MLB Atlanta

Here's hoping that Jeff Francoeur didn't have his mail forwarded to Mississippi. Three days after the Braves made the decision to send the rightfielder to AA in an attempt to rediscover his swing, they've brought him back up to Atlanta.

Ostensibly, the rash of injuries that struck the Braves over the weekend are the reason why Frenchy is back in the big leagues. Manny Acosta, Omar Infante and Jeff Bennett were all placed on the disabled list after last night's marathon with the Astros. GM Frank Wren says that isn't the reason for the move, interesting since the move would be illegal without players going on the DL.

"It had everything to do with the four hits he had yesterday and seven hits he had in three days and starting to relax. It was not until we had our call with the coaches this morning we had made the decision. It was not predicated on injuries at all. When we felt like he was comfortable swinging the bat and looking like his old self, we wanted to bring him back."

That doesn't say much for Wren's decision-making. Francoeur pounded AA pitching for three days and that was enough to change your mind after 362 major league plate appearances? It's hard to understand why you'd bother sending him down at all, pissing him off in the process, if the only reassurance you needed was that he's better than guys two levels away from the Show.

When I checked the Braves record and realized that they were an insane 4-21 in games decided by one run, I was pretty shocked. But after the super-smart people at Baseball-Reference pointed me in the direction of just how historically bad it was, I was even more surprised.

If you sort by one run games for every team since 1901, the Braves rank dead last (#2212) in terms of one run game winning percentage. Yes, over the past 108 years, there has not been a team with a worse relative record in one run games in baseball. Which is pretty astounding.

It's also oddly uplifting, if you're a Braves fan though. See, one run games are primarily luck. Certainly not all luck, but certain "breaks" in the game often dictate how a one run game will shape out, and a 4-21 record is not indicative of the overall talent on Atlanta this year.

Also, the poor record in one run games would seem to indicate a shift in luck for the Braves -- despite the "losing mentality" that you hear about, Atlanta should see a reversal of fortune in some of these close games during the second half of the season.

Given the state of the National League East where Philly is kind-of-sort-of surging, but no one is dominant, that could actually bear out pretty well for the ATL. The downside, of course, is that Braves players are dropping like flies to injury. Of course, not every baseball season is chock full of good luck. This might still be one of them that stays without.

The Fightins' put together a pretty nice little mini-montage of action from the Phillies - Mets game on Thursday night. First you will see awkward descriptions of bat shaving and sexual innuendo. Then you will see Yunel Escobar foul a ball that hits the ground and then hits him in the man-regions. The announcers (admittedly not "doctors") give the wrong diagnosis at first.

Contrary to what the Braves impressed upon everyone yesterday, they have decided to ship Jeff Francoeur to the minor leagues in AA Mississippi (do not pass AAA, do not collect $200). He, unsurprisingly, is not thrilled with the decision.

"This has really put a damper on my relationship with the Atlanta Braves," Francoeur told the AJC.

"I love playing for the city, I love playing for the fans and always have," said Francoeur, a graduate of Parkview High School in Lilburn. "But I'm disappointed with the decision and how the whole process went down."

[...]"I do not agree with this, but I have to do what I have to do," Francoeur said.

Francoeur said he was given the option of going to AAA Richmond and AA Mississippi and chose Mississippi because of his relationship with manager Phillip Wellman, who was his hitting coach when he was last in the minors in Mississippi in 2005.

Well, honestly, you can't blame him. Getting shipped to the minors by a team that's under .500 is pretty daggum embarrassing. It's not as if Frenchy has never struggled either; he's pretty notorious for having an OBP that registers F-A-I-L on most standard measuring devices.

We've hashed out the Braves problems before. 11-27 on the road, worst in the majors. 39-41 and 4.5 back of the National League East (mercifully the Phils are 2-8 in their last 10). Pitchers dropping like flies. Guys hitting .400 careening foul balls off their eyes.

But despite all of that, there is hope Braves fans. It comes in the form of Tommy Hanson (not actually pictured), who pitched the first no-hitter in Mississippi Braves history last night, striking out a whooping 14 in the process.

"It was awesome, by far the best time I've ever had pitching in a game my whole life," Hanson said following a clubhouse celebration. "It was great. The fans were up clapping, it was an awesome time."

[...]"I was kind of sitting in the corner of the dugout and guys would walk by and say, 'Good job,' but you could kind of tell they were all staying away," Hanson said. "I knew they hadn't gotten a hit, but I was trying not to think about it. It was kind of funny."

Nothing like the old awkward jinx factor. Now, Hanson might not be headed to the majors this year (although if he keeps throwing no-hitters and the Braves need pitchers, who knows?) but it could certainly happen, especially with no real knowledge about how Frank Wren likes to roll with prospects.

More than likely, he's going to get promoted to Richmond and if he pitches well there, he'll get some time in the bigs. But Braves fans, as much as this season isn't over, should remember that this kid = future. So be patient.

I'm not even sure whether to be amazed or angry. Judging by the drunken fans screaming "GO COW!", I'm a little less angry than I thought I would be, when I finally saw the giant, 40 foot tall, tomahawk chopping cow that is now the center of idolizing worship fan festivities in Atlanta. Superb work by UmpBump to pull this in.



I would also like to point out that no matter how much people are cheering right now, in a few months, I think the whole giant cow thing will grow stale. And then Braves will have a real ... beef with their fans.

Via Deadspin

There's no bigger flaw in Jeff Francoeur's game than his ability to judge the strike zone. His lack of walks has made him totally reliant on batting average to be a productive player. He's hitting just .243 this season, which makes him a drag on the Atlanta offense, and just .207 at night. The Braves hope that the problem is one that can be fixed with the help of an optometrist.

Francoeur is being fitted with a contact lens for his right eye in an effort to help him with a better approach at the plate. His vision in the eye has steadily deteriorated since he got plunked in the head in 2004.

"We'll see what happens. I'm near-sighted in my right eye a little since I had surgery [for multiple fractures of his right cheek and orbital bone around the eye]. I'm not making excuses, but I feel like I haven't been able to recognize pitches. I've only got to wear it at night."

It's worth noting that last season Francoeur had no trouble hitting at night. He produced a .301/.351/.466 line compared to .273/.303/.390 during the day.

The success of the lens may be the one thing that stops Francoeur from being a one-hit wonder. His 2004 rookie season increasingly looks like a fluke. He was terrible in 2005, okay in 2006 and is back to the dregs this season and, even at 24, you have to wonder how many more chances he'll get to turn things around

On Deck is FanHouse's look at the day's most intriguing baseball matchups.

Seattle Mariners (26-49) at New York Mets (37-37) - 7:10 PM ET

It's a great pitching matchup - Felix Hernandez vs. Johan Santana - but that's not why this game leads off our list of Monday baseball. No, it's because Jerry Manuel will be managing his first home game at Shea Stadium since taking over for Willie Randolph. The nature of that dismissal has been debated to death in New York since then but it will still be interesting to see how the hometown faithful react in their first look at the team since Black early Tuesday morning. Manuel's fertilizer comments, which seem like little more than a tabloid trying to make a stink where none exists, could also play a role in how he's greeted. If Santana pitches well, and no reason he shouldn't against the Mariners, it should all end up as a lovefest by the end of the night.

Right Down Peachtree, the sports portion of Atlanta Magazine (and edited by Jay Busbee, who does some fine work at a few blogs with an exclamation point), has what might be the defining quiz of the 2008 Atlanta Braves season.

They are asking readers to match Braves players and Spinal Tap drummers to their various injuries. And it's not as easy as you'd think.

Oh, and in totally unrelated news, Chipper Jones (right quad) and Yunel Escobar (right hip) are now hurt and day-to-day. Here's the list of injuries.

A. Spontaneously combusted in a flash of green light.
B. Hit self in the face with a batting practice foul ball.
C. Either returned to world of jazz or died.
D. Killed in swamp gas explosion while visiting the grave of Mick Shrimpton.
E. Out till the All-Star break with a bad elbow and a bad case of Shea Flu.
F. Choked to death on vomit. Not his own vomit.
G. Still active. Wrapped in bubble wrap nightly to prevent accidents.
H. May not, in fact, actually exist anywhere outside of the disabled list.
I. Fell down the Wrigley Field dugout stairs.
J. Exploded onstage.
K. Sent back into the Terminator shop for repairs.
L. His trick elbow is in, then out, then in, and now out.
M. Died in a bizarre gardening accident.
N. Out for the year with ligament replacement surgery. Will harvest the ligament from Johan Santana.

See? Not all that easy to decipher. Aside from the keywords like "Wrigley Field" and "foul ball" -- then you can at least separate them into ST v. AB categories and work from there. Of course, it obviously gets tougher if you haven't seen Spinal Tap, but then every minute more you spend watching moving pictures or reading the internet is about as worthwhile as a Mike Hampton contract extension.

How on Earth does Tim Hudson sideline himself due to dehydration? This isn't a scolding, it's pure curiosity. I figured that you can avoid dehydration by drinking plenty of water. If Maslow had constructed a Hierarchy of Preventative Health Measures, wouldn't "drink water to prevent dehydration" be only a level up from "breathe to prevent asphyxiation"?

Today's Dugout is a construction of the only possible understandable scenario I could think of. Necessarily, it is a Spaghetti Western. Read it after the jump.