Major League Baseball

Caray: Braves' troubles vs. AL, Walden's impending return; more

Published Jun. 5, 2014 3:20 p.m. ET

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FOXSportsSouth.com checks in with play-by-play announcer Chip Caray to discuss the latest surrounding the Braves.

FOXSPORTSSOUTH.COM: The Braves are 31-21 against National League opponents, but with the home sweep at the hands of the Mariners, are 0-6 vs. the American League. That comes with the Angels later this month and the Athletics in August. Why is this team struggling vs. the AL?

CHIP CARAY: I think it's just one of those weird, statistical quirky things.

The frustrating part about four of those six games is that the Braves led and they lost all of them. Whether you're playing an American League team or a National League team, if you can't hold leads, obviously you're not going to win.

The Braves had some bullpen stumbles against the Red Sox and a throwing error and a little 82-foot ground ball led to four runs against Seattle, which ended up being a huge part why they ended up coming back in the 7-5 game Tuesday.

Any time you play good teams, and I think the Red Sox and Mariners have proven they are pretty good teams, if you don't play good, clean baseball, you don't play perfect baseball, you're going to have trouble winning whether you're at home or on the road.

Unfortunately, the weirdness, the oddness of it, is that several of those games have come in the heat of Interleague Play, where they Braves usually play very good baseball.

FSS.COM: Certainly any troubles can't be blamed on the DH, considering four of the six games have been played at Turner Field.

CARAY: Again, the bullpen has been good all year, they just had a few hiccups against the Red Sox. The Braves have just not had a point in the season where, for any extended period of time, they've really excelled in all faces of the game: pitching, hitting and defense.

It just hasn't happened yet and they're hopeful it will. But I think that's something that characterized the ball club last year; there were stretches of games where it seemed almost effortless how well they were playing and how crisp they were playing.

That hasn't happened yet and as a result, they find themselves in a dogfight with everybody in the East. It's anybody's division to win and I think we're all nervously excited about where the team is being in first place. But I think we all will look back in September when the Braves are in the thick of a race thinking 'Man, those games in April and May when Washington was hurt, when the Mets weren't playing well, when the Phillies were beat up, the Marlins were still trying to find themselves. That was a real missed opportunity to really make things more comfortable in the division race then it probably will be.'

FSS.COM: It's looking like Jordan Walden could return soon, beginning his rehab stint Thursday in Gwinnett. David Carpenter has a 5.73 ERA since trying to step into that role Walden filled, and while Simmons has been strong, what will it mean to get Walden back in the mix?

CARAY: Jordan's a valuable guy, in that he really allows Fredi Gonzalez to rest some guys in his bullpen. The great thing about Jordan, other than his obvious talent, is that he can get lefties and righties out effectively.

He's a strikeout pitcher. He's a power arm. He can come in and pitch an inning against the tough left-handed bats in a lineup, where you don't have to go to Alex Wood, who has struggled out of the bullpen. You don't have to go to Luis Avilan, who has already appeared in 30 games this year.

When you look at the division when its healthy: the Phillies have left-handed bats; the Nationals have tough left-handed bats in Bryce Harper and Adam LaRoche; even the Marlins have guys from the left side that can give you some trouble.

Obviously, Jordan Walden's a talented guy, he's a big part of the bullpen and he's been missed and hopefully his rehab stint goes well and hopefully he'll be able to join them as soon as Colorado.

FSS.COM: The MLB draft gets underway tonight, with the Braves getting the 32nd and 66th picks on Day 1. This franchise has a history of strong picks that have panned out, Mike Minor, Jason Heyward, Craig Kimbrel, Chipper Jones, Tom Glavine, Dale Murphy among them. We're seeing more of that home-grown talent now with Tommy La Stella and Shae Simmons. Is that what sets this franchise apart, an ability to find and develop its own players?

CARAY: Free-agency is a crap shoot. I think we've figured that out the last couple of years. You know what you're paying, but you don't know what you're going to get for the value of the dollar.

The great thing about drafting and developing your own players is you can teach them the Braves way. Ultimately, the really great organizations draft guys who are high-character with high ceilings and they are molded not only as players, but as men. So when they get to the big leagues, to quote Tony La Russa 'You're not constructing; you're reminding.'

I think that's the great thing about most of the kids that come up to the Braves major league ball club. They know how to play the game. That, I'm sure makes the job easier for the manager and the coaches, because they're trying to learn the league, not learn how to play.

That's not always the case in a lot of places. Yes, crafting and developing a pipeline of young talent is the lifeblood of any successful organization and the Braves are a model that has been and will continue to be the envy of all Major League Baseball.

While the sexy picks will always be No. 1 or No. 2 at the top of the draft board, if you look at the history of the franchise, a lot of guys that were selected in the late rounds that turn out to be really talented players.

That's where the St. Louis Cardinals, for example, have gotten a ton of mileage out of their organization, 15th, 18th, 20th, 40th-round draft picks.

A lot of attention are going to go to those first two guys the Braves pick, but you don't always hit on them. But if overall you hit on some guys in the mid-to-late rounds too, and you get some pleasant surprises, that's what makes it really worth while.

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