Braves' Rotation Can't Be This Good... Can it?

Imagine if every trip through the rotation was as good as the one the Braves just had. In the past five games, Atlanta's starters had this line: 3-1, 1.73, 28 K, 6 BB in 36.1 IP.

The most remarkable thing about those games is that that the Braves lost TWO of them thanks to an awakening, but still inconsistent, offense. The second most remarkable thing is that three of them were started by guys pitching their first full seasons in the bigs and a fourth was Charlie Morton's Major League debut. Of the pitchers in Atlanta's current rotation, only Tim Hudson has more than 21 career starts. In fact, Hudson has 6+ times as many starts in his career (296) as the other four have COMBINED (47).

I know that there is no way that this rotation could continue to be quite this good for much longer. However, I think this is far from a fluke as fans of other NL East teams would like to think. These are all talented guys. Hudson is a bonafide ace, obviously, but the other guys have plenty going for them.

Reyes has great movement on all his pitches, and Cox and McDowell thought last year that it was only a matter of him gaining control of those pitches at the big-league level. Reyes had not struggled in that area in the minors, but was just way too tightly wound in his first starts with the Braves. I've heard Tom Glavine being credited with getting in Jo-Jo's head and telling the youngster how good he thinks Reyes can be, so apparently the control problems were nothing that a pep talk from the greatest southpaw of this generation couldn't fix.

Jurrjens is like having a second Tim Hudson in the rotation. He only has a low 90's fastball but it sinks like crazy and he has a great change to go with it. Jurrjens almost never leaves a ball up in the zone if he's pitching well. When he's going, it's grounball after groundball. A formula that happens to be perfect for Coors Field, where Jair threw 7.2 scoreless innings last night.

Morton was drawing Adam Wainwright comparisons for his performance in Anaheim (of Los Angeles, California, The United States--just can't resist making fun of the Angels' ridiculous name. Now back to the blog), and those comparisons are as valid as they are ironic. Morton has the bigh 12 to 6 curve that highlights Wainwright's repetoire on top of having the same build. The irony being that Wainwright was once a Braves first round pick, exchange for J.D. Drew. Let's hope that Morton sticks around longer than Wainwright... or Drew, for that matter.

Jorge Campillo is not young (29) and is the one that would most easily be given the "fluke" designation, but I'd say he's a much more than adequate fourth or fifth starter. I think there's something quite different to a minor league journeyman (i.e. Buddy Carlyle or Jeff Bennett) all of a sudden "figuring out" the majors than there is to a guy like Campillo who went unnoticed through a stellar career in the Mexican League. The difference is that Campillo never even got his shot in the minor leagues until 3 years ago. If Campillo was an import with solid stats from the Japanese League (which is only marginally better than the Mexican League), it's safe to say that he would have a lot more hype behind him.

All that and I haven't said a word about his stuff yet. Let's just say that it took about as long for me to write that paragraph as it takes Campillo's change or curveball to get to home plate. Hitters wish they could swing twice at each pitch he throws. Maybe then they'd get a few more hits off him.

While they may not be the best rotation in the majors, the Braves rotation is more than enough to help the Braves continue to play like they have over the last few games. Especially if the offense comes out of it's shell, and starts to hit like it has in the last 3 Braves wins... and like it was supposed to all along. Now if we could only find a closer.... (Cue Mr. Gonzalez)