I'm glad for him, but he does not need to be starting for this team in 2017 unless our new starting 3b gets injured.
Garcia
- Thread starter VirginiaBrave
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I'm glad for him, but he does not need to be starting for this team in 2017 unless our new starting 3b gets injured.
Southcack77
Well-known member
Freese signed as a fill in player with the Pirates at a bargain rate because that was his market value. It suggests that the rest of baseball did not see him as a starter. I suppose it remains to be seen whether baseball's collective wisdom is justified with Freese as you have apparently decided it is justified for Garcia.
I think Freese is a better player, but he's hardly a particularly good player. If he's available at a bargain rate again to the worst team in baseball, then sure, it might be possible to get him to over perform slightly again and then flip him. Not a bad strategy. Certainly better than committing a large amount of money long term to a free agent coming off a career season.
But I sort of think signing someone Freese is along the same lines as signing someone like Markakis. Open to criticism from people as to why money was spent on that player when the team was going to be bad anyway.
But seems like an ok signing, though personally I think the organization might get more tickets out of Prado.
I think Freese is a better player, but he's hardly a particularly good player. If he's available at a bargain rate again to the worst team in baseball, then sure, it might be possible to get him to over perform slightly again and then flip him. Not a bad strategy. Certainly better than committing a large amount of money long term to a free agent coming off a career season.
But I sort of think signing someone Freese is along the same lines as signing someone like Markakis. Open to criticism from people as to why money was spent on that player when the team was going to be bad anyway.
But seems like an ok signing, though personally I think the organization might get more tickets out of Prado.
Freese was available for the same reason Santana was available when the Braves signed him. When the game of FA musical chairs stopped, they were sitting there without a chair because no teams had a need AND the money available to sign them.
Every offseason there seems to be 1-2 guys like that. The Braves need to be smart enough to see when guys are available late in the offseason at a bargain rate and take advantage. Instead, they signed Gordon Beckham pretty early, and decided they needed to see more of Garcia.
It's not Freese that I'm specifically upset about. It's the failure of the FO to identify an obvious bargain and act upon it. It shows me they have some major flaws in their MLB roster building decision making processes. They considered themselves "set" at 3b. They were very wrong.
nsacpi
Expects Yuge Games
The odd thing is that the Kemp trade (and taking on his salary for the rest of this year) shows that they had some funds in reserve. But they chose not to use it on Freese (although it is possible that he had a strong preference for playing for a team with a chance of a winning season).
Southcack77
Well-known member
Ervin Santana? If so, The Braves offered him 14 million dollars, which was more than he had earned the previous season with KC. He also had multiple other offers out there per the reporting at the time. In effect, the Braves overpaid for him due to late injuries, which is exactly what Santana had been waiting for.
Freese is an ok player, who probably should be a backup. He caught on as a backup with an ability to starter early for the Pirates due again to their various roster issues. He's been ok. I wouldn't say that any teams are necessarily kicking themselves at missing out on him.
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Braves went into the season with Garcia, Oliveira, Kelly Johnson, and Gordon Beckham in the 3B mix. I don't think they thought they were set so much as they already had chosen their cheap roster fill ins. I wonder if Freese's previous issues with alcohol had something to do with their thinking. Also, I think they did go into season playing the former Braves card when possible, perhaps due to familiarity and also perhaps to sell tickets. Kelly Johnson apparently must be some kind of citizen.
I actually like Freese fine and think he's a pretty average player. I wouldn't mind signing him to that kind of deal, but I'm not sure Atlanta missed out on all that much even with his having had a slightly fortunate season.
Atlanta's season has been formed so much by so many guys playing so terribly or being injured early in the season. It's really quite strange how much bad luck they endured for all that career worst slumping to take place at the same time.
Again, this is a problem. If we all agree (and I don't know a soul who doesn't) that 2015 and 2016 were going to be "lost seasons", how did the front office "fail"?
Garcia was far more worth taking a look at than ANY option the organization had in the system in RF (at the time). So they went out and signed a (somewhat) inexpensive option to play RF and inexpensive "backup options" at 3B (KJ/Beckham) in the event Adonis fell on his face. For the better part of two seasons, he hasn't. This is not to hate on Freese, but more to point out the fact that they wanted to give Garcia a legitimate shot without having to look over his shoulder IF (and only if) he performed. Doing this has allowed them to find out that Adonis can possibly at least be the passable part of a platoon at 3B if that's where the Braves try to save money. I have trouble seeing the harm in that. I wouldn't even have a problem if they choose to give Ruiz his shot next season and platoon the two of them rather than signing anyone else to play 3B.
If you're of the belief (and I think most of us are at this point) that next season's team is going to struggle as well (even though it's likely to be much better), why bring in more stopgaps if the young arms aren't quite ready to truly compete? Next year should be the season you deal with the growing pains and get everybody's feet wet. 2017 will be sink-or-swim time. You've got Jace - if Swanson struggles and Albies doesn't you can slide Albies over. If Albies struggles, you can send him down and play Peterson at 2B.
JMO, but this is all trying to set things up for the monster free-agent class following 2018. You give Mallex, Adonis, and Rio their shots to prove that they can perform capably enough to keep you from needing to go spend $25+ million on someone. If Mallex continues to become the player he looked like he was on his way to being before he got hurt, you slide Ender to RF and go after someone like a Moustakas or Frazier on a much smaller deal to play 3B IF the Garcia/Ruiz platoon falls on its face before the monster free-agent class gets here. Freese might even be an option then too.
I've slipped into the camp that believes we shouldn't sign ANYONE to more than a 3 year deal at this point. I'm fine with "overpaying" someone a little to keep the contracts to that length (or shorter), but think most of the long-term, home-grown, inexpensive "answers" are already in place (Albies, Swanson, Maitan, and plenty of arms) with several others who could be no worse than solid players (Dustin, Riley, Demeritte, Wilson, Cruz, Pache, etc.) if a few things go right PLUS the high picks next summer and this recent international class. These kinds of deals will probably draw the kind of criticism the Markakis deal has, but at least they won't destroy the financial flexibility the brass has created.