Those concerned about the entry of Braves in the spring training without defining who will be next, probably forget that the 2018 and 19 seasons began with Arodys Vizcaíno in this role. Each of those years ended with Atlanta winning a National Eastern League title.
Mark Melancon certainly played a key role when he became the closest to the Braves shortly after being acquired in the 2019 trading deadline. But the fact that Melancon is now a member of the Fathers’ bullpen does not mean that the Atlanta locker will be dry while the club tries to win the title of the fourth consecutive division.
“We have a lot of good options there,” said manager Brian Snitker. “We have a lot of guys who have done this before. I think it’s something about the bullpens in the game today – you’re not going to be very consistent. I think that’s just the nature of the business and the way the industry is. There will be a lot of turnover in bullpens. “
The Braves’ bullpen will look different with Melancon in San Diego and Darren O’Day with the Yankees. The two seasoned veterans served as trusted relievers and valuable mentors during their time in Atlanta.
But Braves still has some competent veteran relievers, Josh Tomlin, Chris Martin and Will Smith. Tomlin looks set to have a great coaching career and Smith is only a year away from establishing himself as an All-Star closest to the Giants.
“This guy was a closest All-Star two years ago,” said Snitker of Smith. “I think we have good options in our pen to close games. How we do that, we just have to see how we get there. But we have two or three guys there who went through this and went through this. Let’s see how it goes. “
Including the postseason, Smith limited his opponents to a batting average of 0.165 and hit 29.1 percent of the batters he faced in 2020. His ERA 4.50 was the result of the fact that eight of the 13 bats he yielded were home runs.
How to find such bad luck? Well, some of Smith’s problems were the product of his generally highly reliable slider. His inconsistency with the pitch was probably the result of quarantining the whole of July while waiting for the negative test for COVID-19. He tested positive early in the summer camp, but never developed the symptoms.
If Snitker wants Smith to face a difficult southpaw on the seventh or eighth entry, he can pass the final assignments to Martin. Another candidate is AJ Minter, who held the position in 2018. Minter certainly looked like a capable player when he recorded seven eliminations in three goalless entries when making a spot in last year’s game of the National League Championship Series against the Dodgers.
Escalation decisions
Using the designated hitter last year, Snitker saw the value of having Freddie Freeman in second place. But now that it looks like his pitchers are going to hit again this year, the veteran coach is considering moving the current Most Valuable NL Player back to third place in the order.
Snitker started the 2019 season by giving Josh Donaldson his desire to hit second, as he did during his best days with the Blue Jays. But Donaldson proved to be more productive in hitting the cleanup spot behind Freeman.
Snitker’s feeling is that with the pitcher hitting at the end of the lineup, Freeman would have more RBI opportunities while hitting third. That said, the captain added that he did not completely reject the idea of once again starting his lineup with Ronald Acuña Jr., Freeman and Marcell Ozuna filling the first three places.
“I think we saw that formation, it is a totally different animal when the pitchers are hitting,” said Snitker. “It is not out of the question. Let’s talk about it and reflect on it to see. But I think it’s real. I think that when the pitchers hit, that point doesn’t have the opportunity to say, hit third, yes. “
Reserve catcher
Once the Braves had a better sense of their financial situation, there was reason to think that they could try to bring Tyler Flowers back with a short-term economic deal. But as time went by, there were more reasons to think that the reserve capture functions could be attributed to Alex Jackson or William Contreras.
Contreras, Atlanta’s No. 7 perspective, apparently has a much brighter future. But the desire to give him a chance to develop as an everyday player in Minors could leave the reserve role of the big league to Jackson, who hit 28 home runs for Triple-A Gwinnett in 2019.
“[Contreras and Jackson] both have come a long way, ”said Snitker. “We haven’t had depth or capture options in our Minor League system for a while. I think it’s a really good choice. “