The Atlanta Braves’ Tyler Flowers has been a nice surprise

When the Atlanta Braves brought back hometown catcher Tyler Flowers this past winter, many Braves were indifferent on the under-the-radar move.

It wasn’t massive news in Braves Country. To many fans, it was just the Braves signing an okay veteran guy to hold the team over until this rebuilding thing is all worked out.

But, bringing Tyler Flowers back to the Atlanta Braves, the team that originally drafted him, was actually a highly calculated move.

While Tyler Flowers was not an elite offensive threat with the White Sox, his pitch-framing and game-calling ability were. And the Braves saw a perfect opportunity to bring a master game-caller into the mix during a season when they knew they were going to have some young guys who need some mentoring (this includes Julio Terehan. He’s still young, mind you).

The Braves didn’t sign Flowers for his bat, although the occasional pop is nice, they signed him because he’s one of the best behind the plate.

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Flowers’ offensive production is sort of coming back down to Earth right now. He was red hot in April, batting .281, and then had a pretty decent May, batting .259. June hasn’t treated him so well offensively, but he’s still been valuable behind the plate.

Julio Teheran certainly deserves credit for how he’s been pitching lately, but I believe Flowers deserves a lot of credit, too. In 9 starts with Tyler Flowers behind the plate, Teheran has now posted a 1.36 ERA (10 ER/66.1 IP) with 8 BB and 66 Ks.

When the Chicago White Sox decided to let Flowers go, it blindsided a lot of Sox fans and even their pitching staff. Especially White Sox ace, Chris Sale.

Flowers was Sale’s personal catcher. To put that relationship into perspective for some Braves fans who might not keep up with the AL Central, Sale was in the Cy Young running every year from 2012 – 2015. Flowers was the only guy Sale threw to from 2014 – 2015.

2014 was Sale’s best year yet. He went 12-4, had a 2017 ERA, was an All-Star and was 3rd in AL Cy Young voting.

The legendary battery of Steve Carlton and Bob Boone in 1980 has the most strikeouts with the same catcher from 1980-present with 286. Chris Sale and Tyler Flowers in 2015 are second with 274.

So, needless to say, Chris Sale wasn’t thrilled about Tyler Flowers leaving the battery.

And it wasn’t just because Flowers was great at calling games, which he was and is, it was his elite ability to frame pitches. Without Flowers, Sale’s ERA just might have looked slightly different, and he would have recorded fewer strikeouts.

Here’s some more fun tweets from the aftermath of Flowers leaving the South Side.

https://twitter.com/DavidJIII/status/673186523756560384

Next: Atlanta Braves invade Ft. Bragg

Tyler Flowers was signed to a 2-year deal by the Atlanta Braves and I don’t see him going anywhere until 2018 at the earliest. There might not be a better guy, given the situation, teaching some of these young talented arms how to pitch than Tyler Flowers.