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Have the Atlanta Braves Mutinied Against Kevin Seitzer’s Methods?

By Alan Carpenter

May 14, 2016; Kansas City, MO, USA; Atlanta Braves base runner Jeff Francoeur (18) rounds third and scores against the Kansas City Royals during the eighth inning at Kauffman Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Peter G. Aiken-USA TODAY Sports
May 14, 2016; Kansas City, MO, USA; Atlanta Braves base runner Jeff Francoeur (18) rounds third and scores against the Kansas City Royals during the eighth inning at Kauffman Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Peter G. Aiken-USA TODAY Sports /
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The Braves’ sudden power surge has to make one wonder if they’ve gone ‘off the reservation’ and ditched the Seitzer Model.

It almost sounded like just fill-in chatter from Joe Simpson during one of the Pittsburgh contests this week.

Paraphrased, Joe mentioned that Jeff Francoeur and Kelly Johnson were both coming to the conclusion that each had seemingly forgotten how to “lift” the ball in their respective hitting strokes.  Thus in batting practice lately, they had been working on that, leading to the notion that Frenchy was beginning to ‘grip it and rip it.’

The result this week?  3 homers from these hitters.

Now that’s not exactly the way hitting coach Kevin Seitzer draws up things.  His ideas come from powering it down at the plate, and are fairly well known at this point:

  • look to drive the ball up the middle and from gap-to-gap
  • emphasis on singles and doubles, don’t try to hit home runs
  • work the counts; avoid strikeouts, put the ball in play, control the bat

So What’s Happening?

Clearly, something was broken and a change was needed.  For the entire season – up to a week ago – this was the situation for the Braves:

  • 34 games
  • 9 home runs
  • 48 doubles, 0 triples
  • 102 runs scored (3.0 per game)
  • .234 / .298 / .323 (full season numbers)
  • 7.46% BB rate / 21.38% K rate
  • fWAR:  -3.0

Over the past 7 days alone, here’s the change – and note that these are team stats:

More from Tomahawk Take

  • 7 games
  • 9 home runs
  • 16 doubles, 3 triples
  • 33 runs scored (4.7 per game)
  • .271 / .333 / .461 slash line
  • 7.7% BB rate / 20.9% K rate
  • fWAR:  +1.0

So all of this improvement, yet no losses on the plate discipline side.  Walk rates and K rates remain constant overall.

All of this, and to be honest, it’s really not all “clicking” yet:

  • Nick Markakis has been slumping for a while, now is back to hitting just .257 (.214 this week)
  • Ender Inciarte:  .213 (but .286 this week)
  • The aforementioned Jeff Francoeur and Kelly Johnson:  .250 and .226 overall
  • Even Freddie Freeman is “only” hitting .272 overall and .241 this week with increased strikeouts too.

Atlanta is getting better Seitzer-esque hitting from these sources:

As this trio is hitting well (with just 1 homer between them), they are also getting increased playing time while Daniel Castro, Erick Aybar, and A.J. Pierzynski… don’t.

Now we can’t get too excited here, as all three of these guys are at or above .400 with their BABIP averages, but the hope is that the ‘regulars’ can get things sorted at the batting cage and join this party.

To Smash or Not to Smash

Sure:  seeing Mallex Smith ambush not one, but two baseballs this week is eye-opening, but it could be a little premature to think that the club has duct-taped Seitzer to his video machine and locked the door behind them:

  • As mentioned, the triumvirate of D’Arnaud/Beckham/Flowers that is carrying this team (that’s a scary thought) has just 1 homer between them
  • The Johnson/Frenchy/Markakis power-surge could be little more than a small-sample-size anomaly, especially with KJ
  • The team is still hitting doubles – at a higher rate, even… and just finally getting some hits to fall, period.
  • Perhaps KJ and Francoeur have decided that they had gotten away from some things that had made them more successful in the past – maybe being too timid at the plate.

Obviously things aren’t all rosy:  the team hasn’t had pitching prowess line up perfectly with hitting en route to a 3-4 record over the past week.  But given that they’re now 11-30 overall?  They’ll take that.

Next: Now Leading Off...?

Now the trick will be to see just how sustainable this all is… with or without Seitzer’s tools.

The next week brings Milwaukee and Miami into Turner Field.  It would be really nice to get the hitting jacked up a bit more from other sources before we see the Giants and Dodgers after that.

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