Thread: GDT: 4/11 Bravos @ Nationals - let the suckage continue!

Mallex's debut got kinda lost in the shuffle of suck yesterday. Congrats to him. He seems like a super nice kid...confirmed for me when he took a minute to chat with Julio the Younger down in ST.
 
UNCBlue012 said:
Somehow the Twins look like a worse team than us right now. Not even looking at the record, they look awful.
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They have some really top prospects, but they all make Mike Hessman look like a contact hitter. Buxton, Sano, and the Korean import Kang are all striking out at a 50% rate.
 
50PoundHead said:
They have some really top prospects, but they all make Mike Hessman look like a contact hitter. Buxton, Sano, and the Korean import Kang are all striking out at a 50% rate.
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Luckily for them, the law of averages will probably balance out at some point. Unluckily for them, the AL Central is pretty darn good and won't relent.
 
UNCBlue012 said:
Luckily for them, the law of averages will probably balance out at some point. Unluckily for them, the AL Central is pretty darn good and won't relent.
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I look pretty stupid right now (truth be told, I look pretty stupid most of the time) because i picked the Twins to win the AL Central on the predictions thread. Their starting pitching should be okay if Nolasco rebounds (and he has shown some signs of that this spring) and they have projected stud Berrios in AAA. But the bullpen rivals the Braves' for ineptitude. I agree that water will likely find its own level and that Buxton and Sano won't continue to flop, but I think the Kang signing is one of the dumbest moves of the off-season. Not that he's a bad player. It's that he's just about the last thing the Twins need.
 
nsacpi said:
The Twins had a tremendous amount of luck last year.
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That's true, but they also had some terrible performances from guys expected to do better and didn't have Ervin Santana for half the season. If they had done more than Jepsen to improve the bullpen at the deadline, they may have lucked their way into the second wild card. Curious to see how they do going forward and what adjustments they might make. They are weak at SS and in the bullpen. Eduardo Escobar has developed into a solid player, but Molitor seems to want to move him around willy-nilly (at least he did last year) instead of putting him at SS and leaving him there.
 
Julio3000 said:
Mallex's debut got kinda lost in the shuffle of suck yesterday. Congrats to him. He seems like a super nice kid...confirmed for me when he took a minute to chat with Julio the Younger down in ST.
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Now, if they just find him a batting helmet that fits...
 
Braves1976 said:
Not really, he has good arm and range numbers at third so it remains to be seen how good or bad he can be there. He's not been near CJ bad at third and only had a -3 DRS there last year with us, mostly due to the errors. That is below average, but not terrible as you and Bowman keep asserting. We have a bigger issue at short with Aybar and Olivera in LF and also AJP is terrible at catcher of course.
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Not sure I recall either or Bowman or me saying he's terrible. Below average seems a bit closer to my previous assessments, so I suppose our views are more similar than you may think. If you extrapolate his 400 innings at 3B over a full season, he's on pace for around 40 errors. I don't mean to imply that errors are everything, but your range needs to be awfully, awfully good to survive at 3B with that fielding percentage. My best guess is that he'd level out at something like 25 errors in a full season, while showing average range. That would certainly put him at below average, bottom third of the league, etc.
 
msstate7 said:
Not sure our FO would give up Olivera as ransom for their first born. They fell in love at first sight... At what, I'm not sure
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I've thought the same thing. The Braves have been in love with Olivera since that showcase he did. I watch the guy and his flaws are glaring. He's not got a glove to speak of, he has zero power, below average plate discipline, and his bat wrap is so bad that his swing is too long to ever hit for average. I honestly don't know why they've been so high on him. He probably needs to go back to AAA and work on revamping that swing.
 
50PoundHead said:
They have some really top prospects, but they all make Mike Hessman look like a contact hitter. Buxton, Sano, and the Korean import Kang are all striking out at a 50% rate.
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Their hitters will be fine. It's the pitchers that kept me from believing they will reach .500 this year.
 
striker42 said:
I've thought the same thing. The Braves have been in love with Olivera since that showcase he did. I watch the guy and his flaws are glaring. He's not got a glove to speak of, he has zero power, below average plate discipline, and his bat wrap is so bad that his swing is too long to ever hit for average. I honestly don't know why they've been so high on him. He probably needs to go back to AAA and work on revamping that swing.
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I watched the video of him before he signed and it makes no sense to me that the Braves think so highly of him. This is just such a head scratcher. At least with Cody Johnson, he was 17 and had some natural power.
 
striker42 said:
I've thought the same thing. The Braves have been in love with Olivera since that showcase he did. I watch the guy and his flaws are glaring. He's not got a glove to speak of, he has zero power, below average plate discipline, and his bat wrap is so bad that his swing is too long to ever hit for average. I honestly don't know why they've been so high on him. He probably needs to go back to AAA and work on revamping that swing.
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scouting is not an exact science...others liked him...and BA has rated him highly...their ratings are basically a scouting consensus
 
gilesfan said:
I watched the video of him before he signed and it makes no sense to me that the Braves think so highly of him. This is just such a head scratcher. At least with Cody Johnson, he was 17 and had some natural power.
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I've watched videos of him before he signed as well. I didn't see anything special and saw red flags. When you add in the fact that he was going to be at least 30 (assuming his date of birth is accurate) before every playing a game it made no sense. Why give a 30 year old a big contract when you know you're going to have to rebuild his swing for him to have a chance of being average?

nsacpi said:
scouting is not an exact science...others liked him...and BA has rated him highly...their ratings are basically a scouting consensus
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This is what makes it even more puzzling. It wasn't just one guy with the Braves who just screwed up. There were multiple scouts who liked this guy. I just don't see why. I don't see what they thought he was going to be a special hitter and he's done nothing since getting here to show that the scouts were remotely right.

I know scouting isn't, as you say, an exact science, but it's rare to see so many scouts blow it so badly on a guy.
 
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