Catcher’s Blog

There are few things I thought that were worth mentioning, so see below for different articles, pictures, etc.

• As most of you have heard, Corky was desginated for assignment with the promotion of Chuck James last night. Corky was hitting .093 for the season, and with Mac being cleared last night to catch in an emergency and pinch hit, clearly Clint Sammons was here to stay. I think the Braves only kept Corky around until they knew Clint was ready or they found another option. He’s not expected to get claimed by anyone off waivers because of his batting average, and thus will go to the minor leagues. Clint will continue to catch for the remainder of this weekend against the Milwaukee Brewers and Mac should return on Monday to his starting duties.
• The Braves and their wives, in their Christmas in July promotion, went to visit and deliver toys to patients in three children’s hospitals. Visiting patients is a really great thing that they do every year and it’s apparent that the kids at the hospitals really enjoy it. I think the players enjoy it just as much as the kids do. There are three different galleries of pictures: one, two, and three.

  I’m not sure of everyone that went, but the pictures include players, wives, and broadcasters such as Mac, Frenchy and wife, Catie, KJ and wife, Lauren, Boyer and wife, Ginsey, Gonzo, Blanco, Ring and wife, Tricia, Brian Snitker, Chip Carey, Joe Simpson, and Fernando Palacios, who is one of the Spanish broadcasters.  And a quote from tough-guy closer, Gonzo, about his experience:

  “This was an unbelievable experience, man,” Gonzalez said after the two-hour visit. “It’s pretty much why we do this, why we’re proud to be big leaguers and see the smile on these kids’ faces.”

• Huddy might have to have Tommy John surgery. His MRI results showed that he had a tear in his ulnar collateral ligament. Both Dr. James Andrews and a Braves physician recommended that he have the surgery done. Huddy would like to avoid having the surgery at all and is going to try to “tough it out”, as stated in a text message. He’s going to try to take the Peter Moylan route to try to avoid the surgery, but no one is sure that it will work. We’ll have to hope it does, but it might just be better for him to go ahead and have the surgery since it might become worse down the line if he pitches with it.
• The Braves may choose the option of trading some players still in the month of August to get other players that can be used in the future and will be younger. Kotsay may be on a different team by the time September rolls around, and even some of the other regulars we see on the field everyday. Terrence Moore says fans should not to be surprised to see the Braves put some of their players on waivers to see what kind of return they can get for them. Putting someone on waivers isn’t risky in that that team can pull him off if they decide not to trade that player after all. Apparently, some still think Frenchy won’t be a Brave by the time the season concludes, but we’ll have to see how things go.

Well, it’s not really new, but Frenchy’s official site has a new look to it than it did last year and I believe it runs better. During the off season it was down, and I’m assuming that’s because it was being redone. The overall look of the site flows really well, in my opinion. The layout is a lot better than the previous one and is more functional for visitors. Frenchy even has his own blog on his official site, but it doesn’t allow you to comment on it like the Delta blog that he posts on, because Delta is running on WordPress and the blog on Frenchy’s site is run by something else. Personally, I think he would get more feedback and interaction by having comments on his official blog, but that’s just me. Maybe he’ll have that feature added sooner or later.

I think the whole blogs by players is cool because most people don’t know what goes into being a professional athlete and what their lives are like from day to day, much less a baseball player. Most players tend to keep their personal lives personal and I think they should to a certain extent, if they feel they want to; it is their choice and their own right to do so. Really Frenchy’s blog is only a travel/on-the-field thing, etc. He doesn’t go too much into his personal life, but he’s in the media so much, you know more about him than many of the other Braves players. Maybe it’s wrong, but I find different facts that I don’t know about a player that I like interesting, as I’m sure I’ve said before. I like the SportSouth bits they do on questions the players are not asked to answer very often or isn’t necessarily a well known fact about a particular player. I assume they’re bringing that back this season since they showed a preview of one of Chipper and his fear of heights during one of the Spring Training games. Should be interesting to see what questions they came up with to ask the players this year.

I think it would be cool to be a journalist like Katy Temple because she gets to travel with the team and gets a little into their lives. Most you don’t see on camera, but as fans you only get a glimpse past the player’s on-the-field play and already known facts. Is it not a fan’s right to find out as much about a favorite player as one can? Ok, I didn’t mean that in a bad way and I know and understand that privacy is needed. Call me a bit weird, but I like random facts that probably won’t ever get me anywhere in the future. As a fan, it makes me like/dislike (usually like) the particular player even more. I would love to just spend a day with one of my favorite players and then write down everything that happened. That would be cool.

Tonight’s game is against the terrible Mark Redman. Maybe karma or luck or whatever you want to call it will avenge us from his awful stay in Atlanta last season. It’s only fair that we beat him, right? Chuckie makes his season debut and someone will get sent down in the process of bringing him up off the DL. No one is really certain thus far of who it might be, but some speculate it’s either Bennett or Prado because they have options left. It’s kind of a tough call there because Bennett is good to have for a spot starter and Prado is good to have right now (even though his defense isn’t) in case KJ’s knee starts acting up again. So far, the knee isn’t bothering KJ, which is a really good thing, but you don’t wanna send down one of your best back-ups off the bench just because he has options. Not really a good reason and it makes me glad that I don’t have to figure this one out to make a decision. Hopefully, though, Chuckie fairs well in the atmosphere of Coors Field and we can actually pull out a win.

First off, I saw this tidbit on MLBTR and thought it was worth mentioning.

The Braves and Rockies were among the teams that showed late interest in Haren, but neither club stood a chance of matching the Diamondbacks’ offer.

It makes me wonder why we were interested in Haren late in the game when we were supposedly not looking for anymore starting pitching with all the “surplus” we currently have going into Spring Training. Naturally, we’d have broke the farm bank with this trade, but acquiring Haren would have been a luxury since we don’t really ‘need’ anymore pitching for the rotation.

MLBTR seems to think that it might have been to get the Mets to up their offer and trade Reyes, which I doubt will happen. MLBTR seems to also think we might try to go after Bedard now that Haren is off the market. I don’t really see us doing that for many reasons, but you never know. Having either of those ace pitchers would solidify our rotation x10 or more, but at the cost of getting them would be way too much to give up or at least in my opinion. Having either would be a great luxury, but a luxury we currently don’t need.

If the four or more guys vying for the last few spots don’t prove to be worth anything after a certain amount of time, then we might consider pursuing another starting pitcher. I think we should at least give these guys the benefit of the doubt for a little while until they prove they’re not good enough first. Again, that’s just my opinion.

Mark Teixeira underwent arthroscopic knee surgery in November, but is expected to be ready to start working out in January in preparation for Spring Training, which pitchers and catchers are to report to February 14, while position players are to report February 19.

Also, since there’s not much else going on, here is an interview that was in the December issue of ChopTalk, and I found it to be an interesting read. The interview was typed up for the official site, so I thought I’d post it here. When Chuck was struggling last year, they didn’t really delve into what was wrong with him too much. He talks about that injury and his usual off season.

Read the rest of this entry »