MLB

2017 Predictions

drayton

By: Drayton Hogarth

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

 

 

2016 was quite an interesting year for everyone, and that includes the sports world.

Many of our local teams experienced ups and downs and surprises of all kind. Now that we have arrived to the New Year of 2017, it is time to make some predictions for our area teams as we march forward throughout the coming months.

The Atlanta Falcons will finish this 2016-17 season with a playoff run. There are not many teams entering the playoffs playing at a higher level right now.

MVP candidate Matt Ryan has a plethora of offensive weapons he can utilize, as well as a solid line to protect him. In fact, it is a team that is good enough to make it to the Super Bowl, but that is where the dream will end as the Falcons will come up short against the New England Patriots in a shootout.

During the offseason, the Falcons will pick up another pass rusher in the draft to complement Vic Beasley. Plus, add in a couple more quality free agent signings, and the Falcons will make another Super Bowl run.

In Athens, Coach Kirby Smart will bring in the best recruiting class in Georgia history. Even better, the on the field product will be much improved as well, as the talent in the program is upgraded to levels that Bulldog fans have hoped for the last half decade or so.

Georgia will finally win the SEC East and challenge for the college football playoff. It’s gonna be the beginning of a fun ride, Georgia fans. Be scared, college football, the sleeping giant has awoken.

Coach Paul Johnson will be expected to challenge for the ACC title in 2017, but same as recent history, the Jackets will not be able to live up to the lofty expectations.

Johnson and his Yellow Jackets seem to do much better when the perception is that they will struggle. When people underestimate Tech, that is when they are at their most dangerous.

Georgia Tech fans will grow weary of this roller coaster ride and will make a surprise move of letting the long-time coach take his triple option offense elsewhere. Look for the Jackets to make a run at current Colorado State head coach, and former Georgia Bulldog, Mike Bobo as their next coach in 2018.

Tyson Summers will get the Georgia Southern Eagles back to the upper level of the Sun Belt. Look for the Eagles to go 10-4 with a loss in the Sun Belt title game, but win their bowl game.

Brand new Suntrust Stadium will see the Atlanta Braves continue to improve and be more like the competitive team that we saw finish the 2016 season. Having Freddie Freeman, Dansby Swanson, and Matt Kemp in the lineup for a full season will allow the Braves to be the best offensive lineup in the National League.

It will be the pitching that will prevent the Braves from making the post season. Look for the Braves to get to .500 or better in the coming season, with prospects for a strong run in 2018.

The Atlanta Hawks will make a deep run in the NBA playoffs and will finally beat the Cleveland Cavaliers, but only three times. Thus, they will lose in seven games to Lebron James and the Cavs—who will lose to the Golden State Warriors.

On the hardwood in Athens, the Georgia Bulldogs will either win two games in the NCAA tournament, or they will be replacing Mark Fox as the head coach of the hoop Dawgs. Oh, and there will be a new athletic director making that decision at the University of Georgia as well.

Look for Josh Pastner to get the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in the NIT and continue to restore the Jackets to respectability in the college basketball world.

Well, that should do it for most of my predictions for the upcoming year. Go ahead and save this article to refer back to, and if I get even half of these correct, you can thank me later, maybe in 2018. Happy New Year everyone!

Santa Wish List From A Southern Sports Fan

kippBy: Kipp Branch

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Christmas is upon us once again. My girls have given me their annual list of items they want from Santa. I have dropped a few hints about things I want Santa to bring me as well.

I want to shake things up and come up with a sports list of things I would like Santa to grant in 2016 and 2017.

Santa please bring Brunswick High a new football coach with a championship resume. 30 plus juniors return from a talented squad that underachieved in 2016.

Santa please not a fourth straight loss to Glynn Academy in football. Life as a Pirate has been tough around here Santa.

Santa please deliver a City Championship and a deep playoff run to Altama Avenue next fall for the Pirates.

Region Championships for Pirate girls and boys basketball

A winning season for the Pirate baseball team to set the table for a title run two years from now.

A State Football championship for the MCA Bucs this weekend.

A 9-1 regular season and a deep playoff run for the Glynn Academy Red Terror football team in 2017.

State Titles in golf, tennis, and soccer for the Spring Sports Monster known as Glynn Academy Athletics.

A State Title for Glynn Academy baseball in 2017

Santa please a total house cleaning in Jacksonville and a new coach with a championship resume for the Jaguars.

Please Santa deliver at least one home game sellout for the Jags in 2017.

Santa please deliver a SEC Football Title to Athens, Georgia next fall.

Please Santa not a fourth straight loss to Florida for my Bulldogs, and please Santa while we are at it how about a 0-12 record for the Gators in football in 2017.

Please deliver a top 3 recruiting class for UGA in February.

Santa please bring some power to the Atlanta Braves roster, and please not another last place finish.

Please solve the traffic issues in and around the Braves new stadium in Cobb County

A March Madness Berth for the UGA men’s basketball team

A College World Series Berth for the UGA Baseball team.

A NL Cy Young Award for Adam Wainwright

A Pro Bowl Berth for Darius Slay, and Super Bowl for my Detroit Lions

One more PGA tour win for Davis Love III, and then he goes on the Senior Tour and beats the brakes off of everyone.

A LPGA tour win for Katie Burnett.

Southern Sports Edition to take the Southeast by storm

A NFC South title for the Falcons.

An Eastern Conference Finals berth for the Atlanta Hawks.

Please make Coastal Georgia a place where college recruiters set up shop to recruit local athletes.

An ACC Title for the GT Yellow Jackets in football in 2017

Losing seasons for Auburn, and Tennessee in football in 2017.

Santa please let Nick Saban retire.

State Titles across the board for Frederica Academy in 2017.

State Titles for all local recreation teams in Glynn County.

Championships for all College of Coastal Georgia in all sports.

A US Open title in 2017 for Zach Johnson and a Green Jacket for Matt Kuchar.

A fat free agent contract for Justin Coleman of the New England Patriots

A call up to AAA for former Red Terror Bo Way, and a ticket to the show in the near future.

Well there you have it Santa. I hope I haven’t asked for too much or left anyone out. Thank you for 2016 and I hope you make all of the requests in 2017 come true.

Santa I know I already asked but please not another loss to the Red Terrors in football.

Merry Christmas to all.

Garcia Trade Favors Braves?

By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Left-handed pitcher Jaime Garcia has spent his entire MLB career with the St. Louis Cardinals, but the Atlanta Braves announced they acquired the southpaw in exchange for prospects John Gant, Chris Ellis and Luke Dykstra. Gant and Ellis are each right-handed pitchers, while Dykstra is an infielder.

MLB.com ranked Ellis, Gant and Dykstra as Atlanta’s 17th-, 21st- and 29th-best prospects, respectively, in 2016.

Garcia is the headliner in the trade, though he had mixed results in 2016. On one hand, he appeared in 32 games, which tied for his career high and represented significant strides after an injury-marred stretch. He made 20 starts in 2012, nine in 2013, seven in 2014 and 20 in 2015.

He underwent season-ending surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome and suffered partial labrum and rotator cuff tears during that span. He also dealt with groin issues in 2015.

While Garcia proved he can handle the rigors of an entire season in 2016, he was nowhere near as effective as he was in 2010 and 2011, when he posted 2.70 and 3.56 ERAs, respectively.

He finished the 2016 campaign with a 4.67 ERA and 1.37 WHIP, which were his highest marks since he made 10 appearances as a rookie in 2008. Home runs were one of the biggest problems for the southpaw, who allowed 26 on a Cardinals team that finished 86-76 and missed out on the playoffs.

Garcia represents the latest veteran addition for the Braves pitching staff, which has also added 43-year-old Bartolo Colon and 42-year-old R.A. Dickey in the offseason.

At 30 years old, Garcia is younger than those two righties, but injuries have to be a concern as he racks up additional mileage on his arm.

Still, Atlanta needed to make changes to its starting rotation after finishing 28th in the big leagues with a 4.87 ERA. Atlanta has plenty of ground to make up in the National League East after finishing in last place at 68-93, but addressing the woeful starting rotation was an ideal place to start.

Garcia comes with risks, but he also has a track record that includes a handful of notable seasons.

For the Braves’ part, they’re starting to flip their recent trend: this time they trading prospects for a Major League player. After building up their farm system following the 2014 season, the Braves are starting to make these kinds of moves.

It remains to be seen whether or not they’ll offer up enough for Chris Sale, but if it took these three prospects to acquire an oft-injured lefty coming off his worst season, it will surely take a king’s ransom to bring Sale to Atlanta.

However, Braves fans shouldn’t cry out too much over what they had to give up for Garcia. Gant contributed to the 2016 squad and would likely have done the same in 2017 if he were on the roster, but weighing the best case scenarios against each other: Gant might have been a decent fifth starter at best, whereas if Garcia shows up he could be a great number two.

Ellis was unlikely to make much of a Dent in Atlanta, and after Sean Rodriguez joined the team this week Dykstra had too many people in his way.

Teams hate to trade prospects away, and fans certainly hate to see it, but given Garcia’s potential versus Gant’s, Ellis’ and Dykstra’s, it’s no great loss. More specifically, if the Braves miss these prospects, even if Garcia can’t stay on the field, something has gone very wrong with the many other even more highly-rated pitching prospects.

Rodriguez Bargain For Braves

tj1By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

After striking quickly on both R.A. Dickey and Bartolo Colon, the Braves continued their offseason feast on Thanksgiving morning by agreeing to a 2-year, $11. 5 million-dollar deal with super utility man Sean Rodriguez.

At first glance, this deal doesn’t seem like anything out of the ordinary. Rodriguez is a part-time player, and part-time players usually don’t break the bank in free agency. What’s interesting is that Rodriguez isn’t your ordinary part time player, and that might quickly make this deal a real bargain for the Braves.

To understand what Rodriguez is, we must understand what he was. Prior to 2016, he posted no higher than a .716 OPS in parts of eight seasons for the Angels, Rays, and Pirates. In those eight seasons, Rodriguez only broke 400 plate appearances one time, and only reached double-digit home runs once with 12.

For players like Rodriguez to survive in the majors, they must adapt. If they become too one-dimensional, their days on big league rosters are numbered. Through his athleticism, Rodriguez was able to survive by producing value with his glove. As a result, the 2016 version of Sean Rodriguez was a multi-positional asset that could plug just about any hole in the Pirates lineup.

In 2016, he exploded offensively, putting up an .859 OPS in 342 plate appearances over 140 games. Because of the low number of plate appearances for that level of production, you would think that Rodriguez is a perfect example of a lefty-mashing platoon hitter, but that’s not entirely true.

Of his 342 plate appearances, only 94 came against left handed pitching. When given his opportunities against southpaws, he did his damage with a .286/.415/.519 to go along with four home runs, four doubles, and a triple. Still, only 94 plate appearances shows that the Pirates didn’t think was only deployable against lefties.

In his other 248 plate appearances, Rodriguez still put up nice numbers. With a .265/.324/.507 slash to go along with a healthy 14 home runs and 12 doubles.

Obviously, we don’t know how he would have performed with another 250 plate appearances in 2016. But, we can confidently believe that his lack of an everyday spot in the lineup was not his fault.

In a crowded Pittsburg infield that included Jung-Ho Kang, Josh Harrison, David Freese, Jordy Mercer, John Jaso, and then-top prospect Josh Bell all competing for playing time at just four positions, Rodriguez wasn’t given the plate appearances his performance warranted.

Looking forward for the Pirates, Rodriguez was a luxury that they ended up deeming not worth the $5-7 million per year offers he was looking at receiving on the open market.

For the Braves, however, veteran position players are hard to spot on their roster that’s been stripped down to the bone over the last two years. His value increases on that team with an opportunity to amass over 500 plate appearances while providing good defense at multiple positions.

With his high level of performance and positional flexibility, it’s hard to imagine that the $5.5 million in annual average value he received isn’t a bargain for the type of production he’s capable of at multiple positions.

Like pitch framing, there isn’t a perfect way to account for positional flexibility, how it affects a player’s total value to his team, and how it translates into dollars – just look at World Series MVP Ben Zobrist.

Moving forward to 2017, the Braves secured someone they could plug in at second base and immediately see top-level production. Through the adjustments he made in his swing, Rodriguez could be considered a 20 home run threat for at least 2017.

If he continues to provide the above-average defense he’s known for, Rodriguez could provide the type of value that will make him the free agent bargain of the offseason.

Atlanta Braves Sign Dickey and Colon

tj1By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

I get the Bartolo Colon and R.A. Dickey signings. Well, I guess I can say more specifically that I would have more than likely been happy to sign one of them, but I can understand the signing of both, even though it’s not a dream scenario.

Colon is 43 years old, and Dickey is 42. They’re both well past their primes, but adding them to a rotation that was rife with youth and trouble in 2016 takes the Braves a step closer to respectability, if not actual contention.

John Hart is no stranger to these kinds of signings, inking Orel Hershiser and Dennis Martinez in the twilight of their careers to pitch for his up and coming Indians team in the mid-90s, a team that reached the World Series in 1995 and 1997.

The Braves aren’t the Indians of the mid-’90s, but they led the major leagues in runs scored for the final month of the season. They have an established star in Freddie Freeman and a star on the rise in shortstop Dansby Swanson.

The rebuilding program begun by Hart and general manager John Coppolella looks promising, much more than it did a year ago at this time. The Braves move into their new ballpark in April, and even if it turns out they’re not ready to compete with the Mets and Washington Nationals at the top of the National League East, they should at least be fun to watch.

Colon, of course, became one of the game’s best characters during his three seasons with the Mets. He pitched, fielded and even hit, with a memorable home run last May in San Diego.

The Braves would settle for seeing him make the 33 starts and pitch the 191.2 innings he did for the Mets in 2016. They’d hope for close to the same from Dickey, who won a Cy Young Award with the Mets in 2012 and spent the last four seasons with the Toronto Blue Jays.

Dickey’s 195 starts over the last six years are tied for the sixth-most in the major leagues, while Colon’s 175 starts over that span rank 19th.

That’s huge for the Braves, who spent most of the season struggling to find guys to make starts. There were plenty of warm bodies, just very few who were ready to make the leap to the big leagues and stay. The consistency that these two older gentlemen will likely bring to the rotation will be a huge feather in the cap of Brian Snitker.

The Braves hope to take a big step forward in 2017, and they figure to be significantly better in 2018 and beyond, with Swanson set to be joined by Ozzie Albies in the middle of the infield and with young pitching on the way.

Five of the six Braves who made 10 or more starts in 2016 are 25 or younger. Eight of the top 12 Braves minor league prospects, as ranked by MLB.com, are pitchers.

The issue Hart and Coppolella faced was too many of those guys who started games this past year weren’t ready, and too many of those top prospects aren’t yet ready to advance.

Short-term deals were important, because the Braves believe some of those prospects will be ready to contribute soon. Eating innings was important, because the Braves had 42 games in 2016 where their starter didn’t finish the fifth.

Realistically, Colon and Dickey are place-holders, two aging pitchers who make the Braves more presentable while a young team gets better around them.

But if one or both can pitch at least decently well, the Braves should expect to see a lot more checks in the win column next season.

New Braves’ Chiefs

draytonBy: Drayton Hogarth

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

With Major League Baseball in the middle of the playoff run, the Atlanta Braves have made news for the 2017 season by taking the interim tag off of Brian Snitker, and have now named him the new permanent manager.

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tj1By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

With a 1-0 victory over the Detroit Tigers on October 2nd, Turner Field closed its gates on an Atlanta Braves’ season for the final time.

The Ted, as it is affectionately known, opened up with a 1-run win for Atlanta as well, coming against the Cubs in 1997. It hasn’t seen much in the way of postseason success in between, and in fact most of the teams celebrating clinching wins there have been visitors.

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Farewell to Turner Field

draytonBy: Drayton Hogarth

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

The major league baseball regular season is drawing to a close, and with it will also bring to a close the Atlanta Braves playing at Turner Field.

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Remembering Jose Fernandez

tj1By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

On Sunday we were all hit with shocking and tragic news: Marlins ace right hander Jose Fernandez was killed in a boating accident. He was 24 years old.

Fernandez’s death hit me a lot harder than I might have predicted. He wasn’t on my team – as a die-hard Braves fan, I should have been inclined to root against him – but he was still a player that I absolutely loved to watch. I wasn’t the only one.

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Braves Tough Season

tj1By: TJ Hartnett

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Can a season be considered a success if the team finishes last in its division? How do you judge a year that was set up to be a failure in terms of win-loss record?

These are the kinds of questions Braves fans will ask as the season winds down and the baseball world looks towards the offseason and towards 2017.

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