Sports Page Atlanta

Brian McCann had 3 more hits yesterday and now is batting .303 this season. He also has a .298 career batting average. That average is the highest batting average by an Atlanta Braves catcher ever by players with at least 1,000 career at-bats in an Atlanta uniform.

Here are the top 4

1. Brian McCann: .298
2. Joe Torre: .290
3. Javy Lopez: .287
4. Biff Pocoroba: .257

By the way, McCann only trails Javy Lopez and Earl Williams for the most home runs by an Atlanta Braves catcher (but he will need a lot more homers… McCann has 67 and Lopez had 214).

Mike Hampton got the win last night when the Braves defeated the Giants 11-4.  It was Hampton’s first win since August 14, 2005.  In that game Atlanta defeated the Arizona Diamondbacks 13-8.

Here is what the Braves lineup was the last time the southpaw received the victory.  Most of them are no longer with the team.

SS - Rafael Furcal

2B - Marcus Giles

3B - Chipper Jones

CF - Andruw Jones

1B - Adam LaRoche

RF - Jeff Francoeur

LF - Ryan Langerhans

C - Brian McCann

P - Mike Hampton

There has been a lot of hype this offseason about Georgia signing wide receiver A.J. Green.  Yesterday he practiced for the first time and looked good overall.  If he plays this season and lives up to the hype he could break the reception mark by Bulldog freshman.

Here are the most receptions by a Georgia freshman and the most those receivers have had in their Bulldog careers…

Terrence Edwards: 53 in 1999 (59 in 2002)

Mohamed Massaquoi: 38 in 2005 (current career-high)

Damien Gary: 36 in 2000 (43 in 2003)

Lindsay Scott: 36 in 1978 (42 in 1981)

As you read, heard or seen already today or yesterday, longtime Braves announcer Skip Caray passed away on Sunday.  He has lots of memorable moments on the air, but probably none bigger than the 1992 NLCS Game 7 game against the Pirates.  Every Braves fan remembers that game, but I want to take you back to that October 14th night and tell you how incredible that game was…

The Braves were down 2-0 in the bottom of the 9th… actually when I start the story it is now 2-1, with the bases loaded and 2 out.

Stan Belinda pitches, Francisco Cabrera singles, David Justice and Sid Bream score before Barry Bonds gets it home… (now here is where it gets tricky).

Belinda was a solid pitcher… a career 4.15 era in 585 games… He also had a 0.87 career postseason era.

Francisco Cabrera sinlges… the man was a .254 career hitter and had only 62 career rbi in 196 games…

Barry Bonds throws home… he was a 8-time gold glove winner… only 5 outfielders have won more gold gloves than he did… he also had 173 career assists from the outfield.

David Justice scored… nothing wow… he was a solid player

Sid Bream… chugging from 2nd base… he’s very slow… in 1,088 career games he had 50 career stolen bases and has never made an attempt in 28 postseason games.

Even with all those all odds against them, the Braves won 3-2.

You can hear Skip Caray now…

Braves win! Braves win! Braves win! Braves win! Braves win!

Pitcher Jorge Campillo dominated as the Braves shut out the Brewers 5-0.  The right hander went 7 innings, 6 hits, 0 earned runs, striking out 6 and walking no one.  This was not the first time Campillo took control of Milwaukee, nor it was the 2nd time.  In fact it was the 3rd time as he improved to 3-0 against the hard hitting central team.  He is not doing horribly against the rest of the majors, but there is a difference as you can see…

                                    Season vs Brewers                Rest of Majors

Record                                      3-0                                       3-4

ERA                                         1.42                                    2.83

Opp Average                           .200                                   .239

Walks                                           0                                       21

Strikeouts                                 18                                        54

Well, Chuck James is back and he is back to his old tricks… that is not necessarily good.  The southpaw pitched 2 2/3 innings yesterday and gave up 6 runs as the Braves lost to the Brewers 9-0.

In the game James gave up 2 home runs… one to Prince Fielder and one to Mike Cameron.

When it comes to James there is a big difference in triple A and in the majors.  In 76 1/3 innings at Richmond, he has allowed just 3 home runs, but in 25 2/3 innings he has allowed 9.

The record for most home runs allowed as an Atlanta Brave is 386 held by Phil Niekro.  Knucksie surrended 482 long balls overall which is 3rd all-time behind fellow hall of famers Robin Roberts and Ferguson Jenkins.

The Georgia Bulldogs are the top team according to the USA Today Coaches preseason poll.  The Dawgs received 22 of the 61 first place votes.  This is the highest Georgia has ever been ranked in the preseason by a major poll.  In 1942, the Bulldogs were ranked #2 in the preseason.

Georgia finished 11-2 last season and will play 5 of the top 18 and 7 of the top 27 teams this season.

Here is a list of the top 25…

Clint Sammons hit his first career home run yesterday as the Braves defeated the Cardinals.  Sammons was just called up from Richmond and has played 4 games for Atlanta.  In those 4 games he has almost as many hits as the other backup catcher Corky Miller and Miller has been the backup all season.  Here are both of their season stats.

                                             Corky Miller                             Clint Sammons

Games                                      26                                                  4

hits                                            5                                                    4

at-bats                                      54                                                  8

average                                     .093                                           .500

home runs                                 1                                                     1

runs batted in                            3                                                    3 

Georgia Tech started the Paul Johnson era on Wednesday as they began football practice.  As you all know by now, Johnson was previously the Navy head coach (yes I know he was at Georgia Southern, too… but most recently he was at Navy).

Anyway all the talk is that he is going to change the offense dramatically.  Well, this is how the Yellow Jacket offense has been split up the last 2 seasons compared to how the Midshipmen divided their offense.

Georgia Tech

2007: 548 running plays (60.2%) 363 passing plays (39.8%)

2006: 526 running plays (58.8%) 369 passing plays (41.2%)

Navy

2007: 804 running plays (85.5%) 136 passing plays (14.5%)

2006: 764 running plays (87.2%) 112 passing plays (12.8%)

The Braves acquired Casey Kotchman yesterday in the trade sending Mark Teixeira to the Angels.  Kotchman is a very good fielder with solid offensive numbers.  The one thing that Kotchman doesn’t have a lot of is strikeouts… which is good.  In fact he is one of the hardest players in baseball to strike out.

Fewest strikeouts this season with players who have played 100 or more games

Yuniesky Betancourt: 101 games - 22 strikeouts

Casey Kotchman: 100 games - 23 strikeouts

Robinson Cano: 104 games - 33 strikeouts

Dustin Pedroia: 106 games - 38 strikeouts

Cristian Guzman: 101 games - 39 strikeouts