RECONSTRUCTION OF ATLANTA
Braves put historic collapse aside
TAMPA — In his press conference to announce his retirement after the season, Chipper Jones talked about how he’d fulfilled everything i n his career and then looked at his Atlanta Braves teammates with tears in his eyes, adding: “I will sit in the foxhole, a clubhouse or a dugout with any of you guys. I love each and every one of you and I hope we go out with a bang here in 2012.”
The question is: Will they really? Or will they go out with a sorry whimper like they did last season, 8-18 after Sept. 1, and blowing a 10½ game lead in the National League wild-card race with 30 games to go?
With a 7-14 Grapefruit League record as of Saturday, it appears the Braves are picking up right where they left off last year, but manager Fredi Gonzalez, whose job conceivably is riding on him being right about this, insists his players have moved past their epic collapse and understand the opportunity in what figures to be a very competitive National League East.
Gonzalez has no problem that his boss, GM Frank Wren, made no significant moves over the offseason, even though the Braves finished 22nd in the majors in runs and led the majors in extra-inning games, with 57 more extra innings than any other club. The latter stat could have been a prime factor in the late-season fatigue by Gonzalez’s hard-throwing back-end bullpen duo, lefty Jonny Venters and righty Craig Kimbrel, the NL Rookie of the Year.
“Our pitching carried our offense for three-fourths of the season last year,” Gonzalez was saying the other day. “After the All-star break we made a conscious effort not to use (Venters and Kimbrel) unless it was a save situation. Unfortunately, we played 55 one-run games and all those extra-inning games, and there wasn’t any other choice, unless we were supposed to make an announcement: ‘Ladies and gentleman (reserve outfielder) Matt Diaz will now be pitching the extra innings.’ ”
Both Gonzalez and Wren believe the Braves’ offense will be better for a number of reasons: (1) having center field/leadoff man Michael Bourn (acquired at the trade deadline last year) for a full season; (2) right fielder Jason Heyward, who had his ticket to Cooperstown canceled last year by a miserable .227 sophomore season, is experiencing no pain his shoulder, which hampered him last season, and (3) they didn’t trade Martin Prado.
“We’re still looking at opportunities in spring training to improve our club,” said Wren, “but just about every team we talked to last winter asked about Prado, who’s our backup for Chipper (who will miss the start of the season with a knee injury) at third base, and I didn’t see where that would be improving our club. Jason needs to make some adjustments — his swing got all out of whack last year because of the shoulder — but we’re not looking for him to put up superstar numbers. If he can duplicate his rookie season (18 homers, 72 RBI), our offense will be considerably better.”
If there’s one thing the Braves are doing, perhaps better than any team in baseball, it’s developing their own players, with the core of their team — catcher Brian Mccann, first baseman Freddie Freeman, Heyward, Prado, Venters, Kimbrel, and all the way back to Chipper in 1995, — all home grown.
It’s continuing this spring in the battle for the starting shortstop job between Tyler Pastornicky, the favorite going in off his .299 season at Double-a Mississippi last year, and Curacao native Andrelton Simmons, who hasn’t played above A ball but was the only player in the Carolina League to hit over .300 last year and has clearly outplayed Pastornicky. “If Simmons opens the season with them, he’d already be the best shortstop in the National League,” said one scout.
Another prospect who has impressed this spring is 20-year-old catcher Christian Bethancourt from Panama, whose throwing arm scouts are comparing to Johnny Bench’s. He’s for later, though. For now, the Braves have to justify Wren’s faith that there’s sufficient talent on hand to win the division and there are no lingering effects from last year.
“When I got to camp I had a yellow legal pad to write down all I wanted to say to them,” Gonzalez related, “and then, what did I see? All the pitchers and catchers and five of our regular players all out there working out. That said everything for me. I did tell them I was proud of the way they handled September. Nobody pointed any fingers. Their message to me was: ‘We’re here and ready to go on.’ ”
BUCS’ BUCKS
It has taken 19 straight losing seasons and the disillusionment of one of the best fan bases in the game, but Pittsburgh Pirates owner Bob Nutting and his appointed guardian of the office vault, ly, ly have finally come around to making a genuine commitment to putting a competitive team on the field. Boy have they come around! Who would have ever thought it would be the penurious Pirates to prompt MLB into instituting significant restrictions on draft bonuses and international signings? And who would have ever thought the Pirates would be laying out big money on long-term contracts for their young players, rather than trading them right before they became eligible for free agency?
“We lost a generation of fans in Pittsburgh and we’re trying to rekindle that,” said Pirates manager Clint Hurdle. “Last year was the first step. Now we’ve got to get to the next level.”
Last season, Hurdle’s first as Pittsburgh’s manager, the Pirates were seven games over .500 and in first place on July 22 and, suddenly, it was as if it was 1960 or 1979 all over again as fans by the multitude, who hadn’t been to the ballpark in years, began flocking to PNC Park.
At the same time, the Pirates spent a record $17 million in bonuses in the draft, including the most ever ($8 million) for a No. 1 pick (righthander Gerrit Cole) and $5 million for outfielder Josh Bell, taken in the second round. Then this spring they raised more eyeballs by doling out $51.7 million on a six-year extension for their stilldeveloping franchise player, center fielder Andrew Mccutcheon. “The fan base in Pittsburgh has been waiting too long, but we’re doing this one step at a time,” Hurdle said.
Unfortunately, the culture change Hurdle instituted in the clubhouse last season was somewhat negated by a second-half slump that left the Pirates 72-90 at season’s end. And the team at hand — for which journeymen catcher Rod Barajas and shortstop Clint Barmes were the primary offseason acquisitions and A.J. Burnett was brought in from the Yankees to anchor the starting rotation (only to be felled by an eye injury) — is still very flawed.
The ever-positive Hurdle, however, remains undaunted — with a one-word credo “Finish” for his troops. “They walked away from 162 games for the first time understanding what that championship season is all about,” he said. “They learned a valuable lesson those last two months.”