Meat and Potatoes 6: Weekly Braves Analysis April 3-8

Welcome to the 6th edition of Meat and Potatoes, a weekly serving of the good stuff: Atlanta Braves analysis, news, and links.

The Lead

The season started! Whoo hoo!

That said, the most pressing story for your 0 – 3 Bravos is not a pleasant one. Center fielder and leadoff hitter Ender Inciarte is day-to-day with a hamstring injury. The speedy Venezuelan was lifted from Friday’s game as he was trying to leg out a grounder. Earlier in that game, I felt like I noticed Ender wince while going back on a ball in center field. This would seem to fit the storyline of the hamstring discomfort, according to beat writer Mark Bowman via Twitter:

Dave O’Brien of the AJC echoed this relative optimism in his article on the injury and here, also via twitter:

From O’Brien’s article, some less reassuring undertones from Ender himself:

“I depend on my legs so it’s frustrating that I’ve been having hamstring issues since last year. It’s a different leg but hopefully it’s not going to be that bad.”

Gulp. Ender missed a month last year to hamstring trouble, after all.

We can find a silver lining in that Inciarte removed himself before sustaining a serious injury. What we can take “serious” to mean is up for interpretation, though. Particularly for a player that thrives on speed to provide value in all facets of his game, a hamstring tweak can linger. Let’s hope 3 things:

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1. Ender is back in the lineup soon.
2. His production is not hurt upon returning by any lingering effects, physical or psychological.
3. This hammy thing will be a thing of the past, as opposed to a recurring ticket to the DL train.

For now, it seems likely that the Braves will just trot Drew Stubbs out there until Ender is back. That’ll do for now, as Stubbs is still capable of providing above league average defense in center. We shouldn’t expect him to set the table with much effectiveness at the leadoff spot though; in a small-ish sample of 140 Plate Appearances last year, Stubbs’ OBP was a cellar-dwelling .283. In fairness, 2015 was well below his career marks offensively. But Stubbs drawback has always been his inability to minimize strike outs, so as to get on base more often and better utilize his speed tool.

As a matter of fact, Stubbs owns the 12th worst K% in the bigs since 2009 when he broke in. He has struck out in 30.3% of his plate appearances. Not exactly who you want at the top of your lineup. Fun fact: former Brave Juan Francisco is at the top of the K% list since 2009 with a 34.4% mark. Atta boy, Juan.

UPDATE: So far it looks like the Braves are going with Erick Aybar at the top of the lineup. Aybar is a marginally better suited hitter at getting on base. He accomplishes this by making a ton of contact; he swings at pitches in the strike zone well above the league average rate, and makes contact with those pitches an amazingly efficient 93.7% of the time. Though he is speedy, Aybar doesn’t translate this contact in to a very impressive OBP or AVG, though. It’s possible he will be able to intentionally see more pitches and walk more in the leadoff role. Time will tell… hopefully he won’t be there long. 

Informed fans may be speculating at this point as to how any extended Inciarte absence may affect the ascent of Mallex Smith to Atlanta. If you don’t know Mallex yet, catch up here via the venerable Ben Chase of these pages. Optimistically speculating about our promising youngsters is going to be a must for our sanity this season. Keep in mind though, that the Braves will be unlikely to rush Smith unless the 2016 club is looking like a contender that he could help to improve.

So hurry on back, Ender! You’re glowing early work in center his been comforting to behold so far.

News and Notes

• Check slide 2 for more minor league coverage, but his tidbit belongs front and center: The Braves have started Ozzie Albies ahead of Dansby Swanson in their farm system. Albies will man SS in AA Mississippi, while Swanson will do the same in A-advanced Carolina. It’s true that Albies has more minor league experience, but he is also mentionably younger. It isn’t hard to speculate that the Braves view Albies’ star as rising faster up to the bigs, given these assignments. We should hedge that sort of thinking and remember that the club started them at different levels so that both could play SS. The assignments may be essentially arbitrary; Swanson may soon leap up to Gwinnett when ready. Contrarily, perhaps the Braves view Albies as their future 2B and want to give him a shot to prove he’s ready to shore up the shaky keystone situation in Atlanta this year. I tend to think that Swanson is the more likely of the two to crack the majors before September, and that such a promotion of either player is unlikely. It’s too hard to tell, though. Keep your eye on this situation… we’ll keep you posted.
• There were a deluge of roster moves as the Spring came to an end. The Braves finalized their Opening Day roster, though it will change slightly when 5th starter Jhoulys Chacin is called up to make his first start. The Braves are currently carrying an extra 8th reliever. I’d assume Chacin will be swapped for John Gant. Poor Friday performance aside, the funky righty has contract options that make him the easiest to move. We at Tomahawk Take took a swing at predicting the Opening Day roster early in the Spring. Check out the results and congratulate/ridicule us!

Click through to slide 2 for more Meat and Potatoes 6! 

Next: More M&P: Minors Leagues, more News/Notes/Links!