Which Brave has most exceeded your preseason expectations?

[Middle Man]

Huh, which one?

[jlcct]

I'll pick the obvious and say Glaus. I had a feeling he could be good but I didn't think he would be this good. I'm glad Heyward has him around to help take off some of the pressure.

[KB 34]

I figured there was a good reason Glaus only signed for $2 million, but so far the reason seems to be other teams screwed up big time. Heyward has exceeded my expectations since I expected him to be decent but not incredible, but not to this extent. Hinske has been a pleasant surprise to a lesser extent. Venters has also been great out of the bullpen.

[BigWorm]

Yeah, Billy Wagner can go ahead and retire. Venters is going to be special too. (At a fraction of the price)

[Devil Wears Prado]

I'll pick the obvious and say Glaus. I had a feeling he could be good but I didn't think he would be this good. I'm glad Heyward has him around to help take off some of the pressure.

Agreed. Out of all of these players, Glaus was the one who has been the most pleasantly surprising, but not by far. I was expecting Martin Prado to hit for a high average, get on-base, and to continue what he started last year but never would have believed that he would be a league leader in hits and didn't think he'd be an All Star candidate. But with that said, Glaus was the best hitter in the NL in the month of May and has totally exceeded my expectations when we signed him. He, along with Heyward, is picking up the slack of those who we expected to have decent to good seasons. Chipper Jones, Brian McCann, or for some of us before spring training, Nate McLouth.

Heyward has not exactly surprised me because even though I predicted a comparatively less productive rookie year from him, I knew he had the potential to quickly turn into the type of player he is right now.

[Devil Wears Prado]

Yeah, Billy Wagner can go ahead and retire. Venters is going to be special too. (At a fraction of the price)

Don't think I would go that far, but yeah, Venters has really been a surprise for me and is one of the reasons why I wouldn't mind keeping Medlen in the rotation because Cox found himself another arm to rely on. Don't know what we'll plan with Michael Dunn seeing that we have three very capable lefties in the bullpen already. Only thing I'd nitpick about Venters is his walk rate, but lately I've been seeing some improvements in his control.

[Hobbes]

I didn't pick Glaus because I actually had reasonably high expectations for him. I thought he was quite capable of producing near this level (though not quite this high). I understood there was risk, but that is why he was affordable.

Prado has further exceeded my expectations.

[warefreak]

I didn't pick Glaus because I actually had reasonably high expectations for him. I thought he was quite capable of producing near this level (though not quite this high). I understood there was risk, but that is why he was affordable.

Prado has further exceeded my expectations.

My sentiments exactly. I thought Glaus would be a beast and was very glad at this signing. He exceeded my expectations a little, but I definitely knew he was capable of this.

Prado on the other hand... for some reason I thought of him like I used to think of Giles, just another second baseman who fills a spot on our team. He has far exceeded my expectations.

[Agent-X-]

It's really close between Hudson and Prado. On the one hand, I have been a believer in Prado for a while. He has passed my expectations by about 35 points. I still think he's in the neighborhood of what he has done the past two seasons, so this is withiin the realm of reasonable for him. Just glad to see him continue it.

As for Hudson, we all knew he could be the ace of the staff, and an ERA under 3 is reasonable for a guy like him. However, coming off injury and having not performed like this since playing in Oakland, my expectations were anywhere from a 3.30 to a 3.80 ERA. He's as sharp as he has ever been.

It's difficult to choose between these two guys. As for Heyward and Glaus, I already knew what each guy was capable of, and while they are proving that potential it doesn't really come as a shock to me like it does from the other two guys.

[Middle Man]

Obviously, there's no correct answer for this since we all had different expectations for each player.

I thought Heyward was going to be pretty good right from the start, so I didn't vote for him. Prado is exceeding my expectations, but not by that much. I thought he'd hit around .300 - .310 with plenty of doubles.

To me, it was a close call between Glaus and Hudson. I thought Glaus would hit fairly well but without a lot of power. His power numbers have been a nice surprise after his slow start. His RBI total is impressive, but as we know, that's largely a function of having so many high OBP guys in front of him.

I voted for Hudson because I thought he'd be an average-ish pitcher this season at best. His numbers so far are equal to or better than some his best seasons, with the exception of strikeouts. Apparently he doesn't need the strikeouts because he sure is finding ways to get guys out. And his consistency has been fantastic - I don't think he's had a bad start yet.

[Andy G.]

I voted Heyward. I didn't have any expectations for him to exceed, really. I had no guess for how well he'd play this year. He seems to be coming out of his recent slump, and before this slump his numbers ranked him among the elite in all of baseball. Honestly, I was pretty high on Prado, Hudson and Glaus coming into the season. They're all performing above my expectations, but Heyward has been unbelievable at times.

[Gman]

I went with Heyward because I thought it was crazy to bring him up this soon. He's handled himself well and he contributes in other ways even when he's slumping with the bat. In hindsight it was a great move to bring him up especially given what little contributions they have gotten from McLouth, Melky and Diaz. I was hoping Heyward could at least match Griffey Jr.'s first year (.264/.329/.420) when he got rushed up from AA after only 60+ at bats . Heyward is actually topping Griffey's rookie numbers by a comfortable margin. So, I'm really impressed.

[Wahoo]

I went with Heyward because I thought it was crazy to bring him up this soon. He's handled himself well and he contributes in other ways even when he's slumping with the bat. In hindsight it was a great move to bring him up especially given what little contributions they have gotten from McLouth, Melky and Diaz. I was hoping Heyward could at least match Griffey Jr.'s first year (.264/.329/.420) when he got rushed up from AA after only 60+ at bats . Heyward is actually topping Griffey's rookie numbers by a comfortable margin. So, I'm really impressed.



This really put his production in a good perspective. Hell, right now, he's outproducing Griffey's 2nd year numbers as well (Griffey was 20 in his 2nd season). It's pretty insane. My expectations were pretty moderate considering the last rookie that we decided to give the starting job to at the beginning of the year, but he's done pretty damn well for himself as a rookie. And, honestly, looking at the numbers, Junior appears to be a pretty reasonable comp for Heyward. I'd feel pretty good if his number follow the same trajectory as Junior. Of course, if he gets injured, I'm pretty sure the Braves will do what the Mariners weren't smart enough to do, move him to a different position (possibly 1B).

[Middle Man]

...doesn't really deserve its own thread, so I'll put it here. Check out the stat comparison between Heyward and KJ up to this point - eerily similar in most regards. So, who will end the season with a better line? Or will they remain similar?

Name .... Team G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS
Jason Heyward ATL 66 239 41 63 13 3 11 44 42 64 5 4 .264 .383 .481 .864
Kelly Johnson ARI 67 253 47 67 22 0 13 34 41 63 5 3 .265 .368 .506 .874

[quick]

...doesn't really deserve its own thread, so I'll put it here. Check out the stat comparison between Heyward and KJ up to this point - eerily similar in most regards. So, who will end the season with a better line? Or will they remain similar?

Name .... Team G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS
Jason Heyward ATL 66 239 41 63 13 3 11 44 42 64 5 4 .264 .383 .481 .864
Kelly Johnson ARI 67 253 47 67 22 0 13 34 41 63 5 3 .265 .368 .506 .874

How did KJ learn how to take those walks? Is this the real KJ, or a Stepford KJ, with Arizona?

[KB 34]

KJ has a career .349 OBP and .263 BA. He's always been really good at getting on base which was why I believed he would succeed even though things looked really bleak for him. Unfortunately his HR power has dropped a lot since the start of the season when he was hitting HR like a steroids guy from the 90s. Still, he's getting a ton of doubles on the season. I'm guessing they will end the season with similar stats since KJ will continue to be really streaky and Heyard will go through some growing pains. Both have impressed me a ton this season.