Ivermectin Man
ZiPS puts a 50/50 season in reach for Acuña, and his projected WAR is more than a win better than anyone else in baseball. Eight of his top 10 comps ought to be Hall of Famers (Betts is still playing), and ZiPS now has him finishing with a mean career projection in excess of 650 homers, with nearly 600 stolen bases and more than 3,000 hits.
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
It's wild that his top 2 age comps are Frank Robinson and Willie Mays
Anything can happen baseball is a cruel bitch. But that's insane. Robinson and Mays are inner circle hall of famers, if Acuna has 80% of the career they have he's one of th ebest to ever play for the Braves.
Stockholm, more densely populated than NYC - sturg
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
It's so beautiful.
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
Thought this quote was really interesting: "You could lop Acuña off the top and this would still look like one of the top teams in baseball."
Also, I'm encouraged by ZiPS seeming to like Ignacio Alvarez.
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
This projection of the rotation helps me not freak out about adding another SP as much.
The scary part is there's a pretty good chance Kelenic grows up and becomes yet another 3-4 win guy in that lineup.
Last edited by Enscheff; 12-14-2023 at 12:24 PM.
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
jpx7 (12-14-2023)
Reynaldo Lopez projected for a 4.10 ERA as a SP. That aint half bad.
"Donald Trump will serve a second term as president of the United States.
It’s over."
Little Thethe Nov 19, 2020.
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
I think Kelenic is a good chance to take because with his toxic relationship with the Mariners he should be receptive to an extension if he does well and likes it here.
"Donald Trump will serve a second term as president of the United States.
It’s over."
Little Thethe Nov 19, 2020.
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
The rotation is in good shape if we can just stay reasonably healthy there... that's been the problem. When the depth is a bunch of AAAA junk, that's when we stumble. Let's hope Elder can sharpen his control now that he will hopefully be stronger and more suited to pitch a full season.
Injuries have literally struck twice as the playoffs began/ or during
It could happen again, but I mean not likely.
Ivermectin Man
I don’t think it’s particularly unlikely that a pitcher isn’t fully healthy come playoff time.
Lugo for 3/$45 would’ve made me feel a lot better about the options if that’s the case. I do still hope AA has something else planned for the rotation. I think it’s still a pretty big need.
"Well, you’ll learn soon enough that this was a massive red wave landslide." - thethe on the 2020 election that trump lost bigly
“I can’t fix my life, but I can fix the world.” - sturg
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
A guy with a history of blister problems getting a blister isn’t exactly crazy. A 40 year old pitcher getting injured isn’t a surprise.
The fact of the matter is plenty of people understood there wasn’t enough SP on the roster, specifically because of those risks with those pitchers. So it’s a little silly to act like there’s no way anyone could have seen those issues coming when people on this board literally said they were distinct possibilities that should have been planned for.
The Braves have had no shortage of good fortune developing position players, so I have to remind myself not to get too upset with some pitchers not working out.
If we had 2022 Kyle Wright and Ian Anderson was a reliable back end starter, we’d be pretty set across the board.
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
I wonder how much the Braves are relying on Anderson's return. I've heard his name a lot from talking heads talking about whether the Braves are going to upgrade the rotation but I hope the Braves aren't letting Anderson's potential return affect their decision making at all. Anderson isn't very good when fully healthy so you can't expect much from him coming back from TJ.
jpx7 (12-15-2023)
I think unfortunately the bad luck was the timing of the injuries. Yes we all know the injuries are possible, especially with the history of those players, but what happened to Fried the past 2 years was bad timing, same with Morton this past year, and Strider the year before.
jpx7 (12-15-2023)