Boy, what a week. And no, this isn’t a “Ivan, it’s only Wednesday” meme sort of thing. The Braves did not have a good week.
They went 1-4 on the field. They lost Spencer Strider and Ronald Acuña Jr., two guys who by themselves could’ve probably hoisted the team into contention if they played like their past selves, regardless of what the rest of their teammates did. Not that Strider and Acuña were playing like their past selves, but as far as outlook goes, replacing Strider for a time indeterminate
(maybe the whole season) and Acuña for a couple of weeks or whatever, with ready alternatives is probably a substantial downgrade.
The FanGraphs playoff odds are telling here. The Braves lost more than two wins off their full-season pace in their last seven days. They were projected to play at an 87-win pace going forward before this week and the injuries; now they’re projected to play at an 86-win pace. Basically, they lost a full win and a fraction in terms of outlook, and then another full win and a fraction by going 1-4. Of course, those two things are somewhat related, as having Acuña may have helped them win more than one game, while Strider’s implosion, which may have been driven by his lack of arm health, directly led to one of the losses.
So, will there be a worse week for the Braves this year?
Some funny notes:
- During Tuesday’s loss to the White Sox, the Braves actually out-wOBAed their opponents, .378 to .348 — they got very lucky (.329 xwOBA) while the White Sox got very unlucky (.380 xwOBA), yet the Braves still lost.
- During Wednesday’s loss to the White Sox, the Braves were supremely unlucky (.231 xwOBA, .331 wOBA), so the White Sox were able to pull it out (.283 wOBA, .311 xwOBA).
- The Mets are the unluckiest team in baseball in terms of xwOBA underperformance. They’re the only team with a teamwide underperformance below .020. Two of their top ten xwOBA overperformance games on the season came in this series (both wins). Sunday’s game was their biggest overperformance of the season, period. The Braves didn’t necessarily deserve to win either game, but… woof, what a week.
