Between Folty, ManBan, Hale, and Wandy, there's plenty of options for the 5th spot, no biggie.
Braves1976 (01-15-2015)
Bowman reiterates Braves' interest in Aoki and adds Gomes to the list of potential targets.
"Before projecting what the Braves might do from an offensive perspective this season, it must be noted that Hart said he is not done making changes to his Major League roster. The primary offensive need is to acquire a left fielder via trade or the thin free-agent market. Jonny Gomes and Nori Aoki are among the free-agent outfielders who have at least piqued Atlanta's interest."
http://m.braves.mlb.com/news/article...major-turnover
Last edited by Braves1976; 01-15-2015 at 07:03 PM.
NinersSBChamps (01-15-2015)
Yep, saw that too. My interpretation is that Bowman's sources are telling him that we have about $10m to spend, and Bowman has our our current number at $92m.
I obviously think Bowman's number is low. Roster Resource has us at $93.5m without Toscano (1.5m), Wandy (2m), and assumes the players w/ basic incentives in their deals will hit none of them (Callaspo has 1m, Jim J has 900k, Grilli has some, etc.). Also, several players have award bonus potential that should be accounted for: Markakis, Kimbrel, Freeman.
My $98m is probably a bit low really.
I wouldn't be surprised if we signed a FA to play left, but put me in the camp for letting the in-house guys fight it out. What the hell, right? I'm still gonna watch, whether it's Nori Aoki or Terdo/Hunter.
We Got 99% Of The Puzzle And It Looks like Dog ****, But Gotta Wait TIL He Puts That Last Piece IN Before We Can Call it Dog ****? Nothing short of announcing they succesfully cloned several young versions of Chipper Jones will make anyone think the offense isn't goin h to be dog ****.
"Donald Trump will serve a second term as president of the United States.
It’s over."
Little Thethe Nov 19, 2020.
I'm on board with pursuing Aoki and Gomes at the right price given that they are the best everyday LF and RH platoon LF available, respectively. This is the time of year and the range of the market where you typically get the best value. If one of these guys signs and has a good first half for us, we can flip for a prospect at the deadline.
To be clear, I think the idea of building the value of current assets by giving them playing time has merit. Almonte is more or less a shoo in to make the opening day 25. The Braves gave him a major league deal and he's out of options. I think Cunningham has value, but he is redundant with Almonte. Hunter and Terd are replacement level players in my view. I would not pass up on a good deal on Aoki or Gomes to protect ABs for those two.
Just 10m? Wow.
Question for my saber pals: I see that Aoki didn't get very many of those WARs last year in KC. And although oWAR plus dWAR does not equal total WAR, which I may never understand (is there a base running WAR? One for clutchness and grit?), I note that his dWARs were good in MIL and negative in KC.
Now, I watched enough of the Royals to know that Lo Cain can cover two states and not break a sweat. In fact, BR says he's worth 5 WARs, which I know from nsacpi means he should sign for $45m AAV. And I know he's a good not great hitter, so a big chunk of that purported value must be defense.
So, my question- does Cain poaching balls in LC cause his WARs to inflate (so his agent can demand the $45m, no doubt) at the expense of Aoki's?
Or, seriously, the guy didn't get bad on D overnight. He's got that lithe Japanese body type that ought to age well. I don't necessarily think it would be a noose to give him three years at a moderate salary, he's likely to be performing at the same level or close to it.
Speaking of supple Japanese, Ichiro is also available. I'd rather see him out there for a season than Aoki.
Julio3000 (01-16-2015)
He's VERY lithe.
Gov, I've wondered the same thing and am not really sure. One thing I have learned in the past year from reading about these metrics is that they are much more susceptible to low sample size then offensive metrics based on how they're calculated. So for Aoki, it may be more accurate to look at the average of his last three years and dial that result down a bit given the expected decline for his age.
Aoki UZR / 150 from 2012 - 2014: 5th out of 13 qualifiers (Markakis was 11th)
Aoki DRS from 2012 - 2014: 4th out of 13 qualifiers (Markakis was 10th)