Chipper to Receive Rest; Career #s Against Arizona

The Atlanta Braves are currently riding high on a five-game win streak and are 10-1 since opening the season on a four game losing streak. Take away those first four games and the Braves are the best team in baseball right now.

In today’s 3-2 win over the Arizona Diamondbacks, Chipper Jones went 1-for-3 with an RBI single, giving him eight RBI on the year in only eight games. Jones is currently batting a solid .286. His eight RBI are good enough for third on the team behind Freddie Freeman’s 13 and Brian McCann’s nine.

Jones has missed almost half of the season thus far, playing in only eight of the team’s 15 games thus far due to his sore knee. Jones had to miss the series opener against the Diamondbacks on Thursday after swelling of the knee during the long flight from Atlanta to Phoenix to play the D‘Backs.

This brings up an unfortunate point in that Jones’ knee on flights, which of course there are plenty of during the season, could cause him to miss quite a few series openers (hopefully not the series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals on May 11, for which I have tickets to).

Juan Francisco, who has hit two home runs in replacement of Jones, has been getting much of the playing time at third base when Chipper is not in the lineup. In addition to Francisco’s two homers this season he’s batting .292 with six RBI. Experts say that Francisco could see as many as 250 at-bats this season in replace of Jones.

According to MLB.com’s Jesse Sanchez, the Braves will give Chipper the day off on Sunday for the final game against the Diamondbacks. So, barring a pinch hit appearance, Saturday will have been Jones’ final game at Arizona’s Chase Field in his career. Sanchez reports that Jones will likely also be given rest on Monday against the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodgers Stadium and will next play on Tuesday, which happens to be Chipper’s 40^th birthday.

It’s interesting to note that Chipper has been in baseball three years longer than the Arizona Diamondbacks organization. Jones’ rookie season was 1995. The Diamondbacks inaugural season was 1998. In 96 career games against the Diamondbacks, Jones has hit around .325 with 15 homers and 62 RBI. Jones hit six of his 15 career homers off the Diamondbacks off of future hall of fame pitcher Randy Johnson. Johnson is the only D’Backs pitcher that Jones has taken deep more than once.

This blog is dedicated to Chipper Jones’ final season in baseball and won’t feature too much talking on topics that don’t feature Jones, or at least the Atlanta Braves, but I must take this opportunity to congratulate Chicago White Sox pitcher Philip Humber on making baseball history by throwing the 21^st perfect game in baseball history on Saturday afternoon against the Seattle Mariners. I was able to see the final inning of Humber’s perfect game and let me tell you the final inning of a perfect game is among the most nerve-wracking things in sports you can ever be witness to.