Attributes	Derek Lowe	Shane Victorino	Attributes
- effective sinking fastball (~90 mph) - mixes in slider and change (low 80's) - has struggled with command of his slider, making him rely on his sinker too much			- high average hitter - good eye at the plate - good power - great speed
Suggested Approach		Suggested Approach
Command the sinker! By getting out in front with a backdoor sinker, he can make Victorino chase more outside pitches. Might consider using an outside change to disguise as a backdoor slider. May be able to roll him over to second that way.		Batting lefty, I think he should sit on inside sinkers and sliders he can scoop over the RF wall. Until he is behind in the count, no need to chase anything outside. Then beware the backdoor slider.

 

April 22, 2010: First inning. Five straight sinkers from Lowe here all on the low/outside 'corner'.

0-0: Victorino makes him throw it for a strike, and he does.

0-1: Lowe tries to get him to chase one far outside, but Victorino doesn't bite and shows off some patience.

1-1: Lowe sees the patience and puts another one on the corner. His command of the sinker in this AB is paying off.

1-2: With Victorino on the defensive, Lowe can throw sinkers of the plate outside until Victorino chases one. Good eye on this one, though.

2-2: And he chases. Good swinging K for Lowe.

 

In his first at-bat in the May 7th loss, Lowe again gives Victorino four straight sinkers.

0-0: Victorino makes Lowe show command. Lowe misses.

1-0: Same. Lowe gets a call on a pitch up in the zone.

1-1: Victorino may be looking for something inside as Lowe buries strike two toward the outside corner.

1-2: Behind in the count, Victorino has to offer at a good 1-2 pitch and rolls a grounder to second.

 

 

It seems like neither guy wants to bend and try something new like Lowe coming inside, or Victorino being aggressive and poking one to left. It's worked out for Lowe so far, but Victorino may get more aggressive today.

 

I hope this makes more sense for tomorrow's line-up, (thanks to Quilvio Veras).  Hopefully it looks better too.

If you guys can think of anything more accurate to put in the graphic above for either player, please make a comment. Standard internet scoring (+1) by others will be used to validate the info, and I'll update it every so often.

 

Go Braves!

A short preview of both players may be helpful.

 

Kris Medlen's SB scouting report is possibly the most vague thing I've ever read.  This was more helpful. 

Medlen has a quality three-pitch mix — a better than average fastball, a plus curveball, and a solid-average change-up. The development of his change-up has been key to his success as a starter.

 

That site also has gif's of his FB and curve, which were awesome.  That fastball reminds me of the one Zach Duke wanted to throw Chipper on Friday, instead of the 89 mph cream-puff that resulted in an RBI single.  With the same pitches, Medlen might resemble Duke's style, only with a good fastball to make it all work.  As Oberholtzer said, "everything should work of your fastball".

 

Couldn't find much on Garrett Jones, but it looks like he is a pretty prototypical power hitter and might have trouble with patience.  This might create a tough matchup as for Medlen as Jones will likely be looking to jump on his fastball.  Medlen might have to nibble at Jones and get him chasing the curve.

 

If anybody has better info on Garrett, please add in the comments.

 

More to come after the game.

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OK, so a bit of a failure on my part last night.  I only got to see two of Chipper's AB's all night due to the rain mixing up my schedule.  However, I did sift through Pitch F/X graphs in order to look at the at-bats he had.  These graphs are shown below along with what I think could very well have been happening. 

 

I hope my analysis is at least entertaining and your comments will give me more info as to what actually happened.  Again, I only saw two of these at-bats so I'm gonna need some help. I'll rewrite stuff that is just plain wrong.

 

For tonight, let's look at Medlen vs Garret Jones.  We've all heard about McCutchen, but Garrett Jones seems to be "that other guy" on the Pirates at this point.  I'll likely only take a couple at bats and try to focus on Medlen's strengths and weaknesses, so we can get to know him better.

Thanks for your input, and Go Braves!

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Yesterday's attempt to start a discussion about our players that wasn't results oriented drew some attention, but didn't really work.  So I thought I'd tweak it a bit, thanks to suggestions by cb and SB.  Since it is to difficult to remember the details of individual battles the day after the game, and those discussions would likely be better off in the game thread anyway...

Let's focus on one battle that seems to have everyone's attention.

 

For tonight's game, let watch Chipper's at-bats.  Instead of judging the at-bat based on the result,  we can argue who got the better end of the pitcher/hitter battle.  Many reasons have been given for his slump to start the season, but it seems like he may be pulling out of it a bit.  And he looked like Chipper last night.  I'd really like to hear everyone's take on his at-bats tonight.

 

Instead of a poll, I'll offer a new (subjective) 'stat'.  This is the 'quality at-bat' and is decided as above, by who wins the battle.

 

One example comes to mind.  The ball Coghlan grounded up the middle in his first at-bat was a weak grounder that he rolled over.  Even though it was a single, I give the W to Hudson for getting the slow grounder.  In this case Coghlan would be 0-1.

 

I'll try to post the situations of his at-bats as they happen, so we can all remember better, along with what I think.  I'll be at the game though, so I won't get the best look at what's happening.  After the game, check it out and discuss.  Like SB said, this might work better in the game thread, but I'd like to try it here for a couple of games.  This will be very subjective, but I think a consensus can be reached. 

 

The goal here is not to drag effort away from the game threads or the recaps, but to start a post-game discussion about a player who may be 'struggling' in order to understand better why.  Like I said i the comments of yesterday's post, if it doesn't work after a few games, I'll drop it.  Hopefully, it might work into a post-game routine like checking the NAHWAL, or maybe just merge it with the game thread.

 

Any suggestions and participation welcome and appreciated.  Go Braves!

The rewrite.

The original post was a bit too inflamatory, causing defense of advanced stats. The point of this post was to get away from the GM type analysis of our players and begin a discussion of the small, in-game battles going on in order to better understand the game.

 

I intended to do this by focusing on Tim Hudson tonight, watching what pitches he throws and in what situations.  I posted a poll for which of his pitches is most dominating, but instead maybe everyone could just list their favorite pitcher/hitter battle of the night after the game. 

 

The original post is after the jump.

Poll

What was Timmy's most effective pitch tonight (5/27)?

22%

Four-seam

5 votes

4%

Slider

1 votes

4%

Change

1 votes

4%

Splitter

1 votes

63%

Sinker

14 votes

22 votes | Poll has closed

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I know that by now that most of the drills have subsided and have given way to warm-ups and pregame rituals, but I was hoping  that some of you down at ST have seen some great drills that I can steal and use on the next generation of  Braves (13-14 year olds).  My main motivation is to get an efficient and meaningful practice put together for the team I am coaching, but thinking about this also had me reminiscing about all my favorites growing up.  If you'd like to look at what I've got so far, I've started a Google doc with a few examples. Please add your own and maybe we can make this a good resource for anyone else who is looking for drills for their kids or players.  I will continue to add to the list and look for links to videos, etc.  This is not really a drill, but my absolute favorite was at Upper Deck (Riverdale) batting cages.  They used to hang metal signs on the back net (about 3 feet circle, 100 ft. away that they would give a free round if you hit them.  I realize some drills are better depending on the perspective.  For example, as a coach, I think hitting off a tee is one of the best ways to improve hitting.  But I doubt many players would list it as a favorite.  Also, some are just alot more fun to watch.  For some reason, watching pitchers warming up with softballs always makes me laugh. 

What are everyone's favorites as a coach, a player, or a fan?