Official 2008 Atlanta Braves Season Thread (59-77) vol. We Blow

Charlie Morton gives up 5 runs early in the first 2 innings tonight for another Braves loss.
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God damn I hate the Phillies.
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I think I'm more surprised when they win, then they lose. It has gotten that bad. I wake up expecting either one of five headlines.....

-Hampton suffers another setback
-Soriano throws off the mound for the first time in 3 weeks, but his elbow/shoulder is not getting any better
-Chipper suffers a hyper-extended knee during his interviews wit the press
-Tex is heating up again for the 31st time this season
-Braves suffers another ONE-RUN/ROAD LOSS
 
Thursday 7/3 Jair Jurrjens vs Cole Hamels

Braves will be wearing a special hat during the week of July 4th and on September 11th here is a pic of the Braves hat all MLB will do the same.

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Too many injuries Look at Rotation on Opening Day

Starters: (Opening Day)
Tim Hudson, (R)
Tom Glavine, (L)
Jair Jurrjens, (R)
Mike Hampton, (L)
John Smoltz, (R)

Starters: (Starting Pitching Active) Totally different from Opening Day
Tim Hudson
Jair Jurrjens
 Jorge Campillo
Charlie Morton
Jo-Jo Reyes
 
Francoeur sent to Double A Mississippi.....
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ATLANTA -- There was a time when it seemed unfathomable to believe Jeff Francoeur would ever be sent back to the Minors. But over the next two weeks, thestruggling outfielder will return to his roots and look to relocate his lost swing.
Hoping a reduced-stress environment will prove helpful, the Braves have optioned Francoeur to Double-A Mississippi. The 24-year-old outfielder is expectedto be in the lineup for Friday night's game against Chattanooga.

After Thursday night's loss to the Phillies at Turner Field, Braves general manager Frank Wren, assistant general manger Bruce Manno and manager BobbyCox all met with Francoeur to discuss this decision. Their intention is to bring him back to the Major League club when play resumes after the All-Starbreak.

Replacing Francoeur on the 25-man roster will be former Georgia Tech product Jason Perry, a 27-year-old outfielder who has combined to hit .309 with 18homers and a .613 slugging percentage with Mississippi and Triple-A Richmond this year.

Francoeur didn't immediately respond to a text message and phone call on Friday morning. But after MLB.com first revealed on Wednesday night that theBraves were discussing this transaction, he made it known that he was both hurt and angry.

"The bottom line is he's upset," Francoeur's spokesperson, Molly Fletcher, said. "But he's going to embrace this and he'sgoing to turn this into a positive."

Since the start of the 2006 season, Francoeur has started a Major League-high 408 games. Before resting during the second game of a May 20 doubleheaderagainst the Mets, he had played in a Major League-high 370 consecutive games, each of which he had started. The only other game he didn't start this yearcame on June 22, when he did have a pinch-hit appearance against the Mariners.

Oddly, this transaction comes just three days shy of the third anniversary of when Francoeur was promoted from Mississippi to make his memorable MajorLeague debut. He homered against the Cubs on that July 7, 2005 night to mark the beginning of a strong rookie season. When he graced the cover of SportsIllustrated in August of that year, the cover's headline read "The Natural."

This year, most everything has looked unnatural for Francoeur, who excitedly arrived at Spring Training with 15 extra pounds that he hoped would helpincrease his power numbers. But his excitement has waned as he's hit just .234 with a .287 on-base percentage and .374 slugging percentage this season.

While at Turner Field for last week's series against the Brewers, one American League scout said that he had never seen another player who wasstruggling so much from a mechanical perspective.

At the behest of hitting coach Terry Pendleton, Francoeur has recently been arriving early on a daily basis for extra batting practice. But while hittingjust .121 with a .183 on-base percentage and .136 slugging percentage in his last 18 games, the frustrated outfielder hasn't realized any improvement.

Given a chance to work on his mechanics while not worrying so much about results in Mississippi, Francoeur may be able to realize his desiredimprovement.

After hitting .293 last year and enjoying a second consecutive season with at least 100 RBIs, Francoeur entered this season with great anticipation. He gotmarried to his high school sweetheart during the offseason and was hoping the Braves might give him a multiyear contract before the end of Spring Training.

When a deal wasn't reached, Francoeur still looked forward to the potential money he might gain when he became arbitration-eligible at the conclusion ofthis season.

Multiple times this year, Francoeur has indicated that he hasn't had the same amount of fun that he did during his first three Major League seasons, butnever has he said he's been pressing too hard simply because of his potential future salary.

Earlier this week, Francoeur's best friend, catcher Brian McCann, was one of the Braves players who pointed out this was the first time in his life thatthe outfielder had struggled in this manner.

Growing up in suburban Atlanta, Francoeur was named Georgia's state player of the year in both football and baseball. After less than one full season inthe Majors, he was named to the Team USA squad that played in the 2006 inaugural World Baseball Classic.

Then last year, after tying for the Major League lead with 19 outfield assists, he was awarded his first career Gold Glove. This year, the five outfieldassists recorded by the stong-armed right fielder ranks 15th among all Major League outfielders.

Some scouts have questioned Francoeur's mobility and wondered if the extra weight has limited his range.

From an offensive standpoint, the Braves haven't seen the power Francoeur produced in 2006, when he hit .260 with 29 homers, a .293 on-base percentageand .449 slugging percentage. Nor have they seen the enhanced consistency he showed last year, while hitting 19 homers, with a .338 on-base percentage and .444slugging percentage.

Also proving frustrating for the Braves is the fact they haven't seen the same clutch-hitting ability that Francoeur showed during his first couple ofseasons. He has hit .198 (20-for-101) with runners in scoring position and has just two hits in 20 at-bats with the bases loaded.

Francoeur's .662 OPS (on-base plus slugging percentage) also provides reason for concern. The only three National League outfielder with a worse markare Houston's Michael Bourn, Colorado's Willy Taveras and Los Angeles' Juan Pierre, who are all speed specialists with very little power.

Damn Jeff has been losing a lot of patience at the plate........a real reason why his BA is getting lower.
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When your name is in the same sentence as Juan Pierre in terms of hitting stats, then you belong at the Double-A level and nothin higher.......
 
Great game to win but 17 innings is going to be tough on the whole team.

Braves vs Dodgers next series

Escobar with a webgem.

Chipper Jones starting 3rd Baseman
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Brian McCann All Star Catcher Reserve
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McCann > Soto

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Originally Posted by dland24

Originally Posted by MFr3shM

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Sweeped by the Phillies
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I came into this thread to see the Francoeur news, and I read this.
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at sweeped.
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ok genius
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Braves were swept by the Phillies, and i doubt you'llread the Francoeur news.
"What's wrong?" Wellman asked.

"I'm hitting .260," his right fielder replied, as if to confess a felony. ".260!"

"Yeah," snapped Wellman, "and you earned every damn point."The conversation started there: the argument first; the challenge second; some videotape review third; and then last, the conclusive hour in a stifling batting cage. They finished at 2:30 a.m. It happened three years ago, and the night would change Francoeur's career. He went on a 12-game tear that would culminate in his summons to Atlanta.

And that is to help explain why he is back in Mississippi again. Thursday's demotion to Class AA was, in one way, the Atlanta franchise's capitulation that it could do no more with him. During the three-minute meeting when Francoeur was notified it was going down, he was given the option to which minor league team he would rather report. It was his easiest answer in weeks.

"When I got to the big leagues, I said Phil Wellman is the reason I got there," said Francoeur, who reached the majors three years after graduating from Parkview High School. "You know what? Coming back here and working with him for nine or 10 games, I'm going to do it and get back there."

Baseball slumps may be assorted by shape and size. The one-week Black Cloud Slump. The 10-day Aren't You Rafael Belliard Slump. The insidious three-week I Can't Feel My Face Slump.

Francoeur's Slump - four hits (all singles) in his last 42 at-bats in the majors; .198 in RBI situations - is the rarest of them all, one that catapults a star all the way back into the bushes. He still objects to how the Braves handled the matter, but then freely admits things had grown so bad, he couldn't even watch himself in the tape room.

"I tried," he said. "I watched some at-bats and you ask yourself, 'What were you thinking?' "

Wellman, who has since become Mississippi's manager, has a counter-intuitive belief in Francoeur. Weeks of wild swinging and poor pitch recognition have led to some truly hideous numbers: a .206 June; a 0-for-14 rut with men in scoring position; and - the bloggers really flog him on this one - a malodorous 2-for-20 with the bases loaded.

To which Wellman says: keep swinging.

"He's aggressive," Wellman said. "I think people need to understand that what's a strike to him is not always a strike to other people. I think when he gets in trouble is, he expands that too much. He knows that. But I hear some people say he's a bad-ball hitter. You know what? He's a good-ball hitter, too.

"He just needs to minimize. To me, the ability he has to get to the ball outside the zone and still hit the crud out of it, that's a gift. And just because it's not like anybody else doesn't necessarily mean it's wrong."

Hurtful 3 minutes

Though Francoeur has come off the initial hard-line resentment he first expressed after being sent down, he will still question how things seemed to accelerate in the last few days. He said he felt more comfortable at the plate during the mid-week Philadelphia series, after putting in extra batting practice. That general manager Frank Wren called the move the hardest he's ever had to make in his career did not mitigate Francoeur's reaction.

"After three years, after playing hurt, playing every day, going in every day whether I got a hit and never complaining, I just played because Bobby [Cox] kept putting me in the lineup," Francoeur said. "But I just felt like a little three-minute thing - 'Hey, you're going down' - I feel like after three years, I was owed a little more of an explanation. But that's Frank's deal and that's what I guess they decided to do.

"My question is, what if I had hit a home run or had two hits [Thursday night]? Does it delay it one day, until I was 0-for-4? I was left standing outside in the dark on that. You almost felt like they had made [their minds] up before the game. That's where I felt frustrated, where I felt a little betrayed."

But at the same time, the deterioration of his performance had taken on a life of his own. If he was not booed at Turner Field when he came to the plate, he was booed when he inevitably returned to the dugout. Coming as it did with the club sinking in the NL East standings, his slump was no longer just one individual's struggle. It was killing the Braves, too.

"There are times as a hitter that you've got to pay attention to details, as far as your mechanics," said third baseman Chipper Jones, who this season could seemingly hit in his pajamas. "And his mechanics right now are about as screwed up as you can get."

There were the subtle hints of desperation. Like the fresh new beard. Or using Jorge Campillo's bat last weekend in Toronto. Campillo, the rookie Tijuanan pitcher.

"I was just looking at bats and it felt good," Francoeur said. "And hell, he's been getting two hits a game."

The sight of it all took David Francoeur, the right fielder's father, way back to Little League.

"When we first started playing traveling ball years ago, back when he was 8 years old, I remember a couple of situations where he failed and just felt like the world had fallen," David said before his son was sent down. "I kind of sense he feels the same way now."

Factors in the decline

In the days leading up to his demotion, asking Francoeur how it's going was asking for a soliloquy. The slump left him ever-ready to dissect himself, which was not a particularly good thing either.

Primary factors ran into the double digits. He continued to miss the repeated sequences he saw: the breaking ball down and away, followed by the inside fastball under his hands. Pull-happy, he was incapable of hitting a ball to the right side. Since May 17, his strikeouts (40) far outstripped his hits (32). His average was down to a season-low .234.

"The minute I go up there and tell myself to take a pitch, it's right down the middle," he said.

A question lingers over his eyesight. Francoeur is in the second week of wearing a contact lens on his right eye to correct near-sightedness that has developed since he bunted a foul ball into his right cheek in 2004.

The club is hopeful the contact can address the vast disparity in his performance in day games (.301) and night games (.199).

"The thing with the contact, that kind of worries me," Jones said. "Because any time your talking about a hitter's eye, that's the most important thing there is."

Francoeur's only alternative had been extra work. On the Braves' Monday off-day, he spent 90 minutes swinging for his old Parkview coach, Hugh Buchanan. On Tuesday, he reported to Turner Field for early batting practice alone with Cox and hitting coach Terry Pendleton. He has also begun talking with sports psychology consultant Jack Llewellyn.

And now it is Wellman's turn. After Francoeur's 2005 midnight confession, he hoisted his average 15 points in barely two weeks, which got him to Atlanta. Once there he hit .300 the rest of the season and finished third in the NL rookie of the year balloting.

Monday will mark the third anniversary of his major league debut, which would not have happened if he had not knocked at Wellman's door.

"I remember it was a week or two after Brian [McCann] and Blaine [Boyer] were called up and I was kind of scuffling," Francoeur said. "That's why I believe in Phil, and I have always had a great connection because he was willing to do that stuff. He knows my swing.

"What I like is, he doesn't try to take my aggressiveness away."

Within Francoeur's first hour of reporting to Pearl - John Smoltz invited him to use his private plane - Wellman had him back in the same cage, doing the same rudimentary batting drills: off the hitting tee, soft-toss and then pitching to him. Francoeur had already abandoned a new week-old stance in which he tried resting the bat on his shoulder, and reverted to his old one, with his hands high and cocked.

"I was telling him, 'Let's go back to being Jeff Francoeur. Quit trying to be careful. You're not a careful hitter. You've never been a cautious hitter,' " Wellman said. "It looked like to me that he gets to the plate trying to make sure he gets a good pitch and by the time he realizes it's a good pitch, the fastball is by him. And I've never seen the guy get beat by fastballs."

Some fans turn on him

Before he was sent down, Francoeur had trouble metabolizing the fan response.

"I can't remember the last time that I ran out there with a big smile when I'm playing. And I'm the guy that smiles all the time," he said. "It's frustrating. When you've never been through something like this, you want people to rally around.

"Instead, it's the other way. You're getting ripped on."

While Francoeur has been a handy target for the call-in radio audience, he has being simply ravaged in Internet chat rooms.

"Benchy le Frenchy," one blogger begged. New nicknames: Stenchy and Francine.

"It's not like he's just showing up and going through the motions," said McCann, his friend since high school. "He's doing everything he can to figure this out. Knowing him as long as I have and knowing what kind of guy he is, he's going to come out of this and we won't even be talking about this at the end of the year."

Or not. This is hardly how anyone might have envisioned Francoeur commemorating his third anniversary in the majors, when he homered in his fourth career at-bat.

The Braves' archives remind them that there is another side to the story. When Jones finished his third full season, he had recorded 74 home runs and 307 RBIs. When Dale Murphy reached 241/2 years old, he had 79 home runs and 248 RBIs. At the end of his first three full seasons and at 241/2, Francoeur stands at 70 and 294.

"I'm disappointed in how it was handled and having to come here," Francoeur said. "But I'm going to make the best of my situation and get back to Atlanta for the second half and do what I do. I haven't lost confidence in myself to play this game. I've played it too long and been too successful."


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Since we swept the Dodgers earlier at home this season I hope for our first road sweep to close out the 1st half.
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Hope Frenchy can bounce back soon before the 2nd half. Lately he's been losing a lot of confidence at the plate and he's a major offensive anddefensive asset to us.
 
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McCann hit 2 deep Home Runs and Tex hit 1 great game Francoeur even got an outfield assist.

Julian Taverez is a bad pick up he doesn't have the stuff anymore.
 
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