Are the Braves the Slowest Team in Baseball
by gondeee on Apr 24, 2009 3:05 PM EDT
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PrintSo far this year the Atlanta Braves are dead last in baseball in stolen bases with a grand total of 3. For the past several years we haven't been much of a running team, but that doesn't mean that throughout the 14-year streak we were a team that did run a lot. In fact, there were years we were near the top of the league in stolen bases, and other years where we were near the bottom -- and in all of those years we won. But for the most part, we were right around the league average, and hardly in the bottom three or four.
The last few years, since Rafael Furcal left at the end of 2005, we have been more of a speed bump than a speed team, registering three straight seasons among the bottom five stolen base teams in baseball. Is this a contributing factor to our lack of winning the last three years, or is it something else? Could it simply be the mix of players we have or is there a recent lack of aggressiveness that has overcome the Braves? Below is a chart of Atlanta's stolen bases verses the MLB high, low, and average from each of those years (94 and 95 were thrown out because of shortened seasons).
To tell you the truth, I had a lot of fun compiling that chart. Call it my mid-afternoon Baseball Reference playtime. It's interesting to see the decline of the stolen base from 1990 until present day, not only in the top stolen base teams, but also in the league average. Though the stolen base does seem to be making a comeback in baseball starting around 2006, but the Braves have not been a part of that comeback, having been left behind by the rest of the league.
We've got some speedy guys on our club. Jordan Schafer will eventually get a solid green light and rattle off several steals in a week. Kelly Johnson and Yunel Escobar have smart speed, and Matt Diaz and Brian McCann get the occaisional pitcher who forgets about them on the mound and allows them to slog over to second. There's some speed on our bench with Omar Infante and Martin Prado. But the old guys, Chipper Jones, Garret Anderson, Greg Norton, and Casey Kotchman, are not going to be getting any steals anytime soon. Jeff Francoeur had speed in the minors, but he seems completely unable to know when to go to second in the majors -- having been successful only 9 out of 20 attempts in the bigs.
Whether it is Bobby Cox's fear of running into too many outs, or a team that just doesn't posess anyone capable of taking the extra base, the Braves are forgetting that speed and stolen bases are a part of the game of baseball, and to not use all the tools of the trade may lead to less than spectacular results.
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Smart Speed...
Diaz, McCann, and Chipper are successful because they pick their spots very infrequently and very well.
Yunel was 2 out of 7 last year in SB attempts.
Kelly is 22 out of 35 (a crappy 63%) in career SB attempts.
Schafer isn’t very good at it (63 out of 98 for a 64% SB rate in the minors).
Infante and Prado have never been basestealers. Kotchman, Norton, Anderson, and Francoeur aren’t even worth mentioning.
The Braves have some team speed, but that speed is almost exclusively used for taking an extra base or tagging up on fly balls.
by Thrashy Thrashy on Apr 24, 2009 3:19 PM EDT reply actions
I wish they would run more. It doesn’t necessarily help your win expectancy on a long term basis, but it’s fun to watch the cat and mouse game.
Kelly and Escobar should be able to run more than they do. They’re not slow guys, they just don’t know how to do it. We should hire Otis Nixon (I hear he’s looking for a job) and see what happens.
Rickey Henderson
The decline from 1990 to 2008 is due to the aging and lack of Rickey Henderson.
Agreed.
His 130 in a season is effin crazy.
A baseball game is simply a nervous breakdown divided into nine innings.
~Earl Wilson
Come on gondee, can’t you take a little joke? Clearly Rickey hasn’t been the only reason for the decline, but in a post about SB how could I not mention him?
Truthfully I think the decline is due to the increase in HR. I’m guessing a HR graph would be inverse to the SB graph as managers didn’t want to risk getting baserunners thrown out with big roided up dudes about to blast them in.
Not entirely
The HR graph probably peaks around 2002-ish, and then the BALCO bomb dropped and Canseco wrote his book and it’s declined since then.
Lack of Running is My #1 Pet Peeve Every Year
Personally, I think this is because of Cox. I have never liked the guy, and get sick of hearing how many games he has won, and how many games he has been kicked out of. I don’t care! He does not know how to handle a bullpen, and he doesn’t run LIKE HE ALWAYS SHOULD HAVE.
Power is great, but we didn’t have much of it last year. I have always been a huge fan of speed, and this team has definitely never utilized it enough. I am not at all surprised that we are last in stolen bases.
I can’t wait until that idiot retires.
Actually, if you look at the graph, you’ll see that when we had speed in the early and late 90’s we did a lot of running. There were some Braves teams that were very aggressive on the base paths. I think it’s something lately with Cox, where he has gotten a bit gun shy about giving base runners the green light.
Billy Beane manages the same way. Look at “Moneyball”: Walk, walk, three-run homer. He never would run becuase it made no sense statistically.
A baseball game is simply a nervous breakdown divided into nine innings.
~Earl Wilson
bingo
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 24, 2009 5:39 PM EDT up reply actions
I think we don’t run because we don’t have any good basestealers. Furcal was good at it, had a pretty high success rate (aside from 2002). If we had anyone on the team with a success rate in the neighborhood of 75%, you’d see a lot more running.
Funny how one of Bobby Cox’s greatest strengths-handling the team he actually has, instead of forcing a particular style-becomes a reason he gets called out on a message board.
hmmm....
I dare say this post is borderline complaining…… is that going to be ok with everyone?
If Albert Pujols’ fat ass can repeatedly steal bases this season, there’s no reason we shouldnt be at least trying. Catchers dont even have the arms they used to.
You’re not funny.
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 24, 2009 5:39 PM EDT up reply actions
That is exactly why we have Gorkys Hernandez
He is our leadoff hitter of the future. Do I dare say that he reminds me of a poor man’s Ichiro?
His arrival may be as soon as next April if the first few weeks of play in Mississippi is an indicator.
After 14 games, he’s batting a cool .357 with an OPS of .928. Also 5 for 7 on steals.
I’m guessing he will be in LF given Logan’s superlativeness in CF.
FYF kicked to the curb, and Heyward slotting in over there?
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 24, 2009 5:40 PM EDT up reply actions
Frenchy could be shipped out at the 2010 trade deadline and Heywood installed in RF for the next 15 years. Not so far fetched at all.
I wouldn’t mind that one bit. I think alot depends on how Gorkys power projects though, if at all.
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 25, 2009 12:09 PM EDT up reply actions
A lack of stolen bases is only important if it directly correlates to fewer runs being scored, which I think would be difficult to demonstrate. Obviously, there are a lot of ways that runs can be scored, but I wouldn’t worry about SB’s unless you made a similar plot with runs scored, and the braves runs scored was much lower than ML average, which I don’t think it has been over the years.
With the emphasis on power in today’s game, I think the biggest benefit of the SB is to take a team out of a double play situation, and give yourself one more shot at the long ball. In some situations (like down by one run late in the game) a team will make a focused effort to “manufacture” a run (single, SB, bunt to third, sac fly), but you don’t see this through the normal course of the game much, expect for the very few teams who focus their offense on such a strategy.
Is there a sabermetric stat that focuses on base stealing? Something along the lines of BA and ERA aren’t really that useful, whereas OPS for example is.
I just brought that up
I think you are right about the manufacturing but OBP is huge in this.
A baseball game is simply a nervous breakdown divided into nine innings.
~Earl Wilson
There’s a few different base-running calculations. Some involve going 1st to 3rd on a single, scoring from second on a single, etc. while others focus on stolen bases. Some other methods focus on leverage too. Here is an example of an advanced metric.
At, it’s simplest form, you can do something like .18*SB – .43*CS, which means you need to steal at over 70% to be productive on the base paths. Other variations will put the percentage at 68 or 69% while lower run environments will put as low as even 63%.
I was surprised, I just read on Fangraphs this very year that the “magic number” is 70%…I could have sworn for the longest time if was over 80%.
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 24, 2009 5:42 PM EDT up reply actions
I was thinking the same thing
You’ll notice that in 2006, where we bottomed out in terms of stolen bases, we were fifth in the majors in run (second in the NL, to Philly). We were also second in the ML in home runs, behind only the White Sox.
When your team is hitting the ball out of the ballpark, there’s no need to manufacture runs on the basepaths. And if you steal ahead of your best hitter, that opens up first base for the intentional (or the intentional un-intentional) walk. You also risk losing runs if you have your top of the line-up guys with a 66% steal rate running when you’ve got a legit power threat at the plate.
Another reason might be.....
the abundance of left-handed hitters we have on this team. When we do actually get someone on first ( as rare as that has been lately ) Bobby would be less likely to send him if a lefty is up, so that the first baseman has to hold the runner, thus opening a hole for the hitter. With that said i would like to see Bobby let Jordan try to steal second instead of bunting him over with the pitcher, then trying to bunt him to third. We need to put more pressure on the defense.
Juan Pierre?
I know, I know…let Shaffer play. Pierre might be an interesting acquisition for the Braves,and maybe help these guys manufacture a run or two.
/ban
Braves 2009 offense: in play, out(s)
Braves 2009 bullpen: in play, run(s)
by Smoltz's Beard on Apr 27, 2009 12:40 PM EDT up reply actions
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