I Wouldn't be surprised if Doumit wasnt the starter. He had a down year. He's not the best, but he's probably the best overall catcher on the team in all facets of the game
People continue to underrate Gattis defensively. If the Braves thought that he couldn't hack it behind the plate a greater attempt at retaining Mac would have been made.
Natural Immunity Croc
Has there EVER been a statement and question a certain someone should absolutely never have made and asked publicly more than...
Kinda pathetic to see yourself as a message board knight in shining armor. How impotent does someone have to be in real life to resort to playing hero on a message board?
Though he's not considered a strong defensive catcher, Doumit would give the Braves a cheap option behind the dish in the wake of Brian McCann's departure to the Yankees. Doumit is owed jusr $3.5MM in 2014. The Braves have Evan Gattis, Gerald Laird and Christian Bethancourt as internal options at catcher, but Bethancourt could require more seasoning, Laird is a backup and Gattis has serious OBP concerns. He alsos struggled against right-handed pitching (.236/.284/.473), which is where Doumit exceeds (.270/.330/.454).
In what world is a 757 OPS struggling and a 784 OPS exceeding? And saying he has OBP concerns when comparing him to Doumit is just being lazy. 48 ISO for Gattis and 60 for Doumit. It all stems from Gattis' low average and his insanely low 248 BABIP against righties. That will change and this his avg/obp will take a pretty big jump when it does.
Doumit is here for the bench and he will should do a pretty good job of it.
thethe (12-19-2013)
I like the trade, solid bench player and the Braves have a wealth of pitchers in the minors...just curious and for debate where do ya'll think each one of these guys will start this year and where they project to in the majors
Sims
Graham
Hursh
Cody Martin
Northcraft
Luis Merejo
Juan Jaime
Mark Lamm
Ian Thomas
David Hale
obviously some of these guys are a few years away, but arguably all of them are better prospects than Gilmartin
Your question brings up an interesting question about projections and projections systems. Most systems take a weighted average of the past three years. My general observation is the weights tend to give too much weight to the last year, particularly for players in mid-career. For younger players (under 25) and older players (over 35) it is appropriate to give more weight to the last year because those are the parts of a player's career where large changes in underlying abilities often take place.
Anyhow my way of doing things for a player in mid-career (age 25-35) is to look at their last three years and throw out their best year and worst year. In effect I pick their middle year out of the last three for making a projection. I'll do a little data mining and cite Shane Victorino as Exhibit A for the desirability of doing this. He had a down year in 2012. The approach outlined above indicated he would rebound in 2013. Of course, he did a bit more than just rebound. He overperformed.
Anyhow, Doumit's middle-year suggests about 1.5 WAR in 2014.
I realize this reflects my own idiosyncratic quick-and-dirty way of doing player projections. ymmv
The pros who do projections generally avoid tagging a kid in A ball as future #1. At this point I think most of them will say Sims has a chance to be a #2 or #3. The guys in our system who are more likely to someday be a #1 are those who have already done something in the majors-Teheran, Minor, Wood, Medlen. They are relatively young and their 2013 performances were not far from being elite. Shave a little off the walk rate or bump up the strikeout rate a little and they are there. Beachy was also not far from being elite when he had his elbow injury. I think people have forgotten how good he was.
I'd say the other guys on your list are pretty unlikely to become #1s. Graham has the biggest upside. But even before he developed the shoulder problem he was a very good but not elite prospect.
Last edited by nsacpi; 12-19-2013 at 09:11 AM.
While other GMs are spending like Slim Thug in a strip club, I think we should consider locking up those four guys with long term deals buying out arb/FA 1-2 years and seeing if we can't lock down The Next Great Atlanta Pitching Staff.
Apparently Heyward, Freeman and Simmons won't take our money. Too much possible upside from the Yanks and Dodgers. But pitchers can always get hurt, so maybe they'll be amenable to some Chris Sale-style deals. More of a gamble than locking up position players, I know, but they've all got ace potential.
Edit: those four = Medlen, Minor, Teheran, Beachy. Maybe Wood, too, but I need to see a little more.
The trouble is while I would be willing to bet that one of our 2014 starters will take that step forward and become an ace, I don't have much confidence in predicting which one it will be. I'd rather not play roulette with pitcher contracts, especially with Sims, Graham, Cabrera, Hursh and some of the others coming down the pipeline.
I follow the minors relatively well, was just curious as to what others thoughts were as pitching has always been a Braves hallmark. All these guys definitely made Gilmartin expendable, rarely do the Braves trade a pitcher who ends up being great which is why I think the Doumit deal was solid. Off the top of my head Wainwright is the only one I could see them truly regretting, correct me if anymore can be thought of. And yes I totally agree on Beachy, hopefully he can regain some of that form. I know Tommy John surgery is unpredictable, but it blew my mind when Beachy had to have his. Dudes mechanics seemed spot on and he was/has such a smooth delivery, nothing violent whatsoever.
Did you see me posting that Gilmartin was destined for stardom or that there was anything wrong with the trade? Didn't think so. You picked a debate/argument over basically nothing.
Big however here though. You and the poster, quoted below, were probably still in diapers when Bruce Chen was just coming up in the late 90's. So neither of you would remember. The org hyped him to they extreme. They gave up on him, and included him. It's not even worth looking up to see who was included in the deal (or comparing WAR). Point is that, no, he never became an ace, but here he's had a respectable enough major career after all these years.
Thanks for sharing all that earth-shaking news. Nobody would've ever known without your input.
Incidentally, Felix could've gone either way as starter or closer.
Last edited by Knucksie; 12-19-2013 at 10:02 AM.