#52

Difference in singles, doubles, triples, strikeouts, sacrifices is within margin of difference. Big drop off in walks, cataclysmic decline in homers. That's how you go from 4th to 14th in runs. 

	2013	2014	diff
runs	688	557	-19.0%
hits	1354	1316	-2.8%
1B	905	931	2.8%
2B	247	240	-2.8%
3B	21	22	4.7%
HR	181	123	-32.0%
BB	542	472	-12.9%
K	1384	1369	-1.1%
SB	64	95	48.4%
OBP	321	305	-5.0%
SLG	402	360	-10.4%
GIDP	119	121	1.7%
Bunts	58	53	-8.6%

Braves actually had a better OPS this year vs. LHP than they did in 2013. Another interesting note is the Braves did slightly better with runners in scoring position than without. Also, our pinch hitters stunk. 

	2013	2014
RISP	732	680
Pinch hit	687	487
1st Half	736	686
2nd Half	705	634
Vs LHP	701	712
Vs RHP	731	651
overall	723	665
babip	300	296

By wRC+, Braves only get better at one position- both in raw number and in MLB rank-  between 13 and 14, and that gain was marginal. Freddie Freeman pretty much stayed the same, every other position got worse. 

	2013 wRC+		rank	2014 wRC+		rank
C	115		5th	95		12th
1B	139		4th	140		1st
2B	90		17th	72		24th
3B	114		7th	82		27th
SS	91		13th	71		25th
LF	111		8th	107		14th
CF	71		28th	67		29th
RF	115		12th	98		17th
team	110		10th	86		26th

#51

Former Braves in the playoffs: 

Royals

Ned Yost

Omar Infante

Tim Collins

Giants

Roberto Kelly

Tim Hudson

Gregor Blanco

Orioles

Jim Presley

John Russell

Kelly Johnson

Cardinals

Derek Lilliquist

Adam Wainwright

Nationals

Adam LaRoche

Rafael Soriano

Tigers

Wally Joyner

Pirates

Jeff Locke

Angels

Don Baylor

Cory Rasmus

Athletics

Jesse Chavez

Eric O’Flaherty

Dodgers

None

Italics- only in our minor leagues. 

#50

I correctly picked 7 of 10 playoff teams, though I did have a few in the wrong spot.

My NL playoff teams: Dodgers, Cardinals, Braves winning divisions, Nationals, Giants as Wild Cards
Actual NL playoff teams: Dodgers, Cardinals, Nationals winning divisions, Pirates, Giants as Wild Cards

My AL playoff teams: Athletics, Tigers, Red Sox winning divisions, Rays, Royals as Wild Cards
Actual AL playoff teams, Angels, Tigers, Orioles winning divisions, Athletics, Royals as Wild Cards

Without further adieu...

Playoff predictions:

Wild Card Games:

Athletics over Royals

Giants over Pirates

Division Series:

Tigers over Orioles in 3

Athletics over Angels in 4

Dodgers over Cardinals in 4

Giants over Nationals in 5

League Championship Series

Athletics over Tigers in 6

Dodgers over Giants in 6

World Series

Dodgers over Athletics in 5

My awards ballot:

NL MVP

1.       Clayton Kershaw

2.       Andrew McCutchen

3.       Johnathan LuCroy

4.       Giancarlo Stanton

5.       Anthony Rendon

6.       Paul Goldschmidt

7.       Russell Martin

8.       Yasiel Puig

9.       Jason Heyward

10.   Juan Lagares

AL MVP

1.       Mike Trout

2.       Josh Donaldson

3.       Alex Gordon

4.       Michael Brantley

5.       Adrian Beltre

6.       Corey Kluber

7.       Jose Abreu

8.       Jose Altuve

9.       Kyle Seager

10.   Felix Hernandez

NL Cy Young

1.       Clayton Kershaw

2.       Jordan Zimmermann

3.       Johnny Cueto

4.       Adam Wainwright

5.       Jake Arrieta

AL Cy Young

1.        Corey Kluber

2.       Felix Hernandez

3.       Chris Sale

4.       Phil Hughes

5.       Jon Lester

AL Rookie of the Year

1.       Jose Abreu

2.       Collin McHugh

3.       Yordano Ventura

NL Rookie of the Year

1.       Jacob DeGrom

2.       Billy Hamilton

3.       Ken Giles

#49

			Arb #	FA After	1st Arb
C	Gattis	0.6		2018	2016
1B	Freeman	8.5		2021
2B	La Stella	0.6		2020	2017
3B	Johnson	6		2017
SS	Simmons	3.2		2020
LF	J Upton	14.5		2015
CF	B Upton	14.45		2017
RF	Heyward	7.8		2015
BN	Bethancourt	0.6		2020	2017
BN	Gosselin	0.6		2020	2017
BN	Pena	1.2	2 of 3	2016
BN	???	0.5
BN	???	0.5
SP	Teheran	0.8		2019
SP	Wood	0.6		2019	2017
SP	Minor	4	2 of 4	2017
SP	Hale	0.6		2019	2017
SP	???	0.5
RP	Kimbrel	9		2017
RP	Walden	3	2 of 3	2016
RP	Russell	2.5	3 of 3	2015
RP	Carpenter	1.5	1 of 3	2017
RP	Varvaro	0.6		2018	2016
RP	Avilan	0.6		2018	2016
RP	???	0.5
xxx	Uggla	13
	TOTAL	appx    95
	Free agents
	Santana	14.1
	Floyd	4
	Doumit	3.5
	Bonifacio	2.5
	Laird	1.5
	Harang	1
	Likely nontenders
	Medlen	5.8
	Beachy	1.45
	Venters	1.625

The Braves lose a decent amount of salary off the books- Santana, Floyd, Doumit, Medlen, etc- but almost all of that is eaten up by arb raises and salary increases to the locked up players. Most of the extensions Wren gave are heavily backloaded. This works well if our payroll goes up (as it presumably will once we get to the new park) but if it doesn't we're essentially playing musical chairs with ourself.

I'm assuming payroll next year will be around 100 million. That was this year's figure before we went significantly over to sign Ervin Santana (remember that the next time you bash Liberty). Given attendance and tv ratings are both down, it's hard to imagine us going much over budget again.

If the Braves let all of their free agents walk (I've included Medlen and Beachy in this group) and tender contracts to all arb eligible players they're at approximately 95 million. That gives us the same team we have with pretty much no room to improve offense or make up for 

Moving BJ and CJ would be ideal, but given the awfulness of their contracts it seems highly unlikely we'd be able to do much than swap our bad contract for someone else's.

Pena will likely be nontendered, and Russell  might be as well. This will save a few dollars, but not enough to make a big difference. Minor will be an interesting case. With a team desperate for offense and short on cash will shell out 4-5  million for an injured, underperforming starter is questionable. IT will depend on how his shoulder reacts, but I wouldn't 

#48

A history of Braves clinches- for and against- in the Turner Field era. A few of the Braves celebrations were delayed- such as 2010 when we had to wait for the Padres to lose- or muted- a few years we clinched on an off day. 

Braves clinch at Turner Field: 11

Braves clinch on the road: 6

Visitors clinch at Turner Field: 10

Visitors clinch at their home park: 3

1997 NL East- Braves clinch at Turner Field

1997 NLDS- Braves clinch in Houston

1997 NLCS- Marlins clinch at Turner Field

1998 NL East- Braves clinch at Turner Field

1998 NLDS- Braves clinch in Chicago

1998 NLCS- Padres clinch at Turner Field

1999 NL East- Braves clinch in Montreal

1999 NLDS- Braves clinch in Houston

1999 NLCS- Braves clinch at Turner Field

1999 World Series- Yankees clinch in New York

2000 NL East- Braves clinch in New York

2000 NLDS- Cardinals clinch at Turner Field

2001 NL East- Braves clinch at Turner Field

2001 NLDS- Braves clinch at Turner Field

2001 NLCS- D’Backs clinch at Turner Field

2002 NL East- Braves clinch on off day/during homestand

2002 NLDS- Giants clinch at Turner Field

2003 NL East- Braves clinch on off day/during homestand

2003 NL DS- Cubs clinch at Turner Field

2004 NL East- Braves clinch at Turner Field

2004 NLDS- Astros clinch at Turner Field

2005 NL East- Braves clinch at Turner Field

2005 NLDS- Astros clinch in Houston

2006- none

2007- none

2008- none

2009- none

2010 Wild Card- clinch at Turner Field

2010 NLDS- Giants clinch at Turner Field

2011- none

2012 Wild Card- Braves clinch at Turner Field

2012 Wild Card Game- Cardinals clinch at Turner Field

2013 NL East- Braves clinch at Chicago

2013 NLDS- Dodgers clinch in Los Angeles

2014 NL East- Nationals clinch at Turner Field
2014 Wild Card- Pirates clinch at Turner Field

#47

I followed the rules/standards given to each manger. 33 players, at least one from every team. The task is slightly easier for me as I made my starting lineup solely of those most deserving, not having to deal with roster spots being squeezed for lesser players winning the fan vote (Jeter, Cano). For outfielders I picked one from each specific spot- LF/CF/RF- this was made much moe difficult by the fact NL left fielders really suck. Also, I didn’t bother with who was healthy or injured (Gattis).  Starters in bold.

Without further adieu… the Dayton All Stars.

NL
C- Jonathon LuCroy, Devin Mesoraco, Evan Gattis
1B- Paul Goldschmidt, Anthony Rizzo, Freddie Freeman
2B- Dee Gordon, Daniel Murphy, Chase Utley
3B- Todd Frazier, Anthony Rendon, Matt Carpenter
SS- Troy Tulowitzki, Jhonny Peralta
LF- Seth Smith
CF- Andrew McCutchen, Carlos Gomez, Billy Hamilton
RF- Giancarlo Stanton

DH- Yasiel Puig
SP- Clayton Kershaw, Adam Wainwright, Johnny Cueto, Jordan Zimmermann, Julio Teheran, Stephen Strasburg, Tim Hudson, Zack Greinke
RP- Craig Kimbrel, Brad Ziegler, Francisco Rodriguez, Jeurys Familia, Huston Street

AL
C- Salvador Perez, Yan Gomes
1B- Miguel Cabrera, Edwin Encarnacion, Jose Abreu
2B- Ian Kinsler, Jose Altuve,  Brian Dozier

3B- Josh Donaldson, Kyle Seager
SS- Erick Aybar, Alicedes Escobar
LF- Alex Gordon, Michael Brantley
CF- Mike Trout, Adam Jones
RF- Jose Bautista
DH- Victor Martinez, Nelson Cruz
SP- Felix Hernandez, Yu Darvish, Corey Kluber, Jon Lester, Masahiro Tanaka, David Price, Max Scherzer,  Mark Buehrle, Chris Sale

RP- Dellin Betances, Sean Doolittle, Wade Davis, Greg Holland, David Robertson

#45

I made a compilation of Braves prospect rankings. Players are ranked by points- 30 points for a #1 spot, 29 for #2, all the way down to 1 point for #30. Polls are not weighted. While Keith Law may have more expertise (or at least a more impressive employer) and Martin Gandy or CB Wilkins, he certainly didn't see our prospects as much as them.

L- Keith Law
G- Martin Gandy
W- CB Wilkins
S- John Sickels
BA- Baseball America
BP- Baseball Prospectus
MLB- MLB.com
TC- Talking Chop

Rank			Points	L	G	W	S	BA	BP	MLB	TC
1		Sims	240	1	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
2		Bethancourt	224	2	5	4	3	2	2	2	4
3		Graham	214	8	3	2	6	3	4	6	2
4		Peraza	210	3	6	5	4	6	5	4	5
5		Cabrera	207	4	7	6	5	5	3	5	6
6		Hursh	206	6	2	3	8	4	9	3	7
7		LaStella	200	9	4	8	2	9	6	7	3
8		Caratini	181	7	10	7	10	8	8	8	9
9		Hale	130		9	12	7	7		9	10
19		V. Reyes	127		15	10	17	14	10	11	13
11		Parsons	113	5	20	16	20	20	7		16
12		Martin	124		11	11	11	11		10	8
13		Simmons	97		13	14	18	16		19	15
14		Thomas	93	10	17	13	19			12	22
15		Salcedo	89		12	15		12		15	12
16		Elander	82		8	18	12	13			17
17		Northcraft	80		19	17	15	25		16	14
18		Salazar	69		26	9		17		14	20
19		Wren	60		27		13	18		18	19
20		Camargo	58		28		16	19		13	21
21		Kubitza	44		16			22			11
22		Jaime	40		14	19		27			24
23		Cunningham	34					23		17	18
24		Schlosser	19		18	25
25		Perez	17		25	20
26		Buchter	16		23						23
27		Merejo	13			23		26
28		De Le Rosa	13			24					25
29		Grosser	11							20
30		Lien	10			21
31		Lamm	10		21
32		Murphy	10					21
33		E. Reyes	9			22
34		Pacheco	9		22
35		Cornely	7		24
36		Lipka	7					24
37		Brosius	3					28
38		Rivera	2		29
39		Hefflinger	2					29
40		Hoyt	1					30
41		Pfisterer	1		30