braves and their players experienced. Similar down months happened previously in the 2011 season, but went unnoticed due to the lack of playoff implications.

No Offense

The Braves offense was not a powerhouse over the entire season. They averaged just under four runs a game (3.96). It was 10th in the NL. While not great, it was even worse over the last month. They scored only 87 runs, or 3.22 runs per game. Now, which of the following slash lines led to the offensive collapse:

#1: 0.235/0.300/0.357
#2: 0.222/0.290/0.388

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Condolences are the only proper greeting for a Braves fan today. And anger is an acceptable response to the team’s play in September, as well. But as the emotion subsides, two truths should stick out. The Braves had a good season, and they have a roster that is poised to get better without an overhaul.

89 wins is not an impetus to cry into your coffee. There are reasons for Braves fans to keep their heads held high, too. They played in one of the toughest divisions in baseball — the only one to produce a 100-game winner, for one — and they came up a buck short. No matter how you slice it (FIP, xFIP, SIERA or good old-fashioned ERA), they had a top-three pitching staff in the National League this year. That’s a good foundation for success, and the rest of their problems are fixable.

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In 2011, the Atlanta Braves found themselves the envy of professional baseball behind a quartet of impressive young arms in Julio Teheran, Randall Delgado, Mike Minor and Arodys Vizcaino. The chatter about these young pitchers remained loud throughout the season to the point where other arms in the system were overshadowed. A handful of those names made headlines only after being dealt to the Houston Astros for Michael Bourn. That trade created a pitching void at the middle levels of the Braves organization. Cue Ronan Pacheco.

In the history of Fangraphs, I wonder how many positive pieces have ever been written about a 23-year year old pitcher in the lower minors who strikes out less than six-per-nine innings while walking a shade under four-per-nine? Knowing full well this piece will draw the ire of a great many Fangraphs readers based on the numbers alone, Pacheco is simply too perfect an example of a pitcher who bucks just about every prospect stereotype on both the statistical and scouting sides to not discuss.

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The Phillies entered the season with the makings of an historical rotation. With Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt, their starting pitching was covered. The Braves entered the season with ridiculous pitching depth. They had a rotation filled with good major leaguers, another solid starter recovering from surgery, and some of the most renowned pitching prospects in the game waiting to make a dent.

It’s funny, then, that the performances this season from Vance Worley and Brandon Beachy — two prospects without much minor league fanfare — have helped elevate each rotation to another level.

Worley and Beachy weren’t exactly afterthoughts, but neither was expected to be a key contributor this season. In fact, Worley started the season in the minors and spent even more time on the farm when both Oswalt and Joe Blanton returned to the rotation. Fast-forward to early September and both pitchers have tallied 2.2 WAR in under 130 innings. Both pitchers are also making a big case for their inclusion in the playoff rotation.

Despite these similarities, the major difference in their production makes a comparison interesting. Worley relies on the called strike while Beachy has become a master of the whiff. Though each is fairly inexperienced as the final month of the season pushes on, their different approaches invites a discussion on the sustainability and predictive value of called and swinging strikeouts.

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