The entire schedule of when team recaps will be.
Team: Atlanta Braves
2007 Regular Season Record: 84-78
Cost per Win: $87,290,833 / 84 = $1,039,176 per win
2007 Season Recap: Well the Braves had a bit of an up and down season. They ended the season 5 games back in the NL East and 5.5 games back in the NL Wild Card chase. They did however have a winning record which is always a good accomplishment in baseball but not what a team that has historically been in the playoffs with regularity is looking for. A lot of the Braves shortcomings came from the lack of performances by some of their high paid veterans. At the same time they had some great showings from young talent that makes it seem that the Braves have a good future.
Not all of the veterans underperformed though. One great performance in 2007 came from Chipper Jones. He led the team in batting average, home runs, and runs; .337, 29, and 108 respectively. Another strong performance came from Jeff Francoeur who led the team in RBIs with 105. Edgar Renteria also had a strong season hitting for a .332 average and scoring 87 runs. A third positive was the mid season addition of Mark Teixeira from the Rangers. As a member of the Braves he hit .317 and had 17 home runs in only 54 games.
Now on to the bad, the top salary earner for the Braves last year was Mike Hampton who made $14.5 million. The only catch with Hampton is that he hasn’t pitched for the Braves since 2005 due to a long series of injuries. He’s been attempting to rehab but it was reported that he strained his hamstring this winter while playing in the Mexican winter leagues so it doesn’t look like that trend will change any. The second player that got paid a lot to underperform was Andruw Jones and his $14 million salary. Most notably was the fact that Jones only hit .222 and that went up quite a bit when he got hot at the end of the season. He did have 26 home runs on the season which was second best on the team but maybe he needs to focus more on just getting hits and not trying to hit it out of the ballpark. Jones is now gone anyway so the Braves won’t have to worry about him underperforming anymore, he can do that for the Dodgers now.
Key Free Agents: OF Andruw Jones, SS Edgar Renteria, RP Octavio Dotel; Renteria isn’t actually a free agent this off-season but he was traded away to the Tigers very early in the off-season and I think he will be a major loss. Andruw Jones has also moved on as I mentioned before. The Braves really don’t lose many key guys and they have already brought Tom Glavine back so this team has a promising future ahead of them.
Offseason Needs: One of the major off-season needs is at short stop to fill the hole left by Renteria. Currently rookie Yunel Escobar is in the starting role on the depth chart but he is very inexperienced, he did however hit .326 in limited action last season so there is hope that he could pan out to be a solid talent. Center field is another question mark but the Braves have historically been good at finding young guys who perform well out there so I’m not too concerned about that position. They have definitely solidified the pitching rotation with the return of Glavine and assuming Hampton can actually pitch this year they will be solid from top to bottom so that isn’t a need.
Prediction for the 2008 season: I think next season will be a lot better for the Braves. They will contend for the NL East in a close race with the Phillies and Mets and I’d like to think that the Braves will come out on top. This is an organization that does things right and doesn’t just go out and buy players, they actually develop talent. For this reason I’m rooting for them and would definitely like to see them revisit the playoffs after a couple of years off. They probably wouldn’t get through the first round of the playoffs but you never know what could happen once a team makes it to the playoffs.
Team: Atlanta Braves
2007 Regular Season Record: 84-78
Cost per Win: $87,290,833 / 84 = $1,039,176 per win
2007 Season Recap: Well the Braves had a bit of an up and down season. They ended the season 5 games back in the NL East and 5.5 games back in the NL Wild Card chase. They did however have a winning record which is always a good accomplishment in baseball but not what a team that has historically been in the playoffs with regularity is looking for. A lot of the Braves shortcomings came from the lack of performances by some of their high paid veterans. At the same time they had some great showings from young talent that makes it seem that the Braves have a good future.
Not all of the veterans underperformed though. One great performance in 2007 came from Chipper Jones. He led the team in batting average, home runs, and runs; .337, 29, and 108 respectively. Another strong performance came from Jeff Francoeur who led the team in RBIs with 105. Edgar Renteria also had a strong season hitting for a .332 average and scoring 87 runs. A third positive was the mid season addition of Mark Teixeira from the Rangers. As a member of the Braves he hit .317 and had 17 home runs in only 54 games.
Now on to the bad, the top salary earner for the Braves last year was Mike Hampton who made $14.5 million. The only catch with Hampton is that he hasn’t pitched for the Braves since 2005 due to a long series of injuries. He’s been attempting to rehab but it was reported that he strained his hamstring this winter while playing in the Mexican winter leagues so it doesn’t look like that trend will change any. The second player that got paid a lot to underperform was Andruw Jones and his $14 million salary. Most notably was the fact that Jones only hit .222 and that went up quite a bit when he got hot at the end of the season. He did have 26 home runs on the season which was second best on the team but maybe he needs to focus more on just getting hits and not trying to hit it out of the ballpark. Jones is now gone anyway so the Braves won’t have to worry about him underperforming anymore, he can do that for the Dodgers now.
Key Free Agents: OF Andruw Jones, SS Edgar Renteria, RP Octavio Dotel; Renteria isn’t actually a free agent this off-season but he was traded away to the Tigers very early in the off-season and I think he will be a major loss. Andruw Jones has also moved on as I mentioned before. The Braves really don’t lose many key guys and they have already brought Tom Glavine back so this team has a promising future ahead of them.
Offseason Needs: One of the major off-season needs is at short stop to fill the hole left by Renteria. Currently rookie Yunel Escobar is in the starting role on the depth chart but he is very inexperienced, he did however hit .326 in limited action last season so there is hope that he could pan out to be a solid talent. Center field is another question mark but the Braves have historically been good at finding young guys who perform well out there so I’m not too concerned about that position. They have definitely solidified the pitching rotation with the return of Glavine and assuming Hampton can actually pitch this year they will be solid from top to bottom so that isn’t a need.
Prediction for the 2008 season: I think next season will be a lot better for the Braves. They will contend for the NL East in a close race with the Phillies and Mets and I’d like to think that the Braves will come out on top. This is an organization that does things right and doesn’t just go out and buy players, they actually develop talent. For this reason I’m rooting for them and would definitely like to see them revisit the playoffs after a couple of years off. They probably wouldn’t get through the first round of the playoffs but you never know what could happen once a team makes it to the playoffs.
1 comment:
Any truth to the rumor that many ballplayers today are taking homeopathic growth hormone oral spray because it's safe, undetectable, and legal for over the counter sales? As time goes on it seems it might be considered as benign a performance enhancer as coffee, aspirin, chewing tobacco, and bubble gum.
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