Smile!!!

Starting Pitchers:

Mike Minor - http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/_/id/30624/mike-minor

Minor shut down the D-backs in a career-high eight-inning performance in his last outing. The lefty has allowed only one earned run in his last 15 1/3 innings. He's mixing in his curveball and showing greater command of his fastball.

Aaran Harang - http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/_/id/5181/aaron-harang

Aaron Harang saw his strikeout totals drop, from 13 two starts ago to four in his latest, but he pitched well enough long enough to record his first Dodgers victory. Though not overpowering, he kept the Brewers in the ballpark.

GAME DAY PREVIEW - http://espn.go.com/mlb/preview?gameId=320424119

LAST NIGHT REVIEW - http://capitolavenueclub.com/?p=6304&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CapitolAvenueClub+%28Capitol+Avenue+Club%29&utm_content=ESPN

WORTH NOTING: Braves: Freeman gets NL Player of Week honors
• After helping the Braves post a 5-1 record last week with a few big games at the plate, first baseman Freddie Freeman was named the National League Player of the Week on Monday.

Freeman hit .478 (11-for-23) -- the third-highest average in the NL on the week -- with 14 RBIs and a 1.087 slugging percentage. He led the NL with 25 total bases, ranked among the leaders in runs scored (seven), hits (11) and on-base percentage (.481) while recording five multi-RBI games.

• Dealing with left knee discomfort that has intensified over the last few days, Braves third baseman Chipper Jones was held out of Monday's game against the Dodgers. However, Jones hopes to be in the lineup as he celebrates his 40th birthday on Tuesday.

"It would be nice, but it's not going to hurt my feelings [if I don't]," Jones said. "The good thing about having Juan [Francisco] is he's provided us some power and some offense. It's not a necessity that I be in there. So I can take my time whenever I am not feeling good."

Go Braves!!

I'm going to assume this isn't another throw away game like the last two. We're actually going to try to win this one.

Starting lineup:

Bourn
Prado
Freeman
McCann
Uggla
Jones
Heyward
Pastornicky
Minor

I like it!!! Let's stop this 2 game losing streak tonight.

Jones back in I see...

http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/batvspitch/_/id/30624/mike-minor

http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/batvspitch/_/id/5181/aaron-harang

I could go for 10 run game from this new "high powered" offense.

It just hit me that their streak of beating left handers ended last night. Beating 5 in a row is very promising though. ESPECIALLY for this team who was very similar to last year's team as you well know. (:

That would be nice...they've looked a lot better against lefties this year....and against right handers too, for that matter! :)

Tonight I can't watch....so they should win.

Yay...er......sorry to hear that cad. :0

well im sorry too... hopefully Minor can continue the good work he has done.

Just kidding...I remember you saying that it seems they win every time you don't watch.

He's been terrific so far...this will be a good test for him.

And this still warms my heart.

Heyward:
vs RHP 38 PA .303/.378/.515
vs LHP 28 PA .308/.357/.500

He needs to pick up the power a little bit but it is probably on the way. In the second half of his rookie year (returning from the injury and what not) he hit .291/.402/.407 for 23 games and had 10 doubles no HRs. For the 48 games that followed he hit .307/.427/.480 with 7 HRs, 5 doubles, 2 triples.

Just has to keep hitting consistently and they extra base hits will come.

He's big enough that it will happen naturally...as long as he doesn't get pull happy or start thinking about HR's right now, I think we'll all be happy.

Indeed. The fact that he's hitting both left and right equally is such a good sign though. Small sample sizes and all.

It's something that Votto does. When I noticed that not too long ago it blew my mind and explains so much.

1813 PA .316/.413/.568 (RHP)
836 PA_ .305/.391/.505 (LHP)

---

Edited 4/24/2012 6:18 pm ET by atlsportsfan2

Chipper has the ultimate lefty/righty thing going...amazing how close they are over a loooooooong sample size.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/split.cgi?id=jonesch06&year=Career&t=b

---

Edited 4/24/2012 6:24 pm ET by bravepap

Well, he is a switch hitter, but it is a fantastic split. It's amazing how he's kind of alternated which side he was more effective from from year to year.

Hit .394 against Lefties in 2008 in 155 ABs. That's insane.

---

Edited 4/24/2012 6:26 pm ET by atlsportsfan2

I'm gonna guess he might make the HOF.

Maybe. We'll see.

That also meant he had a .478 OBP vs lefties. When you're OBP is close to .500 for anything, you're doing something incredible.

But that made me go check Barry Bonds' OBP during the last decade. It's hysterically gaudy as I expected. Most notably from 2001 to 2004.

I wasn't a stat barfer in those days.

Meh...if he's lucky.