Life After Wren

Surely Frank Wren had successes, but in this age people only remember the negatives. People keep bringing up Uggla, BJ, Lowe, and Kawakami. No one knew Uggla would lose his superpowers when he came it Atlanta, though it could be a steroid thing. A big bucks GM has to take that into account. Wren should've known BJ had flaws – at the plate, in the field, and in the dugout. 

How many years will fans give the new GM before calling for his head? Surely not twelve months.

Sounds like Walker and Fletcher are goners. Is it their fault players won't change their approach? If a player hits a home run only 2 or 3% of the time, why do they swing for the fences 100% of the time? At what point do Gosslin and LaStella and Bettancourt start swinging for home runs? Everyone else does, why shouldn't they?

Will this change the chances for the top-ranked Braves centerfield prospect to make the big team at some point down the road? But his chances are limited – he doesn't hit home runs.

The Cardinals and A's know what their players can and cannot do – and only ask them to do what they can do. Is that so hard? Perhaps the new GM will place a higher value on players who strike out less.  

I'm not mad that the Braves didn't make the playoffs. Like most every year, they were in contention until almost the last week of the season, despite the offensive downturn and all the injuries. Perhaps a veteran leader was needed. Johnson couldn't fill that role because of his hotheadedness. Andrelton and Teheran are too young. Gattis and Santana and others are too new. BJ too poor performing. Why not Freddie and Heyward? Glad I'm too busy to read a lot about it.

Great news: Anna scored a 28 on the ACT. She hopes that will get her into UGA. This past Sunday her friend Brennan was baptized at NP. During his testimony he showed group prom photos with Anna in them.

ROB: I think it is a good move if Coppella (sp) gets the job - though a bad move if they hire Dayton Moore

From 2010 to 2012, Justin, BJ and Heyward combined to average 64 HR's and 69 SB's.  In 2013 and 2014, they have averaged 50 HR's and 34 SB's.

Justin's HR's have gone from an average of per year in 10-12 to 27 each of the last 2 years.  His stolen bases have dropped from 27 to 8.

Heyward averaged 20 HR's per season through the first 3 years of his career.  During the last two seasons, he has averaged 13.  The last 3 years have seen his HR totals go from 27 to 14 to 11.  He averaged 14 steals from 10-12 and 11 steals in 13-14.

Here is the big one.  BJ averaged 23 HR's and 36 SB's from 10-12.  Looking back, people say he was given a bad contract due to his history of high strikeouts and low batting average.  However when he did make contact, he was very productive.  In his contract drive year of '12, he barely missed a 30-30 season with 28 HR's and 31 SB's.  Obviously those numbers have fallen off the cliff the last 2 years - average 10 HR's and 16 SB's.

Sports fans pretty much want everyone fired.  I am sure that many of the FireFredi people wanted Bobby Cox fired every year as well.

I think one of Wren's best moves was trading Vizcaino and Delgado instead of Teheran and Minor.

I think Kyle Wren probably has a more promising future as a Brave now than he did before.

  

ME: Hard for Wren to have predicted those fall offs. Fans hated to see Prado go but welcomed Justin with open arms. There was lots of positive fan talk at that time. Should Schuerholz be fired for his "no balls should drop between our outfielders" statement? I still get mad about that - every time an easy fly ball falls in. I will be forever spoiled by Andruw. In the end Wren was fired for the Braves having to eat the contracts of Lowe, Uggla, and eventually BJ. And the greatest of these is BJ.

Why do you think they dropped off so? Any theories? Were pitchers learning how to pitch them? Chipper said it's easier to hit a home run when you're not trying to hit one – and therefore harder to hit a home run when you're trying to. Seems like that's the problem? Even if Chipper were the hitting coach, the players would still do their own thing. As a coach Chipper couldn't call out players in the media, though as an ex-player I wish he would. Kinda like how he shook his head at Francoeur bulking up and pulling the ball.

There are so many stories of players trying to live up to big contracts and failing. You'd think a player would be more mindful of that. But today's players aren't generally known for being read up on the history of the game. And those who fail history are doomed to repeat it.

Read a fan saying he hoped Dayton Moore got the GM job.

The state of the Braves has gotten so bad that my friend David Hurt sent out his first ever tweet: "Someday professional athletes will be paid for what they are doing, not what they've done…can you tell I'm a Braves fan?" Though I'm not sure exactly how that would work.

ROB: I believe Chipper loves the freedom of his new life and soon to be new wife to commit to spending almost every day from February through October of every year living the life of a major league hitting coach.

I think they would be better off by making him the teams organizational hitting coordinator.  All of the major and minor league hitting coaches would report to him.  Chipper would develop the organization's hitting philosophy and pass that on to the minor and major league coaches.  Chipper could work with hitters directly in spring training and during home stands, but his travel would be limited to a certain numbers of minor league visits.  Chipper would select the coaches that would understand and adhere to this thoughts on hitting.

Justin has bulked up and sacrificed speed for power.

The 3 year Heyward HR drop is the thing the organization needs to understand.  Was it last year's injuries?  Was it moving him to the leadoff spot?  I need to look at his HR rates before and after they moved him to leadoff in last year's St Louis series in July.

When you have nothing better to do, google video's for 'BJ Upton Tampa'.  Look at how fast he loaded his swing on his Tampa HR's.  Somehow when he got here last year his mechanics were screwed up.  He has been trying to fix them since then.  I think he can be fixed, but it may not be in Atlanta.  Also, while you are googling, find the video of the BJ - Longoria dugout confrontation in Tampa.