2018 Offseason And Targets

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Nerfherders said:
What about Domingo Santana? That guy was the loser in the musical chairs that was the Brewer's regular lineup. He wasn't good last year, but he hardly had a chance to get going. He's relatively young, had a great 2017, and the Brewers still have a glut of outfielders.
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The reason I mentioned Thames rather than Santana is because Santana's right-handed. He doesn't really fit if you keep Duvall and/or are looking to get Camargo OF ABs against lefties.

There was all the speculation at the deadline that we were talking to them about one of their left-handed bats - would guess that could've been Thames instead of Shaw.

Even if they wouldn't take Julio's money back, they'd still save that $6 million and could possibly even use it to chase Daniel Murphy - who would be a great fit for them while they wait for Hiura. Cain, Yelich, Braun, Shaw, Aguilar, Murphy, Arcia, Pina would be awfully tough.
 
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If the Astros trade Tucker for 2 years of Realmuto then they are stupid plain and simple. With Bergman gonna break the bank at some point and there’s Correa and Springer that are looming not to mention Cole is a FA next year.
 
Hudson2 said:
If the Astros trade Tucker for 2 years of Realmuto then they are stupid plain and simple. With Bergman gonna break the bank at some point and there’s Correa and Springer that are looming not to mention Cole is a FA next year.
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unless they win a World Series or two. I highly doubt they care how stupid you think they are then.
 
Southcack77 said:
They've only spent 25m.

Some conservative estimates would probably have them with another 25m to spend.

I think that would put them in the 120-125 range, which would line up pretty well with past payrolls and the finances.
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Payroll sits at $107M. The Braves almost certainly don't have $25M left to spend on opening day payroll.

The deals the Braves have not signed should be a wake up call that payroll will be around $120M+, exactly as predicted almost a year ago.
 
Hudson2 said:
If the Astros trade Tucker for 2 years of Realmuto then they are stupid plain and simple. With Bergman gonna break the bank at some point and there’s Correa and Springer that are looming not to mention Cole is a FA next year.
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I think the Astros have proven beyond all doubt that nothing they do is stupid. If they trade Tucker for JTR it was done for a very good reason.
 
Seems pretty obvious to me the Braves went into the off season with their projected contracts for cOFs severely underestimated. AA had his sights set on JD, and he got him immediately. They didn't leave nearly enough cash aside for a Brantley or Cutch, and now they are stuck in limbo trying to recalculate their optimal path forward.

They have downgraded C, upgraded 3B, upgraded the bench, and the rotation as currently stands should improve as much as the young guys improve (I expect a full season of Gausman to largely counterbalance the loss of Sanchez' surprising production). They have failed to address cOF, but it looks like there's a strong chance that position will be downgraded as well from the surprising 2.6 WAR Markakis provided.

Summed up, this off season is shaping up to be a very minimal upgrade to the roster overall. In an off season where they had $40M+ and one of the deepest farm systems in the game, I expected a larger push. Nothing close to "all in", but I expected significant improvements to the MLB roster.

Instead, what we've seen (and will likely continue to see) is low risk additions while the young core continues to improve. It's looking like the biggest improvements to the roster will come organically from guys recently on the top prospect lists. The potential is certainly there for Acuna, Albies and a handful of the pitchers to improve this team by 5 wins just by getting better naturally.

Perhaps that's the best plan. Perhaps it would be foolish to let the early year of contention change the overall plan.
 
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If you play Camargo a lot in the OF and sign someone like Cabrera, you can make a case we did a better job with our money than signing a big name cOF. Donaldson carries some obvious risk, but could legitimately be a 5+ WAR 3b. Figure if Camargo plays average defensive, he should be good for 2-3. You can make the case it's a better use of money than signing Brantley, Cutch, or Pollock and leaving Camargo at 3b. The question becomes, what we do the extra 6-12 million saved from not signing Donaldson. May be we sign Morton or Happ? Color me unimpressed with that option. Brantley and Ramos might have been a smart move however.
 
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Enscheff said:
Seems pretty obvious to me the Braves went into the off season with their projected contracts for cOFs severely underestimated. AA had his sights set on JD, and he got him immediately. They didn't leave nearly enough cash aside for a Brantley or Cutch, and now they are stuck in limbo trying to recalculate their optimal path forward.

They have downgraded C, upgraded 3B, upgraded the bench, and the rotation as currently stands should improve as much as the young guys improve (I expect a full season of Gausman to largely counterbalance the loss of Sanchez' surprising production). They have failed to address cOF, but it looks like there's a strong chance that position will be downgraded as well from the surprising 2.6 WAR Markakis provided.

Summed up, this off season is shaping up to be a very minimal upgrade to the roster overall. In an off season where they had $40M+ and one of the deepest farm systems in the game, I expected a larger push. Nothing close to "all in", but I expected significant improvements to the MLB roster.

Instead, what we've seen (and will likely continue to see) is low risk additions while the young core continues to improve. It's looking like the biggest improvements to the roster will come organically from guys recently on the top prospect lists. The potential is certainly there for Acuna, Albies and a handful of the pitchers to improve this team by 5 wins just by getting better naturally.

Perhaps that's the best plan. Perhaps it would be foolish to let the early year of contention change the overall plan.
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Totally agree that the unexpected acceleration of being competitive changed the outlook of the team short term. That being said, IMHO, you don't waste a JD signing of 23mil to fill in the cracks everywhere else with just good enough players. To your point, I think the upgrade is negated (at this point) by cOF uncertainty and the TOR that AA was said to want. Doesn't mean the team will be worse, but the Mets have surprised me and the Gnats are solid. I do think that AA will get someone who may move the needle.....but so far...eh.
 
Deester11 said:
Totally agree that the unexpected acceleration of being competitive changed the outlook of the team short term. That being said, IMHO, you don't waste a JD signing of 23mil to fill in the cracks everywhere else with just good enough players. To your point, I think the upgrade is negated (at this point) by cOF uncertainty and the TOR that AA was said to want. Doesn't mean the team will be worse, but the Mets have surprised me and the Gnats are solid. I do think that AA will get someone who may move the needle.....but so far...eh.
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I can also see AA going out and trading for a Realmuto and Peralta duo, or something of that type. He's just an interesting manager. dude is so hush-hush.
 
UNCBlue012 said:
[TW]1075078084339134465[/TW]

"price apparently went above what they wanted." Dude signed cheap...lmao.
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Every single intelligent person who discussed the Braves off season assumed, implied, or explicitly stated the Braves would need to spend ~$15M per year on a cOF upgrade, or trade significant prospect capital to address the position.

Both Cutch and Brantley signed for values very close to what was expected, yet the Braves didn't make it happen.

Logic dictates this means 1 of these 2 statements is true:

1. The Braves miscalculated the acquisition cost of a cOF upgrade
2. The Braves have a trade, or several trades, primed to bring in a cheaper cOF

There are no other scenarios.

We may have to wait for Harper and Pollock to sign for the Braves to pick up scraps in a trade from whomever gets those 2 guys.

We may have to watch Markakis or CarGo team up with Duval in LF...or Reddick...or Peralta.

Or...we may get to see AA get good value for a guy like Haniger or Frazier or someone else we haven't even considered. It's possible a Haniger trade can't happen until AA knows a JTR won't happen, and a Gray trade needs to happen before the Haniger for pitching trade can happen, but the Gray trade won't happen until a few more FA SPs come off the board, etc, etc.
 
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i'll be extremely disappointed if there isn't a significant OF addition. and if markakis is brought back i'll be extra disappointed.
 
Super said:
i'll be extremely disappointed if there isn't a significant OF addition. and if markakis is brought back i'll be extra disappointed.
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I don't think Bowman lumping Brantley and Cutch in with Markakis and CarGo was a coincidence.

I think it was done to set the tone for a future comment along the lines of "the Braves got similar production without paying $16M+ over multiple years by signing CarGo/Markakis for 1 year to platoon with Duval".

This scenario is becoming more and more likely.
 
Enscheff said:
Payroll sits at $107M. The Braves almost certainly don't have $25M left to spend on opening day payroll.

The deals the Braves have not signed should be a wake up call that payroll will be around $120M+, exactly as predicted almost a year ago.
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I haven't torn the payroll down to it's studs in a couple of months, but pretty sure I had it around estimated 70m post arbitration and that jibes with what baseball reference is projecting.

Leaving about 50m to get up to the 120-125 range.

I'm not discounting your estimates at all, but maybe you could point out where you disagree with Baseball reference? Or maybe I'm just forgetting a transaction.

....

I don't think it's particularly realistic to believe that AA was just profoundly wrong about projecting Brantley and McCutcheon. If he did value them less than this market, he would have certainly known that all the projections suggested they were going to be overpaid.

I just don't see any way he came in with all his chips on I'm getting a better deal than anyone thinks on one of the second tier OFs. He had to be prepared for the market going the way people thought it would.

Even if that preparation was being content not to push in all the chips this year and wait on player development or the deadline. Like Nscapi has advocated when he's not conspiring to acquire Zach Greinke. Like you said, that's not a clearly wrong approach. Though it's certainly disappointing for fans. And my view is "if not now, then when?" Every season there will be teams spending more than is prudent playing for the short run. When is it clear that field will be more clear for Braves?

I would very much have preferred to do more on a short term deals like I laid out. But, I don't even know what AA thinks the weaknesses are and I'm not sure what he's going to do to address them.
 
Enscheff said:
I don't think Bowman lumping Brantley and Cutch in with Markakis and CarGo was a coincidence.

I think it was done to set the tone for a future comment along the lines of "the Braves got similar production without paying $16M+ over multiple years by signing CarGo/Markakis for 1 year to platoon with Duval".

This scenario is becoming more and more likely.
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you are reading too much into Bowman, I think.

It's a forgone conclusion that whatever the Braves do, he and DOB are going to put a home town spin on it. I wouldn't let that make you feel like he has any idea what's coming.
 
# Pos Player 2019 Salary
1 C Flowers $4.00
2 1B Freeman $21.00
3 2B Albies $0.55
4 3B Donaldson $23.00
5 SS Swanson $0.55
6 LF Acuna $0.55
7 CF Inciarte $5.00
8 RF Trade/FA $0.00

9 SP1 Teheran $11.00
10 SP2 Folty $5.50
11 SP3 Gausman $9.20
12 SP4 Newk $0.55
13 SP5 Touki $0.55

14 BN1 Culberson $1.40
15 BN2 Duvall $3.10
16 BN3 Camargo $0.55
17 BN4 Backup OF $0.00
18 BN5 McCann $2.00

19 BP1 O'Day $8.00
20 BP2 Viz $4.80
21 BP3 Freeman $1.50
22 BP4 Venters $2.25
23 BP5 Minter $0.55
24 BP6 Winkler $1.60
25 BP7 Fried $0.55

Total $107.75

That's with a big fat 0 in cOF and a bench spot.

Nothing I've seen suggests an opening day payroll larger than the $120M-$125M I predicted almost a year ago.

Folks probably need to come to terms with the idea that JD was the extent of the major FA spending, and we better all be hoping AA has some slick trades lined up to improve cOF...or we get to see Markakis for another year.
 
UNCBlue012 said:
[TW]1075078084339134465[/TW]

"price apparently went above what they wanted." Dude signed cheap...lmao.
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That's just how DOB operates.

If the Braves make a move it's bold. If they don't, it is a wise marshaling of resources.

The Braves beat is pretty useless. The break nothing of consequence, they don't really bring much analysis to the table, and they're not going to hold anyone's feet to the fire until they get the word it's ok to pile on.
 
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