Sure, St. Louis has had some bizarre breaks with weak hits, but the Atlanta Braves have had quite enough offense to overcome that. Except that it hasn’t been quite enough.
It 4 games, the Atlanta Braves have a total of 32 hits and 16 runs… two hits required to plate each run scored.
Over the entire regular season, Atlanta had 1432 hits, scoring 855 runs… a ratio of 1.67. In other words, the Braves are being less efficient in their run-scoring than we’ve been used to seeing over the course of the 2019 season.
Monday’s game was the microcosm of that stat: 8 hits, 4 runs… and a whole lot of runners left hanging on various bases.
In fact, there were 9 of them. Hitting results with Runners in scoring position? 0 for 9, with just 1 sacrifice fly.
There’s a bunch more stats we could go into about this, but the fact is this: the Braves are getting very little production from the middle of their lineup.
In fact, when you peruse the roster, the team is really being carried by 3 or 4 players:
- Ronald Acuña (8 for 16 plus 3 walks;1.579 OPS)
- Dansby Swanson (7 for 14 and 1 walk; 1.248 OPS)
- Adam Duvall (3 for 7 in his part-time role; 1.357 OPS)
- Ozzie Albies is the next name, but it was a single homer that gets him an honorable mention here: he’s batting .250 with 2 walks.
Nobody else on the roster has an OPS above .550.
Yes – the Cardinals do feature some excellent pitching, and Adam Wainwright‘s outing was surprisingly exceptional… unless it was the hitters themselves making him look better.
We’ve already discussed Freddie Freeman’s struggles in these pages… turns out he’s not the only one with issues, though he’s also clearly the been in the middle of all things related to run-scoring this season and now he’s struggling – a lone homer notwithstanding.
A Minor Change
These stats are all the more concerning with Jack Flaherty coming back – on short rest – for Game 5. It isn’t like there’s room to have these guys ‘work through’ their issues in the hopes of being back in shape in another week or so.
Moreover, the pressure to perform is only building with each passing day… and frankly, I have no idea how anyone (athlete or whatever) gets loosened up enough to be successful in an elimination game scenario.
Maybe it’s by achieved by focus drills, or by joking around, or by inspirational speeches, but if I’m Brian McCann or Josh Donaldson or Freeman or Nick Markakis… stepping into a batter’s box with a series average of .176 or less posted up on the scoreboard can’t be a good feeling.
That’s why I’d like to see Brian Snitker make a couple of changes in the lineup for Wednesday:
- CF Leading off: Acuna. This isn’t broke… don’t fix it. (Right-Hand Hitter)
- SS Swanson (RHH)
- 1B Freeman. Because he’s still an intimidating force (LHH)
- 3B Donaldson. Because he protects Freddie (though admittedly he can’t protect against a strikeout). (RHH)
- LF Duvall. Because he’s hitting well and has already hit Flaherty in this series. (RHH)
- 2B Albies. Because I can’t put him any higher. (SWH)
- RF Markakis*. More in a moment. (LHH)
- C McCann (LHH). Braves’ pitchers are throwing well to him.
- P Foltynewicz (not a hitter)
* – There are 4 plausible names for this slot: Ortega, Hamilton, Joyce, Markakis. All of them bat (or can bat) lefty.
None of them have much experience against Flaherty and none of them are hitting well right now. Given all that, you may as well stick with Markakis, since he’s showing some signs of coming around.
The Atlanta Braves need to bunch their better-hitting players together to have better opportunities to generate runs.
I don’t know that this lineup entirely does that, for at some level you do have to ride the horses that got you here. That’s why you can’t go crazy and move Duvall to 3rd or 4th in the order, for instance.
Do or Die Time
If the Braves can’t hit, they it will be obvious to all that it wouldn’t matter who their next round opponent might have been, for both Washington and Los Angeles are scoring some runs (after the Nationals’ slow start, they’ve joined the party).
Happily, St. Louis is actually in the same boat: the could point to the Sunday game that they (perhaps) should have won, plus the fact that their offense is being carried by Marcell Ozuna and Paul Goldschmidt… with occasional cameos from Molina, Edman, and Wong.
So Wednesday’s game will come down to this:
- Which team can hit consistently against a tough pitcher
- Which team can avoid the nervous mistakes in the field
So it’s a subtle lineup change, but one that might help keep a rally going a bit longer.
We’ll know in a few hours. Game time: 5PM EDT. Win or go home.