The Braves have placed Cristian Pache on the 10-day injured list with a hamstring strain and activated fellow outfielder Ender Inciarte from the IL, manager Brian Snitker announced Thursday (via David O’Brien of The Athletic).
This is the second IL placement of the year for Pache, who previously missed time with a left groin injury. When healthy, it has been an abysmal season for the highly touted Pache, who has batted .111/.152/.206 with one home run in 68 plate appearances.
Inciarte, who suffered a strained hamstring April 16, has appeared in 12 games and logged a meager 20 trips to the plate this year. The once-reliable starter hit a horrid .190/.262/.250 with one home run in 131 PA last year, though he slashed a much better .294/.368/.353 before his IL trip this season.
The Braves’ best option in center this year has unexpectedly been Guillermo Heredia, but he has been on the IL since April 30 with hamstring inflammation. The absences of Pache and Heredia should clear the way for Inciarte to take over in center for the time being.
Well, hate to say it… but Ender is better than Pache is (right now). The team is unfortunately better with Ender out there … painful as it says
Concerning why there’s so many IL trips. These guys are supposed to be in top condition and not have so many IL trips.
True across MLB. It’s as if you have a screwy pandemic season without minor leagues (to keep the reserves game-ready) then a shorter spring training with delayed minor leagues and everyone is supposed to be fine.
It is true across the MLB but it seems the Braves are the most hit by it. For example, there is really no reason soroka injury last year has a big setback m after time off and full blow surgery. Something tells me Braves trainers or strength/conditioning is doing something wrong. Prob not giving them enough roids … lol
Mike Soroka is a different story than the CFs being injured. Its rare someone comes back from a serious Achilles injury.
The ChiSox, Mariners, Brewers, Cardinals and Twins have worse health in their OFs than the Braves.
Its time for Travis Demeritte.
Bravesfan
Go look at the Jays injury list my friend, last count there were 21 who are or had been on the IL – That is nuts only 6 weeks into the season.
That really is nuts. I’m sure my bias to the braves, NL, NL east plays a big part of my opinion.
It’s pretty normal for all fans to have a bias towards the teams they follow. No question the whole league is suffereing with injuries, but according to the latest from Sportrac, the Braves have had 13 players injured for a total of 261 man games lost. That’s actually 14th worst in the league (basically middle of the pack)
Toronto, by comparison has lost 21 players and 397 man games lost… 5th worst in the league by games lost. San Diego ‘leads’ with a jaw dropping 568 man games lost.
Clearly you haven’t looked into previous ankle injures for pitchers. There is actually a very high success rate of pitchers coming back from this type of injury. @garry Harris
Right.. people come back from ankle injuries all the time. Now in other sports, I can see it being an issue for a while, but a pitcher in baseball… that shouldn’t be an issue
Wow, thanks for that. I didn’t realize SD were so bad off on the injury front.
( Proves the bias point 🙂
Not really. Ender won’t make much of a difference.
We need consistency from Freeman and Ozuna, they can’t be automatic outs like they are more often than not.
Don’t get me wrong, if he hit his weight like he had been, you’re right … he won’t make much of a difference. But if he bats .220 and has a solid OBP, then honestly…. That’s a much better player than pache and although we won’t feel it like the day Austin Riley first got called up and hit a bunch of bombs, it’s enough to give the braves a more competitive chance in some of these games. That said, you’re 100% right about Ozuna and Freeman. Those are impact bats that aren’t haven’t an impact. If they were just a shell of what they normally are, this teams offense looks way better
Only issue is his D is slipping. But, imagine being happy with .220
Maybe the Baseball G-ds are looking out for the Braves.
Clearly, the team does not care about putting a winning product on the field, so the G-ds are getting rid of Pache for them.
Oh my Jesus h Christ
Y’all are seriously giving up on Pache already huh?
No. Rational baseball fans aren’t. He’s still the future.
Future what? Future bench player for a rebuilding team? You probably right then.
Legend says some Braves fans are waiting for Jordan Schafer to break out.
Clearly you’re overreacting or trying to cause a stir. Granted you underlying point that Pache isn’t remotely ready for the bigs is very much true. He’s still young, 2020 screwed with his development I’m sure, and in all honesty, he was rushed through the minors. He wasn’t exactly crushing each level on his rise up. Pro needed to prove he could hit AA and AAA ball more often. Watch Waters develop into a better baseball player because they are taking more time with him,
That attitude is exactly why the Braves can’t get over the hump in the present. Not every prospect you have is Albies or Acuna. Pache had pretty high trade value despite how much he looks like a designated fielder. If AA was smart he would have dealt him at peak value for a proven star. But the Braves love to hoard prospects instead.
Slow down there amk. Albies is nothing to celebrate.
Pache had (probably still has) high value, but he wasn’t going to bring a proven star. He has always been considered a glove first player. Pretty much Andruw Jones minus the bat. He was always talked as an extra piece, not the headliner in any deal.
Did you see the joke of a return Arenado got? At Coors Pache would be a decent project. See if you can toss him into a Trevor Story deal…or are the Braves still delusional and think Swanson is the long term answer at SS?
amk I’m with you, I’ve been saying this same thing for a while about Pache and Wright. Some guys, despite the pedigree and prospect ranking, don’t pan out. The Braves haven’t done a good enough job evaluating some of these guys. Five minutes into his first big league start the entire baseball world knew what I’d been saying for 2 years about Allard. He’s not gonna be a starter with a mid 80’s fastball. Luckily the Braves pivoted quickly and got Martin. Last year you might’ve been able to pry Merrifield away from the Royals with Pache and Wright. You make that offer today and KC hangs up and laughs.
And I agree to an extent about Swanson. He’s the second coming of Jeff Blauser at best. I think you can win with him but he’s not a perennial all star. He’d be much better outside of Atlanta IMO. I’m more worried about Freeman’s sudden inability to hit lefties and his rising K numbers than upgrading at short.
Albies had a 4.1 & 4.7 WAR in his first 2 full seasons (@ 21 y/o & 22 y/o) — better than many, including Whit Merrifield (@ 28 y/o & 29 y/o), for example. His 2020 was heavily affected by a nagging wrist injury when he hit from the right-side (his best side). Not sure I’d be celebrating players, but he’s worth getting excited about in a healthy, regular season.
Albies is a good instinctual hitter and a very good defensive 2nd baseman. My problem with Albies is that he doesn’t have smart ABs. He swings at bad pitches and could draw more walks than he does. He has improved a bit when it comes to taking pitches but he started off drawing fewer walks than he should. On the other hand, Albies can hit bad pitches with the best of them.
That kind of batter is not to be trusted as a situational batter, e.g. advancing the runner, working count on a pitcher in trouble. Two years ago, Braves could have potentially advanced to play the Nats in NL championship series if Albies moved the runner to second in game 4 that Braves lost in xtras. Next batter got a hit that would have scored runner from 2nd. Braves would have won the series against Cards if they won game 4.
I like a lot of Albies game but his weakness makes me think twice about putting him in the lineup where he needs to be a good situational hitter.
He stinks. The guy couldn’t hit the water if he fell out of a boat… I don’t care how well he fields. I would bat Ynoa for him every game if I could.
The fool is you if you consider you are a fan of a team that (in your opinion) does not care about winning. Find a team that (in your opinion) does care about winning.
Ender was getting a few knocks before his IL stint. Looks like the key for him is going the other way instead of rolling over to the right side every AB. I said it before, Pache not having a Minor League season in 20 affected him. He is overmatched at the plate just like Austin Jackson was when he was in the lineup. He needs to stay at Gwinnett and play everyday without the pressure of producing in the Show. Watch out with all these OF injuries, Waters probably gonna get a call.
Couldn’t help but notice that last little bit there. Its almost time.
Waters needs to hit reasonably well at Gwinnett before being tossed to the big club.
Seriously, could he do any worse than Pache?
I don’t know if Waters would do worse than Pache right now in the bigs, but here is what I do know….
In 2019, Waters and Pache were promoted to AAA Gwinnett at same time late in the year. At AAA, Pache hit better than Waters. Waters was having trouble striking out against AAA pitching. Neither player lit up AAA. After a brief slump, Pache ended up batting around 270 (rough estimate) at Gwinnett in a small sample size.
Both players were hurt by cancellation of minors in 2020.
Excuse me….. why is nobody mentioning me as a possibility?
Because your off to a slow start in AAA and ur OBP % / K rate are brutal. Waters isn’t ready for the show quite yet either. Although I think he’ll be our guy in the future
Hopefully Michael Harris starts to climb up through the minors. It’s looking more and more like we’ll need more outfield prospects soon.
Exactly bravesfan. Waters has not yet shown he can hit AAA pitching. Bring him up too soon and fans will be saying the same thing about him as they are now saying about Pache. Both of these kids need to adjust to AAA pitching, gain some confidence and THEN have a go at ML pitching.
As much as he may not want to, I think Ozzie and Acuna need to flip flop spots in the lineup. With Freddie/ Ozuna not hitting their stride we need the MLB home run leader hitting cleanup
So you want him to have less ABs?
Soooo give him less at bats??? Doesn’t make sense. It would make more sense to move someone other than the pitcher into the 8th and 9th spot, move that pitcher to the 7th spot. Get guys more likely to get on base in front of Acuna, while maintaining more AB’s per game
I would never move the pitcher to the seventh spot but I would consider moving the pitcher to the eighth spot in order to get Pache/Inciarte/Heredia/Adrianza (whoever is in there) better pitches to hit because they have Acuna hitting right after them.
With Fried or Ynoa, the Braves might consider letting the pitcher hit cleanup. Anything to generate a little offense.
If Freeman and Ozuna aren’t hitting at a high level, it’s wait till next year.
Acuna is a superstar. Albies, IMO, is a solid player with the bat, nothing more. He can hit bad pitches with the best of them but he is not and never has been a smart hitter because he swings at bad pitches and has never been a good situational hitter. You cannot count on Albies to move the baserunner in a key spot in the game. This failure has hurt the Braves in postseason.
Ideally, Albies should be batting at the low end of the batting order. That he hits cleanup speaks to the lack of depth in the Braves batting order.
Yea but that bullpen is losing too many games and the bats are all solo home runs and tons og strike outs. Hate to say it but if it keeps going this way the Braves are going to be sellers at the deadline.
Prefect landing spot for Rob Refsnyder…..
At last. I’ve seen enough of Pache’s .weak hitting. As injury-prone as he is, Enciarte will be a breath of fresh air, The hitting has been embarrassingly-bad at the bottom of the order. And what’s with Morton? He’s tanked worse in his last few starts than the numbers show. Everything down the middle, can’t get the 3rd out, and in general just throws bp, That 18 M is not getting much ROI right now.. No way this team wins the division this year unless it turns around multiple problems.
Abysmal? Horrid? You can skip the hyperbolic adjectives, you’re writing three paragraphs about an IL placement and a call up, not the great American novel. Both players are well below average, we get it.
And Harvey Lembeck, you were a z-grade actor who shined in “Stalag 17” but slowly and HORDIDLY descended to “Beach Blanket Bingo”!
I say trade Freeman while you can get great value, baby!!
Christian Pache is not a Major League Baseball player.
Correction: Christian Pache is not a Major League hitter currently. His defense is very good.
No correction needed. 4th outfielder, defensive replacements are a dime a dozen. He’s been overhyped ever since Acuna broke out. I guess because he’s a toolsy, Latino, center fielder he had to be the next RAJ. I’ve never seen it. He can’t hit. Reminds me so much of Gorkys Hernandez as a prospect. Should’ve traded him last offseason.
I’m not saying he’s guaranteed to be a superstar but give him another season or two before making a true judgement on him.
Watch out. Braves fans will be all over you for saying the guy with a now negative career OPS+ is not a good player and ridiculously overhyped.
I am a Braves fan, sometimes I think I’m the only realist in the bunch though. I’ve been around since the 80’s and have seen enough “can’t miss” prospects miss that I stay skeptical.
I think Pache can possibly turn it around with the bat. With his elite defense if he can hit at all he will play. Kind of off subject but I heard talk of prospects. Remember Kevin Maitan the guy Coppy got caught doing underhanded dealings with? I personally was horrified to lose him (along with a dozen other players) well he hasn’t done much of anything yet. Maitan is still only 21 but he’s looking like a bust.
Maitan, Betemit, Marte, Schaefer, etc. the list is long. Not even mentioning pitchers. Kyle Davies? Randall Delgado? People fall in love with prospects, sometimes for good reasons, but forget the goal of the minor leagues is to fill a big league roster. Sometimes it’s better to sell early.
Imagine if we had sold early on Acuna and Anderson though. You never know. I would include Soroka based on talent but he keeps getting hurt.
The difference with those two guys is they produced, had physical tools and projection. Pache hasn’t ever really produced, he’s still all projection. There’s a reason no mlb team employs me, I’m certainly no scout, but the guys we do employ have to be better at evaluating their own talent and not overvaluing it is my point. Touki, Newk, and Wright have very little value now compared to just two years ago.
As a Jay’s fan I will sincerely miss the Braves. Wish we were playing more then 6 games .
We’re not playing well right now and all six of our games happened to be in a span of two weeks early in the season. Toronto is good but not that much better than Atlanta overall. You simply caught us at the right time.
I agree, sometimes timing is everything. With so many injuries on both teams would be interesting to match up when both are at full strength. Who knows see ya in the WS ( I hope ) . Would be a throwback to 92 🙂
@marko. Blue Jays absolutely spanked the Braves. I think it’s still possible to turn the season around but the Braves need about half a dozen key players to step it up. Injuries have definitely hurt. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the Blue Jays/Braves in the World Series. Still a lot of baseball to play. Blue Jays have some good young hitters. In the AL East I really like the Rays and Blue Jays.
As a Braves fan, I’m glad we’re not playing you more THAN 6 games, specially in that joke of a stadium you call home right now.
But don’t be a stranger and visit the chats when you can.
Maybe you’ll learn some proper grammar while doing so.
Oh a salty Brave’s fan who is an English professor to boot.
It’s Braves’. I thought they had better school in Canada?
Commentators were saying Braves have not lost a season series to Jays in several years. So, Jays finally won 2 season series this year. In the final analysis, it won’t mean much to the Jays if they don’t get to and advance significantly in postseason
Let’s give Waters a look soon, please.
Agreed
Pache needs time. Too much pressure up in the Show. That whole wearing Andruw Jones number, Elite Defense rating and comps to Andrew are overwhelming. He only had a “cup of coffee” at Gwinnett in 2019. He just needs to play everyday for the Strippers not the Atlanta Braves in 2021. I’m telling you guys though, Watch of for Waters that kid is going to surprise a lot of people.
I too need to play everyday with the Strippers
Same here
Also, No, I don’t want Acuna to have fewer at bats by hitting cleanup. Heck bat him second or third. Issue is RBI chances for him are non existent when your 8th and 9th place batters are automatic outs.
Ozzie, Acuna, Freeman, Ozuna, Dansby 1-5 seems like the best to me….of course they would actually need to be performing for that to actually work
Decent first 5, I think Ozzie, Freeman, Acuna,Ozuna,Swanson,Riley,Contreras, Inciarte. Reason I put Acuna third is it will put more pressure in pitchers to get Freddie going. When Freddie goes this team goes. Right now Ozuna isn’t making pitchers nervous like last year. I think if you put Acuna there they will pitch Freddie with caution. He will take his walks then you have to deal with Acuna.
Man, the Braves had it all wrong back in the day. Chipper should have been first all in his career if the best hitter should be hitting lead off.
I’m sticking to my guns from day 1, Acuna should not leading off. His first pitch solo homers are cute and all but do nothing for this team.
If Chipper had the speed that Acuna does, then yes, he would have been leading off.
We are talking about hitting here not speed. Besides, Acuna is not much of a base stealer, at least not a good one. The argument here is to give him the most at bats, which I 100% understand. However, this lineup is not generating runs at all. Don’t bring up 2020 because it was a useless, 60 game season. Means nothing now. Given the current circumstances, move him down so he has more opportunities to drive in runs.
I mean I guess we can keep reassuring ourselves that it’s early, but ppl have been saying that since April.
Acuna is not much of a base stealer? He stole 37 bases in 2019.
bravesnation nc, I’ve been thinking about your proposed lineup and agree with a lot of it. Albies is not a good situational hitter. He is an instinctual, good bad ball hitter. Because he cannot be counted on to advance baserunners, he should either bat lower in lineup or leadoff (he can run and hits for decent avg). Ideally, he should bat lower but Braves have too many guys who are better suited for lower in lineup and who don’t hit as well as Albies. So leadoff actually makes fair sense with this batting order.
I also like Freeman in 2 hole better than Acuna. So Albies, Freeman, Acuan, Ozuna makes a lot of sense with this particular lineup.
I would probably put Riley after Ozuna, then Swanson, Contreras and Ender.
But, if Freeman and Ozuna are both gonna have off years, it doesn’t matter which lineup one chooses.
Bottom line, Offense has to get going. Freeman has to get going. Starters last 5 days have pitched really well they could have won a few of those games with a little more run support. I don’t trust the bullpen right now even with Martin back
Braves 0-6 against Jays.