2025-2026 offseason thread

If AA doesn’t get another SP nobody is allowed to act surprised, or use “pitchers are risky” as an excuse when Elder starts 30 games again due to injuries to the most injury prone rotation among all contenders.

AA is a SP away from an above average, and maybe even good, off season. He needs to finish the job.

Again, the problem isnt with Elder in the rotation. The problem is when he is asked to be more than a 5th starter. I would rather add a quality bat than a quality SP. I dont know that Bo Bichette is feasible but he is exactly what the offense needs. 2B, 3B, SS, DH, whatever. We will have plenty of at bats available I am sure. Or perhaps Miguel Andujar and another decent reliever.
 
FanDuel shorting/missing payments could end up costing us the SP we need
I’m not sure it will cost a SP this year, especially if it’s a one year deal to someone, but this is a point worth watching and I’m surprised it’s hasn’t been discussed more here. Have a thread on this particular subject. But TV broadcasts are up in the air for the Braves and eight other teams.
 
The off-season has been a success to this point, aside from installing Weiss as Manager. I'd give it a solid grade of B (or 8/10 if we were using that scale). We upgraded SS, the bench, and the BP, which were our 3 most obvious holes.

If we get an impact SP, it's easily a grade of A on the off-season.
 
The off-season has been a success to this point, aside from installing Weiss as Manager. I'd give it a solid grade of B (or 8/10 if we were using that scale). We upgraded SS, the bench, and the BP, which were our 3 most obvious holes.

If we get an impact SP, it's easily a grade of A on the off-season.
Strongly disagree. I think folks have lost sight on what an A offseason looks like because there's been so many terrible transaction periods lately from AA. The fact he's once again acting like a competent GM does not mean he did a great job. It's certainly great to see, but it's not great work.

An average offseason (C, or Grade 50, or whatever means average) for a professional sports GM (a guy being paid a ton of money to make these decisions) means he fills all holes on the roster without adding any surplus value, and without tanking too much future value. They paid market rate to fill all the team's needs. That's literally the job description of a GM, and that's the bar for average.

And that's essentially what AA has done. He paid market rate for 2 good/great BP arms, a mediocre SS, and a platoon OFer. If he again pays market rate form someone like Bassitt, that's literally another average, or Grade C move. His move for Dubon was a good move now that we know he's a bench player, and that's literally the only above average move he's made so far. The WW hire is unacceptable D/F move, only slightly spared by the coaches hired around him, so that drags the overall offseason down a good deal.

So a bunch of average moves, a single good move for the bench, and a terrible manager hire is what he's done. If he pays market rates for a SP, he has filled all the roster holes, and piled up a reasonable amount of depth on the MLB roster, and did it without mortgaging any future wins, which I would claim is above average overall.

If AA gets a legit MLB SP at market prices the offseason will be a C+...a bit above average. If he doesn't get a legit MLB SP it will be a C-...a bit below average. If he makes some brilliant move for a SP that adds a bunch of surplus value he could pull off a B/B- offseason...solidly above average.
 
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Strongly disagree. I think folks have lost sight on what an A offseason looks like because there's been so many terrible transaction periods lately from AA. The fact he's once again acting like a competent GM does not mean he did a great job. It's certainly great to see, but it's not great work.

An average offseason (C, or Grade 50, or whatever means average) for a professional sports GM (a guy being paid a ton of money to make these decisions) means he fills all holes on the roster without adding any surplus value, and without tanking too much future value. They paid market rate to fill all the team's needs. That's literally the job description of a GM, and that's the bar for average.

And that's essentially what AA has done. He paid market rate for 2 good/great BP arms, a mediocre SS, and a platoon OFer. If he again pays market rate form someone like Bassitt, that's literally another average, or Grade C move. His move for Dubon was a good move now that we know he's a bench player, and that's literally the only above average move he's made so far. The WW hire is unacceptable D/F move, only slightly spared by the coaches hired around him, so that drags the overall offseason down a good deal.

So a bunch of average moves, a single good move for the bench, and a terrible manager hire is what he's done. If he pays market rates for a SP, he has filled all the roster holes, and piled up a reasonable amount of depth on the MLB roster, and did it without mortgaging any future wins, which I would claim is above average overall.

If AA gets a legit MLB SP at market prices the offseason will be a C+...a bit above average. If he doesn't get a legit MLB SP it will be a C-...a bit below average. If he makes some brilliant move for a SP that adds a bunch of surplus value he could pull off a B/B- offseason...solidly above average.
1. We got 2 of the best relievers on the market for cash at very little overall risk. Those are not "average" moves.

2. Calling Kim a "mediocre SS" is pessimistic at best. He was a 3+ WAR SS before the injury. Is there risk he doesn't get back to what he was? Sure. But most projections have him around 2.5 fWAR, which would represent nearly a 2 WAR increase over the production we got from the SS position last season. How you can describe a 2 WAR increase at any position as an "average" improvement is beyond me.

3. Yaz is solid player and we already had a pretty good starting OF (assuming Harris isn't ass again). But what Yaz really gives us is the ability to rotate DH and give Profar and Acuna rest, without sacrificing offense. I don't know that this can accurately quantified. Sure, you can call this an average move if it makes you happy. But Yaz seems likely to at least provide similar offensive production to Ozuna circa 2025, while also providing quality defense.

4. If we get an impact starting pitcher, we will have improved no fewer than 3 positions significantly. I call that way better than than an a C+/B- grade.
 
If you pay market rate for a player, no matter how terrible the player he's replacing is, you made an average move. The fact you made a terrible move years ago and had a terrible SS doesn't make the move to acquire a competent SS any better. It takes exactly zero skill to identify SS as a hole that needed to be addressed.

The fact 3 positions needed significant upgrade does not make the moves that filled those holes any better. Again, allowing gaping holes to be on the roster doesn't make the moves you finally make to fill them any better. It seems you are unable to separate the needs of the roster from the moves made to fill those needs.
 
If you pay market rate for a player, no matter how terrible the player he's replacing is, you made an average move. The fact you made a terrible move years ago and had a terrible SS doesn't make the move to acquire a competent SS any better. It takes exactly zero skill to identify SS as a hole that needed to be addressed.

The fact 3 positions needed significant upgrade does not make the moves that filled those holes any better. Again, allowing gaping holes to be on the roster doesn't make the moves you finally make to fill them any better. It seems you are unable to separate the needs of the roster from the moves made to fill those needs.
LOL so now you're arguing about the "skills" of a GM in relation to whether a move is good or not. Good grief.

It seems you are unable to differentiate the status of the roster now and what it was before. Who cares what happened last off-season? We are grading the moves of this off-season based on what our needs are. And so far, we've improved 3 positions significantly.
 
I don’t really see how $20m is “market rate” for Kim when he had at least one offer for $48m. I think 1/$20m, with the guarantee of another 1-year deal or a draft pick, is pretty nice.
 
If you pay market rate for a player, no matter how terrible the player he's replacing is, you made an average move. The fact you made a terrible move years ago and had a terrible SS doesn't make the move to acquire a competent SS any better. It takes exactly zero skill to identify SS as a hole that needed to be addressed.

The fact 3 positions needed significant upgrade does not make the moves that filled those holes any better. Again, allowing gaping holes to be on the roster doesn't make the moves you finally make to fill them any better. It seems you are unable to separate the needs of the roster from the moves made to fill those needs.
According to this logic the only good move a gm can make is acquiring a player below market rate… while he is competing with 29 other gms. I‘m just curious which gm out there is actually doing a good/great job in your opinion?
 
According to this logic the only good move a gm can make is acquiring a player below market rate… while he is competing with 29 other gms. I‘m just curious which gm out there is actually doing a good/great job in your opinion?
He's kind of got the old Walter Mitty thing going on, but the pictures of Walter in the old anthology textbook didn't make him look as angry.
 
Only move I'm really not that hot on is the Yaz move. Seemed a bit premature. I don't think it's anything to get worked up about because he will provide the flexibility necessary to cycle guys through the DH role. I just thought they would aim a tad higher. We'll see on Kim, but he's a major league SS unlike what we had there last year and Dubon is the kind of guy I've been advocating for. One more bench spot up for grabs. It could be Eli White, but I think it will more likely be another IF.

Suarez is a good signing. I'd still like to see another starting pitcher so we'll see who is left standing when the music stops and maybe that's the guy.

I think there are a lot of solid points here. I agree with Enscheff that the needle didn't jump forward, but also agree with Carp that at least the needle didn't move backwards.
 
According to this logic the only good move a gm can make is acquiring a player below market rate… while he is competing with 29 other gms. I‘m just curious which gm out there is actually doing a good/great job in your opinion?
I too was wondering this. the only way for a GM to do a 'good' job is to fleece another GM..or wait for a player's market to crash and swoop in (which means the deal is still market value).. I mean, I am a huge critic of AA.. but I didn't understand this logic.

AA has done an ok job this offseason. He is unfortunately stuck with his past bad decisions and that has made his job harder. but as it stands now, he seems to be doing things to correct some of the deficiencies he helped create.

I get that Yaz by himself is not inspiring.. but if he is a spilt specialist, then he becomes above average +.. if he faces a LHP, then AA failed because he failed to install a manager who is not an idiot.

Same as Dubon.. he should see very few RHP and should be giving several guys days off.. that is another above average move

Pen depth has been above average.. although it has not gone far enough.. he needs to add more or add to the rotation to push guys to the pen.
 
Only move I'm really not that hot on is the Yaz move. Seemed a bit premature. I don't think it's anything to get worked up about because he will provide the flexibility necessary to cycle guys through the DH role. I just thought they would aim a tad higher. We'll see on Kim, but he's a major league SS unlike what we had there last year and Dubon is the kind of guy I've been advocating for. One more bench spot up for grabs. It could be Eli White, but I think it will more likely be another IF.

Suarez is a good signing. I'd still like to see another starting pitcher so we'll see who is left standing when the music stops and maybe that's the guy.

I think there are a lot of solid points here. I agree with Enscheff that the needle didn't jump forward, but also agree with Carp that at least the needle didn't move backwards.
if it didn't move backward or forward, then you agree with Cheff that is was mediocre. I think if the moves AA has made are deployed correctly, then the needle did in fact move forward.
 
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