Just leaving this here:
1991: 2nd in NL
1992: 3rd in NL
1993: 3rd in NL
1994: 5th in NL
1995: 9th in NL
1996: 4th in NL
1997: 3rd in NL
1998: 4th in NL
1999: 7th in NL
2000: 6th in NL
2001: 13th in NL
2002: 10th in NL
2003: 1st in NL
2004: 5th in NL
2005: 4th in NL
Other good recent Braves teams:
2010: 5th in NL
2012: 7th in NL
2013: 4th in NL
The only thing I would add is that since Simmons in particular is a negative offensive player I would look at what the Braves position players were in overall WAR in that stretch. I'm going to assume that they were pretty high as well.
Not convinced... think we need a few more pitchers. Freeman should bring us a solid young pitcher or twoOriginally Posted by thewupk
That #1 offense sure got us real far......
Where is the comparable pitching ranking? Don't think anyone ever said the Braves' pennant run was due to their overpowering offense.
The point is this: the front office is selling a very specific narrative about our glory days. And that narrative is "Pitching, pitching, pitching." Everything was about pitching, and thus everything should be about pitching. We won with pitching in the 90's, so it makes sense for us to focus almost exclusively on pitching in our re-build.
Set aside whether the lessons of 1991 are relevant to 2015. That narrative is greatly over-simplified. As the numbers up there show, we generally had really effective offenses. The only seasons where we won with pitching and a crummy offense were 2001 and 2002. We could usually hit the ball. Remember the offensive talent we brought up in the early glory days: Gant, Justice, Meta Brian Hunter, Blauser, Chipper, Javy, Klesko.
Now, yes, the strength of those teams was the pitching. But if you're going to use the division champion Braves' teams as a model for your re-build, you need to keep this in mind: those teams didn't have good pitching or even great pitching. They had extraordinary pitching. Those were some of the greatest rotations in the history of Major League Baseball. They were fronted by three Hall of Famers, one of whom is one of the five or six greatest pitchers in the history of the game. That's the standard for which you're aiming. It's a big ask, and building that sort of pitching staff requires an otherworldly combination of shrewdness and luck.
It is a mistake to get stuck in a mindset that you can only build a championship team one way. Take a look at KC, the Mets and other teams that have recently played in the World Series. You will find teams that are quite different in terms of strengths and weaknesses.
You need good players regardless of what they do or the spots they take up. It's pretty simple. Right now the Braves have a lot of work to do with the position players.
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