2025-2026 offseason thread

I know the Braves wont do this but they need to embrace this positonless pitcher stuff. In a world where 30% of teams make the playoffs we need to build a playoff team and hope to make the playoffs not the other way around. In the playoffs its better to get 2-3 elite innings than 6 good innings from a pitcher. Sale and Schwellenbach are good enough to go 6 innings in a playoff game but we can get almost as many innings from a pitcher coming out of the pen in a playoff series. The arm is most susceptible to injury when it is fatigued. So pitchers with injury issues we should be able to keep them healthier pitching more often but for shorter periods. For Sale it would be better for him to pitch 5 innings every 5 days than give him 6 days rest and have him pitch 6+ innings. And if we arent giving those extra days rest we need a 5th starter far less often with all the offdays in a season. Something like 15-20 starts in a season. We could go with bullpen games or call up a spot starter for those games if need be. We have plenty of options this year. Strider/Lopez/Holmes I think can all go 2 innings every 3 games and be pretty dominate. Sale we put on a pitch count around 80 pitches. If he can get through 6 or more in that many pitches all the better but generally the 5th is the limit. Schwelly and Waldrep being young you let them 6-7 if they can. I think we would need to add one reliable starter and my favorite for this strategy would be Ranger Suarez. We could reasonably expect 6 IP from him most nights. In theory with Strider/Lopez/Holmes pitching 2 innings every 3 games that comes out to around 120+ IP a year, And thats how we need to look out of it. How many quality innings can we get from people while keeping them healthy. It shouldnt be 200 innings as a SP or 70 IP as a reliever. Some people should be in between that. So we would have 7 pitchers giving us 120+ IP which leaves 6 more spots for relievers to fill in the rest of the innings. I think this would work extremely well if we could pair pitchers with very oppising styles. Like imagine facing Sale for 5 innings then having to face Strider pitching from the right side in a game. Also why adding the lefty Suarez is important,
 
https://twitter.com/x/status/1979191654301995040

Braves right now:
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msstate7 said:
Them.

Sonny gray will be an overpay for sure, but he's sorta what we need. A guy that takes the ball every 5th day bc he stays healthy.
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We would have to trade prospects of course but taking all of Grays salary would cut it down.
 
The Braves are going to have to go outside their comfort zone and take some chances with starting pitching acquisitions either way - unless we want another situation where Bryce Elder is leading the team in starts/innings.
 
Not averse to obtaining Gray depending on the balance or salary we would absorb versus prospect capital we would send to the Cardinals; take more salary sending less in terms of prospects or more prospects and less salary. Cardinals have puzzled me that last few years. It seems they should be better but they are a C+ team. If they shed Gray, they will need pitching and maybe a package that includes Lucas Braun and a pitcher that is further away (Baumann, Hernandez, etc.) could get it done if the Braves take on enough salary.
 
msstate7 said:
That most likely requires a 3 year commitment. We all know AA loves 1 year commitments
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Yeah but this offseason I think AA goes off his normal course. The CBA is gonna change a lot of things and if he can sign a couple of big guys that won't be affected the next offseason. AA is gonna finally spend I believe .
 
Hudson2 said:
Yeah but this offseason I think AA goes off his normal course. The CBA is gonna change a lot of things and if he can sign a couple of big guys that won't be affected the next offseason. AA is gonna finally spend I believe .
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Hope so
 
Gray is a pretty interesting trade candidate. If you assign $10M per WAR for a legit SP, and project him for 3+ WAR in 2026, it’s very likely he would sign for $30M+ if he were a FA willing to sign a 1 year deal.

So if the Cards paid for the $5M buyout, he would have almost exactly zero trade value. If they paid $10M total he would be worth a low end prospect with real value.

I would not be shocked in the least if AA got Gray plus $10M for something like a FV 40+ prospect.
 
Almost doesn't matter how much you spend on a 1 year deal. So Gray seems reasonable.

I do not think that the Braves will be winning any battles for the top free agents.
 
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