Da Braves
The offseason has already been more exciting than Braves fans had anticipated…and not in a good way. Last week, GM John Coppelella resigned suddenly just after Major League Baseball announced it was investigating the Braves organization for suspected transgressions in their dealings with international prospects.
No significant details were disclosed, including any real notion of how long the investigation might last and what the consequences might be. In other words, limbo land for the team until further notice. Coppelella’s prompt resignation ( along with one senior scout) would suggest that he is culpable. Since then, the club has disclosed little detail.
Senior execs John Hart (President of Baseball Operations) and Terry McQuirk (CEO) are still on board and have been very quiet. The timing of this investigation and it’s vague nature come at an inopportune time for the club. They are in the process of a “rebuild”, and they have been steadily spinning optimism for the near future, especially when you consider that the team has just completed their 3rd consecutive 90-loss season.
The popular notion is that they have restocked their farm system in short order, recovering from the barren cupboard left by long-gone scapegoat and prior GM Frank Wren.
Speculation includes the possibility that the rapid restocking of the farm system, built in part on the signings of several prominent international prospects, may have drawn the attention of MLB. Another possibility is someone inside the organization tipped off MLB. The absence of substantive information from the club feeds more speculation.
Among other questions is the role that John Hart played (or should have played) in Coppelella’s work. Hart is “President of Baseball Operations” (leaving one to wonder what other types of operations occur in a company called the Atlanta Braves). On the MLB.com report by Mark Bowman, Hart struck a high-minded tone “I can speak for everybody with the Atlanta Braves, we’re deeply disappointed. But again, we’ve cooperated. This is the Atlanta Braves. There is a certain standard that you just live up to.”
Hart probably should have spoken in the past tense. The high gloss of the Braves brand is already badly tarnished by chronic poor performance. Consider no playoffs since 2013 (5 of 15 teams make the playoffs in each league). No playoff series win since 2001. Again, the most recent 3 seasons of 90 or more losses. This year’s 72-90 record left them 25 games behind division-winning Washington.
His take on “the Braves’ way” is not reflected in team performance, and now, demonstrably, not in the front office either.
Many inside baseball folks agree that the Braves farm system is now among the best in MLB. Nonetheless, the ranking of prospects is a notoriously imprecise process. We can measure pitch speed, for example, but the minor leagues remain full of hard throwers who will not necessarily make a successful transition to being an effective major league pitcher.
The Braves under Coppelella had said that they consider young pitching to be “the currency” of a successful rebuild. And during his tenure, they have collected a goodly number of well-regarded pitching prospects. But the tricky part is parlaying that currency into major league WINS. Recent results have not been encouraging when it comes to acquiring major league talent.
And how did the Braves do in 2017? When asked for a one-word description of the 2017 season a few weeks back, Coppelella said “improving”. That is technically true since they lost two fewer games this year vs. last. And yet, the improvement was not merely mathematically marginal.
Consider the team position by position. The Braves badly over-marketed Dansby Swanson last offseason. A year later, it’s not at all clear that he is their shortstop of the future. Ozzie Albies looks quite promising at second base and Freddie Freeman is a fixture at first base. Third base was the site of a moderately bizarre series of “experiments” in 2017 for Atlanta. Adonis Garcia opened the season there, providing decent but inconsistent play at bat and with the glove. Following his injury, the Braves tried Rio Ruiz, Johan Comargo, Freddie Freeman (huh??) and finally, Brandon Phillips, who was wrenched from his second base spot late-season to make room for Albies. Phillips performed quite well in his sudden transition to a new position, and he was rewarded with a late-season trade to the contending Angels.
The outfield is less unsettled but given Matt Kemp’s inconsistent availability and production along with his fat paycheck, there is uncertainty there as well.
All of those areas of concern pale in comparison to the pitching staff. If the 2018 season started today, what might the Braves rotation look like? Julio Teheran is the “top of the rotation”–if the Braves are on the road. His record at Sun Trust was abysmal.
Next is….who? We’ve not officially heard that R.A. Dickey is not coming back for another year. Mike Foltynewicz has been highly erratic and finished the year on a down note. His ERA, WHIP, strikeout to walk ratio and home runs per nine innings were all worse in 2017 than a year earlier. So was his won/loss record (10-13), for all the traditionalists out there. He averaged just over 5 innings per start, adding stress to an undertalented and overworked bullpen. The remainder of the starting group comes from Newcomb, Sims, Fried, and Gohara. There’s a lot of talent in that group, but no proven performers.
Manager Brian Snitker has been signed for one more year. Hardly a vote of confidence, but thanks to Copelella, his job status was suddenly not the biggest problem to resolve. And you could argue that he did his usual solid job of managing developing prospects over the 2nd half of the season when the roster looked rather like AAA plus level, especially the pitching and infield.
To put it bluntly, the rebuild has a long way to go. The footings have been poured and now the architect is gone. Who will replace him, and when? Will the same folks who brought in John Coppelella use better judgment and maintain tighter oversight than they apparently did in the era just passed?
For that matter, should those people roll out now, to give the new team final freedom from “the Braves’ way”?
It may be a while before we learn more about the transgressions that cost Coppelella his job. In the meantime, we’d like to see a winning ball team seriously competing for a title. They need to get going. It’s only a few months ’til pitchers and catchers report for 2018. Big questions need good answers. Who’s going to do it? Batter up, McQuirk!