DirkPiggler (11-16-2021)
Front loading contracts is not a smart financial move.
Natural Immunity Croc
jpx7 (11-16-2021)
Jaw (11-17-2021)
Front loading for the Braves only makes sense if, and only if:
1. The Braves are sitting on a lot of unexpected 2021 revenue, and
2. The corporation will just take that extra money as profit, or apply it to debt.
If both those statements are true, and the decision is to apply cash now to Freeman's contract vs letting Liberty Media take it as profit, then it might make sense to give Freeman a lump sum up front and let the time value of that cash help the team in that sense. Paying him $30M now means they don't have to pay him $35M 5 years from now.
If it's "spend it or lose it", then spend it on Freeman now so they don't have to spend as much later.
Of course, that may all be a bunch of stupid talk, and not at all how the Braves finances work, but it's a scenario where front loading makes sense.
Last edited by Enscheff; 11-16-2021 at 03:13 PM.
DirkPiggler (11-16-2021), jpx7 (11-16-2021)
50PoundHead (11-16-2021), jpx7 (11-16-2021)
You just can't stop getting stuck on points that don't prove what you think they prove.
I say "use the extra cash now to increase flexibility later". You say "use the extra cash now to increase WS chances now". You then somehow try to justify the different opinion by pointing out revenue growth that will be the same in either scenario, and therefor isn't a point in favor of your opinion. This is basic logical thought.
We should all understand by now that the best way to win a WS is to get to the playoffs as often as possible. Trying to "go for it" in any particular year is a colossal waste of resources.
Of course this all is probably a wasted discussion because the Braves internal accounting probably doesn't work in the way required for frontloading to make sense.
jpx7 (11-16-2021)
As a blatant old-school and face of the franchise guy, these are the reasons I'm all for finding a way to make the money work and having Alex push his chips in now.
The Astros are coming off three World Series appearances in five years - with a couple of breaks, they could have been the next version of the Giants of the early 2010s. Even though they didn't quite pull it off I don't think their fans will regret it even though it will wind up costing them Correa here at the end. For whatever reason, their fans have always seemed to embrace Altuve more than him - and he's likely going to retire having been an Astro for his entire career.
The same situation now exists here - if Alex pushes his chips in and adds Reynolds and another SP like Castillo, the vast majority of the core will be in place for another 3-4 years and he'll still have pitching depth and several prospects with legitimate upside in place to step in when Dansby walks and he needs another OFer. Just as in Houston, there will be a group of fans that will say "I'd rather have had Acuna or Ozzie finish his career as a Brave". The difference is that the majority would prefer it's Freeman doing that since he's the one that the face of the franchise has more or less been passed to from Chipper - and Ronald and Ozzie will have a *elluva lot more value than he will in 4-5 years when you're starting a rebuild.
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?
It makes sense to frontload the contract if Liberty gives us a hard cap. If they say we can only spend X million in a season, then it can make sense to pay FF 30 million now while you're paying Acuna 15 b/c in 6 years you want to pay Acuna 30 million.
X will likely change over time, but paying FF now so you can pay Riley, Acuna, Albies etc later makes sense to me.
I hope we do not spend prospect capital on a 1B. Lots of bats are available that can be impact bats.
I do wonder if he can get KMarte or Renyolds though.
You'll still have the benefit of the Battery/New TV deal in the out years to manage a straighlined or escalating Freeman contract.
Right now we have the benefit of paying Acuna/Albies/Riley/Fried dirt. I liken this to the late 90s yankees when they had the core 4 cheap and were able to compliment the roster with their excess funds. We should be doing the absolute same thing now.
If in fact we do have this 1 year surplus then we could sign Freeman/Verlander/Marte/Soler/Kimbrel/etc....
Of course it doesn't guarantee a thing but I'll go to war with that squad.
Natural Immunity Croc
Jaw (11-17-2021)
That's the point I was going to make. The other angle I think about is that even if money loses value over years due to inflation (always has/always will), matching money to expected production needs to be taken into account. Say you give Freeman $160-$180 MM over six years. If you front load that, he would be easier to unload if his production were to fall off in the last two years of his contract and/or you would have more money available to replace the expected erosion in Freeman's production.