I mean, it’s early, and I’m no bravesjournal doomsday syncophant, but this team just doesn’t look very good. There are parts that could and should be good, and parts that can be great, but they aren’t.

reasons to panic:

One of the three who were already hurt this year is going to miss another 40-50 games with an injury, you know it’s true
Either hudson or smoltz is going to miss the end of the year with an injury
Thomson has already started returning to his career norms
For backup? Hram
Reitsma
Braves relievers (cormier, remlinger, reitsma) who have shown effects when overused in the past are already being overused, along with swamp monster
Mccann has never caught a full major league season, and may tire in august-september

reasons not to panic:

well? Y’all help me out here.

“For this ballpark, it was a fair outing,” Braves manager Bobby Cox said.

Someone forgot to tell bobby that they moved the fences back.

Reasons not to panic:

It looks like Andruw’s season last year wasn’t just a fluke
Our defense is still very solid
Saltimanchia (probably misspelled) could be on the team before the end of the year
The relievers look like #### the first two months of every season
The starting pitching is a lot better now than it was at the beginning of the year.  Maybe McDowell had to learn how to get each of them ready.

Like I said at the end of the chatter last night, I’m not panicing yet.  But I’m not happy about the way we’re just sinking slowly.

I’m not sure losing 7 out of ten is a slow sink.

Reason to panic:

This team reminds me of last year’s mariner’s team.

Reasons not to panic:

The teams ahead of the Braves are the Mets and Phillies.

That was a nice little game today, for sure. Apparently the mets have played a whole bunch of crappy teams this year too, and the braves have played a bunch of road games. I’d look up the percentages, but I don’t want to get too in depth into this blog thing this week, because I got a deadline coming up next monday. Next week, expect me to have actual numbers to back up my points.