Talking Chop’s favorite FanPosts of 2017

Hello, friends! Happy Holidays, Happy New Year, and so on and so forth. As 2017 draws to a close, we at Talking Chop wanted to look back on the year in Fanposts, because there was a lot of good stuff contributed by the commentariat this year.

WIthout further ado, a recap of some of the stuff we liked the most is below, organized by month:

January

• Breakout prospects of 2017 — notable not for the content, but for the discussion it generated, which was quite excellent. Very interesting in the context of what happened... and didn’t happen... over the course of the 2017 calendar year.
• Post your own personal Top 30 (prospects) — again, mostly a call for discussion in the comments, but also very interesting to go back and compare. Who was the best prospect guru relative to what happened? Look at the comments and report back!

February

• Recap of the Community Prospect Best Tools list, Detailed Analysis and Summary (two separate posts) — praeceps93 did yeoman’s work pulling this together, and this list reflects the community’s consensus (as far as majority votes, go, anyway) on prospect tools prior to the 2017 season. How has this changed from last season to this one? Maybe someone should do this again!
• Projecting the future of the Shelby Miller trade — just how lopsided was this trade, many months after the fact? mfrancis14 takes a look.

March

• Why doesn’t Mauricio Cabrera strike out more batters? — a very interesting and thorough examination of something that didn’t end up mattering at all for the big-league Braves in 2017 season. This is what the offseason does to people. Thanks, mcfrancis14, for the detailed treatment.
• Folty’s Window of Awesomeness Choose Your Own Adventure - some of the best thought-provoking stuff all year here from ABsinceWayBack. Unfortunately for everyone, Folty chose the adventure of “be an average starter” last year, which isn’t really all that interesting.
• From Ender with Glove: The Implications of Inciarte’s Famous Catch - well-written summary of a great moment.
• Bartolo Might be Prehistoric - another great summary of a 2017 Braves pitcher by ABsinceWayBack. Unfortunately, this was one of the best things about Colon as a Brave, since his on-field performance was kind of stinky, to say the least.
• Options, in Layman’s Terms - from the aptly-named BravesOptionsGuy, this is a great reference that should be stickied if you’re stickler for the arcana of MLB roster rules.
• An Up Close View of SunTrust Park - pictures are great, and when they’re pictures of the Braves’ new ballpark before Opening Day, even better! Thanks, CurtisPotts, for giving those of us who won’t make it to the new park for a while (if ever) an inside, hi-def view!
• Five Bold Predictions for 2017 - it’s become somewhat of an annual tradition, and this is worth reading in its entirety, post and comments, to see what wacky things the commentariat predicted happening in 2017, some of which actually transpired. Thanks to BravesRays for summarizing the 2016 results, and to everyone for making public their predictions.

April

• Book Review: “Ballplayer” by Chipper Jones - no, this isn’t a mandatory homework assignment, but Steve89gt did it anyway, giving all of us a glimpse into Chipper’s autobiography.

May

• Freddie Freeman is Better thank You Think - by Bill Dennis. Except, what if I already think he’s the bee’s knees? What then?
• Best Organizations at Developing Pitchers - great research and food for thought from bischofshof.
• The Angels got 4 free innings - Bill Dennis details, in excruciating fashion, one of the worst on-field performances of Braves baseball ever.
• Bartolo is Big - remember up above, where ABsinceWayBack had that great Bartolo Colon fanpost? He followed it up with one trying to investigate Colon’s issues. The Braves didn’t care, though, and parted ways with Colon shortly thereafter.

June

• Why am I a fan of the Atlanta Braves, by mavkgb99 - this was a bit of a thing at Talking Chop in early June, and this was a great post.
• What is wrong with Julio Teheran? JMac13’s thoughts — when a veteran struggles, there are always theories and handwavy explanations for the struggles, but sometimes analysis goes above and beyond in providing both theory and evidence for the declining performance. That’s what this post did.
• Way too in-depth prospect rankings - gotta appreciate the effort from ncristoldeman here, who provided lots and lots of thoughts, going very deeply into the (now very different) Braves farm system.

July

• How RA got his ERA back - yes, it’s another ABsinceWayBack post about a Braves starting pitcher, and yes, it’s another great deep dive on the wacky world of one of baseball’s few knuckleballers.
• An Ace for Atlanta - a long, detailed exploration of everyone’s favorite question (but what is an ace?) and the relevant considerations for the Braves when thinking about possibly trading for one. Spoiler alert: the Braves didn’t, and haven’t yet. Credit: goliathefy.

August

• Where are the Braves’ Top 20 Prospects of 2012? - this effort by Raichu could either be illuminating or depressing (or maybe both), depending on how you want to look at it.
• MLB Teams as English Soccer Clubs - I don’t know anything about the EPL, but maybe you do, and if so, this might be of interest.
• Swing Breakdown: Change in Dansby Swanson’s Stance Making All the Difference - swing analysis is great if you know how to do it (which I don’t), so it’s always a pleasure to read something along those lines, like this post contributed by RSmith1. Notably, while Swanson hit very well in August (which is when this post was made), he backslid in September. I wonder if his swing mechanics did as well...
• 2016 Atlanta Braves: Where Are They Now? — a weird trip down Recent Memory Lane, courtesy of (probably)notabandwagonfan.
• Players Eligible for the 2017 Rule 5 Draft in the Atlanta Braves Organization - FONZY451 provided Talking Chop with his Fonzgraphs feature here, generating a ton of discussion for something that always ends up being fairly inconsequential: the Rule 5 draft.

September

• September’s fanposts were largely eaten up by the start of the Community Prospect List, painstakingly run by rajah. You can check out the final list here.

October

• The Costanza Defense: How A Illiterate Drunk Saved by Braves — I’ve got three words for you: “Fanpost by BobWickmansBeerGut.” What else do you need in life?

November

• Best Players Available in the 2017 Rule 5 Draft - Fonzgraphs returns, taking a look at the Rule 5 pickins from other organizations. As was the case for pretty much every such analysis, actual pick Anyelo Gomez was not featured.

December

• Grading the Braves Pitcher Arsenals - this post and its companion posts (linked therein) by nscheffel assess the pitch quality of the various Braves pitchers — interesting stuff.

2018 is sure to bring a lot more fanpost goodness. If you’ve got thoughts, we love hearing them and then arguing about them. (Unless they’re rosterbation thoughts, in which case, there’s already a thread for that!)