Atlanta Braves Morning Chop: some controversy and some history

A quick history lesson about the impact of great starting pitching, specifically as it relates direct to the Braves’ success in the 1990’s+.

When the Atlanta Braves emphasize premium pitching, there’s a really good reason for doing so.

The Hall of Fame triumvirate of Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, and John Smoltz were together in Atlanta for 10 seasons.  Good things happened then.  Here’s some fun facts from that era (1993-2002):

• 952 total team wins in the regular season.
• 100+ wins 5 times
• 451 pitching wins from this trio (47% of the Braves’ victories)
• Innings pitched?  A staggering 5995.  But they didn’t average 200 innings per year (barely) since Smoltz saved 65 games, was out the entire 2000 season, and was a reliever for 2 years of that decade.  Also the 1994 strike.
• They also saved the bullpen – averaging less than an out away from 7 innings per start… for 10 years.

But let’s put these numbers into perspective:

• The Braves franchise reached 100+ wins on only 3 other occasions since their founding in 1976… and one of those others was 2003.  The other two were before 1900.
• Maddux/Glavine/Smoltz got pitching Wins in 51% of their starts.  Of all qualified pitchers of that same era (these would be the 261 better starters), they averaged a Win in only 37% of starts.
• The Big 3 took the loss in only 25% of their starts.  The qualified starters?  34.6%.

So they accounted for at least 14% more wins  per start than the average starting pitching, lost almost 10% fewer times and lasted longer.

That’s what gets you to playoff baseball on such a consistent basis.

The Chatter

The buzz this morning is about Ender Inciarte‘s failed attempt to steal second base with one out in the 9th inning, Freddie Freeman at the plate, and the Braves trailing by a run.

There’s a couple of arguments against Ender making the dash for second:

• Because Freeman
• Failure is a bad option (it left Atlanta with no one on, two outs, and in this case a 2 strike count against Freddie)
• Even if it works, they walk Freeman intentionally

I don’t subscribe to the last point… though Seattle probably would have tried to get him to chase things that weren’t strikes (the ‘unintentional-intentional’ walk).  Still, such a plan would have put the winning run on base, which teams are loathe to do.

My own take is that it is because of Freeman that the steal attempt was a good play.

Catcher Mike Zunino had only thrown out 17.6% of base-stealers entering the game.  Inexplicably, he managed 2 of 3 last night, counting the crucial one.  Brandon Phillips isn’t as fleet as he once was, but Lane Adams stole the base easily.

It is likely that the Braves had the ‘go’ to run last night based on Zunino’s track record.  Last night turned out to be a good night for him, though.

Getting into scoring position would certainly have made life easier for Freeman.  His AB was essentially “gapper or homer” to tie or win the game.  If Inciarte is on second, that changes to “single or gapper to tie… homer to win”.

If you had an 82% chance to steal second (and Inciarte had been 17 for 22 in steal attempts), then wouldn’t you roll those dice?  Certainly, that would have enhanced Freeman’s chances (or Kemp’s) of tying the game.  It also would have all-but-eliminated the double play possibility.

Just because a play doesn’t work doesn’t make it a bad play.  Lane Adams trying to score when the Seattle defense left an opening for him was not a bad play.  In fact, he was probably safe, but the call went against him and the replay review answer was “the call stands.”

So in the 9th inning, Ender Inciarte and the Braves were unlucky.  Hey – these are major leaguers and they will make good plays against you sometimes.

Here’s the box… which includes yet another triple from Albies:

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Original Table

Next: The full game recap

TONIGHT:  Marco Gonzalez (0-0, 7.11) vs. Lucas Sims (1-3, 5.24).  7:35pm at STP.