• The AJC’s Braves blogs appear to be abuzz with the possibility of trading for someone like Jake Peavy, who would certainly be fitted for the Braves, who need an ace for the upcoming season.  The 2007 Cy Young winner was only 10-11 last year, but he did play for the Padres, who, for lack of a better phrase, absolutely sucked. Apparently Peavy is available for the right price, though a proposal has probably not been put on the table yet. Do you think he’d be a good fit?
• Maybe Furcal is cheaper after committing three errors on the Dodgers’ way to the showers for the season, eh? I’d take cheaper.
• What sort of power outfielder do you think the Braves have more chance of landing?  A Matt Holliday type? A Manny type? Xavier Nady? Or should we trade our best box of toothpicks for Andruw (I’m kidding, I’m kidding).

To me, I’d love to see Peavy on the team – but no way of knowing if we can swing it. We NEED an ace. Is Peavy the dude for us?

The Braves’ offense looked good in the first inning.  Yunel Escobar singled and scored on a double that Chipper Jones hit into the gap.  Those two quick hits got the Braves on the board with a 1-0 lead in the first.  Unfortunately, that was about all the offense amounted to for the night.  They managed only 1 more hit for the rest of the evening.  However, that one-run lead held until Matt Holliday sent one into the seats.

It’s sad to see a gem of pitching by Tom Glavine go wasted.  Tommy pitched 6.1 innings amassing the following: 3 H, 0 R, 3 K, 3 BB.  Either way, it’s great to see him back in a Braves uniform. Boyer’s untimely home run pitch gained him his second loss of the season.  It was a quick, cold game (2:05, ~38 degrees) that resulted in another loss for the Braves.  It was a combination of lack of offense and our bullpen that cost us this game.  We need to get a few of these one-run games going the way of the Braves or it’s going to be a long, heartbreaking season.

The Braves’ record now stands a 3-4 while the Rockies are 2-5.  Hopefully we’ll see a little more offensive punch out of the Braves tonight as Jair Jurrjens faces off against Ubaldo Jiminez at 8:35pm EST.

Preseason Team Awards

Best AL Team: Detroit Tigers
Best NL Team: New York Mets (I said it, but I’m not happy about it.)
Most Hyped Team: New York Mets
Worst AL Team: Tampa Bay Devil Rays
Worst NL Team: Florida Marlins (this was a no-brainer.  The state of Florida is apparently cursed.)
Best AL Division: The AL East beats out the Central for this title with the Blue Jays being the determining factor.
Best NL Division: The East is strong (and beats out the West) with the Mets, Phillies, and Braves all looking for the division title.  We should see some great baseball out of this division all season long.
Worst AL Division:  The West is going to be ugly with Oakland, Seattle, and Texas.  Texas should be on the rise, but Oakland completely disassembled whatever they had last year in their fire sale.
Worst NL Division:  The NL Central has a couple teams that are decent (Chicago and Milwaukee), but Cincinnati, Houston, and Pittsburgh bring the division down to the worst in the NL.

This year is going to be fun to watch in several divisions – the AL East and Central promise to be intriguing, as do the NL East and West.  The Tigers and Indians are going to create some great story lines, and we’re all familiar with the NL East and the competition we’ll see there this year.

Preseason Individual Awards

AL MVP: Alex Rodriguez
NL MVP: Matt Holliday
AL Cy Young: C.C. Sabathia
NL Cy Young: Jake Peavy
AL Batting Title: Ichiro Suzuki
NL Batting Title: Matt Holliday
AL HR Title: Alex Rodriguez
NL HR Title: Ryan Howard

There we go – our projections for the individual awards in 2008.  No, we don’t think Johan Santana will win the NL Cy Young award this year – he’s a great pitcher, but I think Peavy will pull it out this year.  The others don’t have many surprises – Matt Holliday is a very solid hitter that is only helped by the fact that he plays in Colorado.