Jair Jurrjens

Signing an oft-injured pitcher to a slightly over-priced, incentive-laden deal?

The Orioles have made it a side-business over the past few years, inking such pitchers as Justin Duchscherer, Dana Eveland, Randy Wolf, Josh Rupe and Jeremy Accardo.

The Baltimore Orioles are taking a chance on 26-year-old right-hander Jair Jurrjens, and there's a fair chance that it will pay off in a big way for them.

The San Francisco Giants should have made five moves this offseason in addition to re-signing free agents Jeremy Affeldt, Angel Pagan and Marco Scutaro, and extending the contract of Santiago Casilla.

The MLB trade deadline brings excitement each summer as contenders try to improve their team while pretenders look to the future.

The saying in baseball is that you can't have too much pitching, so starting pitchers are always at high demand around the deadline.

An elite starting pitcher can be the difference in reaching the postseason or making a run at a World Series Championship.

Cliff Lee was traded at the deadline to the Texas Rangers a few years ago and led them all the way to the World Series.

Jair Jurrjens isn’t getting any better. Since suffering a knee injury in the second half of the 2011 season, Jurrjens has looked uncomfortable on the mound has has vastly underperformed for an Atlanta Braves team that needed him to be one of the consistent starters in their rotation.

The Atlanta Braves are one of the hottest teams in baseball right now, having won nine of their last 10 games.

And, they've done it with a combination of pitching and hitting.

With their recent success, and the early-season questions of needing to acquire another outfielder to take the place of Martin Prado, I'm wondering if it's best for the Braves to stand pat with their lineup.

It appears as though the pitcher's era has begun.

There have been many surprises this season, and many teams have ended up with great pitching staffs.

It is very debatable which team actually has the best pitching staff.

In this article, I will give my opinion on the matter, and rank the top five staffs in the NL, along with a few honorable mentions.

Begin Slideshow

I have recently heard talk of the Braves considering making a trade before the non-waiver deadline on July 31st.

However, I do not think a trade would be helpful to the current situation the Braves are in.

Sure, it would be nice to have a center fielder who could hit, but there are drawbacks to this.

In this article, I will address these drawbacks, and discuss the five main reasons I believe a trade would do harm to the Braves.

One of the biggest questions surrounding the Atlanta Braves was the status of starter Jair Jurrjens.

After an impressive 2011 debut, Atlanta fans can breathe a sigh of relief. Although the young righty was absent for much of the Atlanta playoff run last season, he was seen as a crucial part of the Braves starting staff.

After looking at Braves starting pitcher Jair Jurrjens’ numbers prior the start of last season, many would have slated him as the team’s No. 2 starter, right below Tim Hudson, after two impressive campaigns in both 2008 and 2009.