The Atlanta Braves - Hello darkness my old friend

#31,129
#31,129
zjcvols said:
That’s because the Braves organization broke him. He would probably had never hit lefties well, but I’m 100% convinced the Braves organization is to blame. Guys don’t have their best year at age 20.
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His swing has been an issue from day 1. When he's on, he's great, but his swing has always been too long and had a hole in it. He was insanely hot early in his rookie year and then the book got out on him and he's been slump prone and underpowered for years.

It's insane that a guy 6'5" 220 is basically a slap hitter that hasn't gotten to 15 HRs since about age 23 or 24. Even if the Braves messed him up, you'd think 2 organizations and 5 years later he would've figured something out.
 
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#31,130
#31,130
Heyward is way, way too mechanical. Whatever 17 hitting instructors he had growing up/early in his career should be in stocks.

The fact that he has had a successful major league career in spite of them and that swing is once again amazing.
 
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#31,131
#31,131
TBrown said:
Heyward is way, way too mechanical. Whatever 17 hitting instructors he had growing up/early in his career should be in stocks.

The fact that he has had a successful major league career in spite of them and that swing is once again amazing.
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It really does prove what an incredible athlete he is. I can remember his rookie year they were playing in an ESPN game and Heyward jammed himself and Bobby Valentine literally saw the swing and said out loud "Yikes... I know he's been hot, but I don't know how long that's gonna work".
 
#31,132
#31,132
TBrown said:
Heyward is way, way too mechanical. Whatever 17 hitting instructors he had growing up/early in his career should be in stocks.

The fact that he has had a successful major league career in spite of them and that swing is once again amazing.
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Yup. He is way too busy at the plate.
 
#31,136
#31,136
zjcvols said:
You’re right I shouldn’t say broken. He was a really good player for a few years.

The Braves stunted his offensive growth
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Freddie and Jason came up at the same time. One will have his number retired by the organization and the other was traded before he hit the market. One has a steady short mechanical stable swing the other looks like a fish out of water when swinging. I said it when they first came up in one of our first threads that Freeman would be a better offensive player, just didn’t think the gap would be so large.

The onus is on Jason not the Atlanta Braves.
 
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#31,137
#31,137
Did Heyward hit a growth spurt really late or something?

I’ve always thought his swing looks like a kid was inhabiting a basketball players body and he was thrown into a baseball game.
 
#31,138
#31,138
GAVol said:
His swing has been an issue from day 1. When he's on, he's great, but his swing has always been too long and had a hole in it. He was insanely hot early in his rookie year and then the book got out on him and he's been slump prone and underpowered for years.

It's insane that a guy 6'5" 220 is basically a slap hitter that hasn't gotten to 15 HRs since about age 23 or 24. Even if the Braves messed him up, you'd think 2 organizations and 5 years later he would've figured something out.
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All that leverage and power in those long legs and utilizes none of it
 
#31,139
#31,139
Florida Stanley said:
All that leverage and power in those long legs and utilizes none of it
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Yep, and that always has seemed to be an intentional decision on his, or his hitting coaches' part. He's put up slap hitter numbers for most of his career because he has a slap hitter swing. Even if Giancarlo Stanton had that swing, he'd probably hit 25 HRs at most in a season. I've never seen anything quite like it - he has a swing that makes no use of his frame, natural strength, and athletic ability.

I'm not willing to blame the Braves for his career not panning out either. Any team would have done what the Braves did in that situation - make him not the face, but a face of the franchise, talk him up to the media, etc. If Heyward couldn't handle that, and that's why his career didn't turn out as planned, then he was destined for that no matter what team he played for. You could see the holes in his swing as soon as he debuted, but the assumption was that he'd eventually get it fixed and make adjustments. He never did.
 
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#31,140
#31,140
Florida Stanley said:
Freddie and Jason came up at the same time. One will have his number retired by the organization and the other was traded before he hit the market. One has a steady short mechanical stable swing the other looks like a fish out of water when swinging. I said it when they first came up in one of our first threads that Freeman would be a better offensive player, just didn’t think the gap would be so large.

The onus is on Jason not the Atlanta Braves.
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When you think about it, how many consistently good hitters have elongated, loopy swings like that?

Guys may be large human beings, like Judge or Stanton, but their swings are relatively tight and compact and get their hands to the baseball quickly.
 
#31,141
#31,141
Florida Stanley said:
Freddie and Jason came up at the same time. One will have his number retired by the organization and the other was traded before he hit the market. One has a steady short mechanical stable swing the other looks like a fish out of water when swinging. I said it when they first came up in one of our first threads that Freeman would be a better offensive player, just didn’t think the gap would be so large.

The onus is on Jason not the Atlanta Braves.
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Yes, Jason deserves the blame too. It’s his career and he’s not made the proper adjustments. But the Braves also pressured him to try and be something he’s not. He put a .393 OBP as a 20 year old. That’s beyond rare. And then after the 2010 season it was a bunch of things about how the Braves wanted him to be more aggressive and tap into his power. And then he hurt his shoulder, Chipper called him out when he should have not been playing, and then in 2013 took a fastball to the face and he’s never been the same.

People forget he showed power ability. His third year he hit 27 homers and almost slugged .500 (when offense was down too). If the Braves have said “Hey get on base like you do, we are gonna put you in the two hole, just be you” or shut him down after his shoulder problems first started barking I’m thinking there’s a different career for Jason. Now after his Braves career, I don’t know what might have happened and why he can’t be a 115-120 OPS+ guy but that is my opinion on him as a Brave.

Also if he was 6’0/190 lbs we totally view his career different (at least his first six years).
 
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#31,142
#31,142
zjcvols said:
Yes, Jason deserves the blame too. It’s his career and he’s not made the proper adjustments. But the Braves also pressured him to try and be something he’s not. He put a .393 OBP as a 20 year old. That’s beyond rare. And then after the 2010 season it was a bunch of things about how the Braves wanted him to be more aggressive and tap into his power. And then he hurt his shoulder, Chipper called him out when he should have not been playing, and then in 2013 took a fastball to the face and he’s never been the same.

People forget he showed power ability. His third year he hit 27 homers and almost slugged .500 (when offense was down too). If the Braves have said “Hey get on base like you do, we are gonna put you in the two hole, just be you” or shut him down after his shoulder problems first started barking I’m thinking there’s a different career for Jason. Now after his Braves career, I don’t know what might have happened and why he can’t be a 115-120 OPS+ guy but that is my opinion on him as a Brave.

Also if he was 6’0/190 lbs we totally view his career different (at least his first six years).
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lol you’re exact words were “the Braves are 100% to blame”

Cream always rises to the top, if he had it, no one could’ve stopped him.

I agree that the Braves could’ve done the man better (benched him for Jose freakin Constanza lol) and with some of your points. Jason just never made the correct changes or was not capable of doing so. The thing is, he is still a very nice player. All the hype around him was a disservice, at the time MLB was really trying to get more of the black youth to chose baseball over other sports, due to the dwindling numbers in MLB. He was everyone’s savior. That was a lot of weight to bear.
 
#31,146
#31,146
Florida Stanley said:
lol you’re exact words were “the Braves are 100% to blame”

Cream always rises to the top, if he had it, no one could’ve stopped him.

I agree that the Braves could’ve done the man better (benched him for Jose freakin Constanza lol) and with some of your points. Jason just never made the correct changes or was not capable of doing so. The thing is, he is still a very nice player. All the hype around him was a disservice, at the time MLB was really trying to get more of the black youth to chose baseball over other sports, due to the dwindling numbers in MLB. He was everyone’s savior. That was a lot of weight to bear.
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I just hope the same thing doesn't happen with Acuna. I think even more pressure was put on Heyward than Acuna, but they're still facing the same kinds of things...the Braves would love for him to be the face of a re-emergent franchise.

Different management team today than when Heyward was here, but I think it does say something that the Braves have already locked down Acuna 115 games into his career. I don't know/can't remember if they made overtures to Heyward about a long-term deal before arbitration, but they didn't lock him down like they have Ronald.
 
#31,147
#31,147
05_never_again said:
I just hope the same thing doesn't happen with Acuna. I think even more pressure was put on Heyward than Acuna, but they're still facing the same kinds of things...the Braves would love for him to be the face of a re-emergent franchise.

Different management team today than when Heyward was here, but I think it does say something that the Braves have already locked down Acuna 115 games into his career. I don't know/can't remember if they made overtures to Heyward about a long-term deal before arbitration, but they didn't lock him down like they have Ronald.
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Maybe, but Heyward didn't sign a $100 million extension after less than a full year of playing time
 
#31,148
#31,148
YankeeVol said:
[QUOTE="05_never_again, post: 16651831, member: 3797"]I just hope the same thing doesn't happen with Acuna. I think even more pressure was put on Heyward than Acuna, but they're still facing the same kinds of things...the Braves would love for him to be the face of a re-emergent franchise.

Different management team today than when Heyward was here, but I think it does say something that the Braves have already locked down Acuna 115 games into his career. I don't know/can't remember if they made overtures to Heyward about a long-term deal before arbitration, but they didn't lock him down like they have Ronald.
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Maybe, but Heyward didn't sign a $100 million extension after less than a fill year of playing time[/QUOTE]
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I don't know/can't remember if the Braves made any sort of effort to lock Heyward down this early in his career like they did with Acuna. Hopefully, that's an indication they are much more sold/certain about Ronald than they were Heyward.
 
#31,150
#31,150
05_never_again said:
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. I don't know/can't remember if the Braves made any sort of effort to lock Heyward down this early in his career like they did with Acuna. Hopefully, that's an indication they are much more sold/certain about Ronald than they were Heyward.
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I don't really remember teams doing these kind of extensions that Acuna, Severino and Nola got back then. It's sort of a new phenomenon
 
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