Atlanta Braves Fan Confidence Poll

I agree with lots of what you said, but being the chronic nitpicker that I am..

Freeman is looking great but I’m not sure he has stabilized at the ML level yet. I think its possible he has but I sense a few more dramatic up-and-down cycles for him.

Prado is going to be good, he is too good at hitting the fastball and making contact to slump for any long period. Plus, all of a sudden the dude has developed power, not only to the gaps (and Prado’s doubles last year were one of my favorite parts of watching the Bravos in 2010) but beyond that fence thing.

Chipper is a mentor to almost everybody on the team and has also had moments of “old-school” chipper this year. But I pray that our team isn’t relying on him too heavily because it would be silly to expect more than 145 games (including playoffs) from Chipper.

Call me old-school but Sea Bass gets the rare “defensive anchor” bonus from me. He is a pleasure to watch in the field and I really feel that he improves the defense of Dan Uggla (in a more intangible way) and our 3rd baseman (because of the confidence our 3rd Baseman would have to have in the guy to his left in almost any situation- btw, I was a bit negative on Agon’s range pre-season but his sure-handedness and confidence within his zone is a comparable factor.) Plus, we all knew what to expect from him on both the upside and downside. Right now he is splitting the difference and while it is the 1st half (in which Agon has traditionally been very strong) I think it is unreasonable to be displeased with his holistic performance thus far.

Dan Uggla….

Be optimistic with Heyward, beyond what his injury-prone nature means for the team, when healthy he can make an incredible impact and I firmly believe we will see him make an impact in the month of June. If he doesn’t we have a couple of suitable replacements who can produce (Hinske and that Jayson Werth/Jeff Francoeur fellow.) But like I said, I think we will see him back and producing reasonably soon.

But beyond the specifics, the thing that kills me about this team is the fact that we never seem to help ourselves in close games. It really isn’t the score that is causing me such anguish, but more how each game is going. We seem helpless, partly because of underperformance, and partly because we can’t get enough consistency to produce.

But I firmly believe, and Braves nation I hope you believe with me, that we will turn this around. I still think this is our year. And if anyone remembers even last year they can tell you that our standing and record is pretty fortunate and that there is a lot we can do with it.

has one of the highest OBPs on the team.