Farewell to Wood, Peraza, Jimmy Johns, and Avilans.

weso1 said:
That quote gives me a lot of hope. To state that this is the first building block. I'm excited to see how the offense evolves from here. I think Hart gets that the offense needs a lot of help.
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Um, if he doesn't get that, it's time to take him behind the barn and put him out of his misery. There are really only a handful of people in the who don't get this, and they're all posting here.
 
weso1 said:
That quote gives me a lot of hope. To state that this is the first building block. I'm excited to see how the offense evolves from here. I think Hart gets that the offense needs a lot of help.
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That scares me more than it would have 2 days ago. I'm not sure I want to see part 2
 
weso1 said:
See this is the type of rhetoric I'm talking about. His minor league numbers are really good. Why even say that last part? I mean you only mention the positives of Wood and the negatives of Olivera. I could just as easily say, I'd rather have the athletic 3B with the strong bat over the unorthodox delivery velocity declining starter.
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He's played 19 minor league games, 6 of which came at the rookie ball level. Wood is a proven commodity. Olivera has clearly done nothing yet to prove he's the strong bat you claim. And we added a top 50 prospect to boot.

I've yet to hear an argument on this board as to how this deal makes sense.
 
ChapelHillMatt said:
They have done a good job but not every trade they make will be good. You don't have to blindly support them.you even said yourself earlier in the thread (when you found out who was in the deal) that there should be a significant return. Now after you find out what the trade is you go into spin mode and try to paint a positive picture no matter how bad it looks. You have a tendency to do this with every trade. I get that you are an optimist but just because someone is against a trade that doesn't mean they have an axe to grind with the front office. This trade just makes no sense for a team trying to rebuild. We gave away more young talent than we are getting back and we added payroll.
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A few things. We added payroll as a number but we filled a spit that was going to take a huge financial commitment and we have the arms to replace Wood in the rotation.

What if I believe Olivera is a big return? There is a reason he got huge money in thenoffseason.

I was told not to blindly support the trades in thenoffseason as well. I just happen to think the front office knows what they are doing
 
If we didn't do that stupid Cahil trade, maybe we could've taken more salary and kept Peraza.

Just speculation on my part of course... but I really hated that ****in trade
 
thethe said:
A few things. We added payroll as a number but we filled a spit that was going to take a huge financial commitment and we have the arms to replace Wood in the rotation.

What if I believe Olivera is a big return? There is a reason he got huge money in thenoffseason.

I was told not to blindly support the trades in thenoffseason as well. I just happen to think the front office knows what they are doing
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It's just funny - and kind of sad - how you will immediately shift your opinion to take the lens of whatever the organization is doing. Time after time. No matter what. You lose a lot of credibility with your objectivity.
 
SidSlid92 said:
I've yet to hear an argument on this board as to how this deal makes sense.
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It "makes sense" insofar as I think Hart believes the Braves scored an offensive-impact infielder way under where the market would value it—both in terms of his average-annual-salary (thanks to the Dodgers swallowing the signing bonus), if he were a free-agent, and in terms of prospect-status, since he's old as turd-buckets. They also maybe get a young, better Avilan, if healthy, and a lottery-ticket arm.

Oh, but the main player also comes with the "if healthy" caveat, has never hit major-league pitching, has precious few minor-league PAs, and is almost as agèd as Nick Markakis—which is why there's a good argument that this trade ultimately doesn't make sense. The rebuilding Braves got older, not that much cheaper, and essentially took on all the risk (and, please—let's quit assuming Alex Wood is slam-dunk for arm problems just because he's got some motion in his ocean) while paying a premium price for the luxury of assuming that risk.

So, yea: this transaction can "make sense" from certain angles, but that doesn't mean it's made savvy, smart, or sound. "Making sense" is a bare-minimum qualifier that leaves a lot of room to see this as a raw deal for Atlanta, risky at best, retrograde at worst.
 
yeezus said:
yes national writers who have no ties to the Braves are "trying to come up with reasons." a lot remains to be seen with this trade, but clearly people - outside this board, even - don't think the Braves were robbed. to declare anything right now like we know the outcome is just silly.
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I've just scoured Dodgers forums, MLBTR, and some general baseball boards, and basically you, thethe, Enscheff, and some guy on MLBTR (who might be Enscheff) are the only people roundly defending the deal.

Most Braves fans are upset, or very skeptical. And we should be. This is a very unconventional move.

Dodgers fans, though, are ecstatic.
 
yeezus said:
I'll give you credit, you've been borderline homer on everything recently (I say borderline because it's tough to be against most things we've done). I just disagree that this is an awful deal, and again: I haven't seen anyone outside this board think it is terrible for us. that can sometimes tell you something.
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You must not be reading very many things outside of this site then. Most of the people outside of this site I've read that are neutral parties are rather confused as to why we overpaid so much for Olivera. And I haven't really read any neutral party that didn't say we overpaid so far.
 
thethe said:
A few things. We added payroll as a number but we filled a spit that was going to take a huge financial commitment and we have the arms to replace Wood in the rotation.

What if I believe Olivera is a big return? There is a reason he got huge money in thenoffseason.

I was told not to blindly support the trades in thenoffseason as well. I just happen to think the front office knows what they are doing
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You thought Wren knew what he was doing too until he got fired. It's just the way you choose to follow your teams. It makes it hard to take your posts seriously. You support every move the current GM makes, no matter what it is. If we loved Olivera this much we should have signed him. If they wanted a big bat trade for one but do it for someone younger and has proved himself. Olivera won't help us when we are contending again
 
I just keep asking myself: Did I blackout and lay with Hart's mom or something? Because dude has definitely made it his personal mission to trade any players to whom I take a real shine.
 
smootness said:
I do agree with a lot of this, though not the part about the Heyward/Upton trades.

But I don't like that we're acting like we just realized the FA market for hitting was weak.
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It is not just the FA market. Top notch hitting, especially with a modicum of power, is very hard to find these days. Up until this past off-season, in the free agent market pitchers got paid more per projected WAR than hitters. It switched dramatically last off-season. And it looks like it will remain that way for a while.
 
Regarding Olivera, here is one angle to think about. The Dodgers signed him for 62M or about 10M/year. The going rate for free agent hitters last off-season was 7-8 M per expected WAR. So maybe they valued him at about a little over 1 WAR per year.

Nick Markakis btw was signed by us at 11M/year and a reasonable projection for him was 1.5 WAR/year over the life of the contract. We paid the going market rate for him.

You can play around a little with uncertainty being different for the two players, etc. But the bottom line is the market valued Markakis a bit higher than Olivera last off-season. I don't think enough has changed since to change that ranking.
 
jpx7 said:
It "makes sense" insofar as I think Hart believes the Braves scored an offensive-impact infielder way under where the market would value it—both in terms of his average-annual-salary (thanks to the Dodgers swallowing the signing bonus), if he were a free-agent, and in terms of prospect-status, since he's old as turd-buckets. They also maybe get a young, better Avilan, if healthy, and a lottery-ticket arm.

Oh, but the main player also comes with the "if healthy" caveat, has never hit major-league pitching, has precious few minor-league PAs, and is almost as agèd as Nick Markakis—which is why there's a good argument that this trade ultimately doesn't make sense. The rebuilding Braves got older, not that much cheaper, and essentially took on all the risk (and, please—let's quit assuming Alex Wood is slam-dunk for arm problems just because he's got some motion in his ocean) while paying a premium price for the luxury of assuming that risk.

So, yea: this transaction can "make sense" from certain angles, but that doesn't mean it's made savvy, smart, or sound. "Making sense" is a bare-minimum qualifier that leaves a lot of room to see this as a raw deal for Atlanta, risky at best, retrograde at worst.
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Yeah, I can squint at this deal and see how it "makes sense," and I can see a few ways that it could pan out for the Braves, but it comes with an awful lot of risk attached. I'm not going to go hurling calumnies at the Johns, but I'm skeptical. Hopeful, yes, but skeptical.
 
From Keith Law

Atlanta's end of the deal makes far less sense to me, unless everything I've heard on Hector Olivera is off base. He's played sparingly in Double-A and Triple-A this year, but has been largely out of action for the last five weeks due to a hamstring injury. He's a below-average athlete with questions around his throwing arm because of possible damage to the UCL in that elbow, although he's played mostly third base this year and will likely do the same for Atlanta. At the plate, he's got fringy bat speed with plus raw power, the type of hitter who could poke 20-25 homers with a mid-.200s batting average if playing every day. He's already 30 years old, and the five years Atlanta acquired take him into the typical decline period for hitters, so this is as good as it gets -- but given how little experience he has in U.S. leagues the variance around that rough projection is even higher than it would be for most players. I just don't see why Atlanta, a team retooling for 2017 and beyond, would give up Peraza and Wood to get a player who's already on the wrong side of his 30th birthday and doesn't appear to be a star.

The Braves did get one of my favorite under-the-radar prospects in right-hander Zach Bird, a very athletic player who just turned 21 and has struck out over a man an inning in the hitter-friendly Cal League this year. Bird is typically 90-94 with an above-average curveball and changeup, and his delivery works well, but he was very raw when he signed as a 17-year-old out of high school in 2012 and is still learning to repeat the delivery and has below-average command and control even now. He has mid-rotation starter upside, but the risk of him never getting there is still high. It will be great for him to move to a less hostile environment in the Carolina League.

Atlanta also gets lefty Paco Rodriguez, who has two modes -- effective and injured, with the latter in play at the moment. He'll likely have periods of both modes over the next few years, as he was considered a high-injury risk out of the draft in 2012, with several teams taking him off their draft boards due to medical concerns, but when he's on the mound he's death to lefties and useful against righties, the type of player Atlanta could flip next July if he's healthy to acquire a longer-term asset.

For Atlanta, therefore, this deal revolves around Olivera. If the Braves are right and he's an above-average or better regular right now, then it's a good trade for them, especially since they'll only have to pay him $32 million over five years. Getting Bird and the pick are positives, but their present value isn't enough to materially alter the balance of the deal right now. If they're too optimistic and/or Olivera's elbow blows out, then they gave up a lot of future value in Wood and Peraza to acquire a player who doesn't do enough to push them toward contention in 2017 when Boondoggle Field opens in Cobb County.
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i think the only way we "win" this trade is Wood gets hurt and Peraza kinda flames out, both of which are more likely than Olivera becoming a stud... and I find all 3 of these scenarios unlikely
 
sturg33 said:
i think the only way we "win" this trade is Wood gets hurt and Peraza kinda flames out, both of which are more likely than Olivera becoming a stud... and I find all 3 of these scenarios unlikely
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There are other ways we could win the trade. I like Bird and he has been lost in the shuffle. I'm not a fan of this trade. I hated losing Peraza. But I think there is maybe a 30-40% chance we win the trade. To me that's not good enough. But it is far from the worst trade I've seen.
 
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