Megathread: Braves lose Maitan, Bae and 10+ plus International Sanctions.

[thewupk]

Yeah, I plead guilty there. Being down on the Neck signing was never really about Neck. He's a good soldier and has been as advertised, as thoroughly uninspiring as that is.

I hated the reflexive "we replaced an All-Star Gold-Glover with an All-Star Gold Glover! All is well!" spin. I hated losing Heyward. I hated that Markakis even wore the same damned number on his uni. With the benefit of hindsight, it looks a bit different, but it still leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Now, after that, my pivot was to "my favorite player to watch is gone and the team is going to suck, but at least I can see Tron Simmons every night..."

Nick is who he is. We paid market value for him and that's essentially what we are getting. The whole argument, for the most part, was should the Braves be paying market value for players like that. As it turns out it doesn't matter since they aren't close to contending while he's been here. Like Dickey and Colon it simply doesn't matter with where the Braves are as a team. The problem was if the Braves really were contenders in 2017. A contract like Nick's would have hurt the team since they are a mid market team with a limited budget.

Hindsight on the Heyward contract is nonsense really. Anybody can be right in hindsight and nobody saw Heyward declining to this level on offense. It was always his defense that people thought would dramatically decline which gave them pause about a long contract. Anyone saying otherwise is lying. And to me, like always, it's about the process and not the results. Signing a 26 year old FA who is a stud defensively and a good hitter to a big contract isn't a bad process even if the results stink. Trading for a 31 year old OF who is among the worst defensively and average to above average offensively is not a good process. If the team makes good process decisions they will get back to winning even if some of them have bad results.

 

[thewupk]

If the anti-moneyball headline comes after two NL Championships and a World Series you wont hear me complaining.

But even under Dave Stewart the D-Backs, like every team, had an analytics department. It probably had a very small voice but it was there. And Stewart is probably the most extreme example you'll find. You'll also find he wasn't a very good GM.

But that doesn't mean the more analytics the better. If a team neglected scouting in favor of almost all analytics they would be terrible, especially in trying to get amateur talent.

Like most things the answer is in the middle using both. Use every tool you have.

IMO scouting is best for amateur talent and finding under the radar MLB talent who you think you can fix. See Jared Wright for one of many examples in that area. Analytical decisions should be prevalent on major trade and FA signings for established MLB talent.

 

[Russ2dollas]

Baseball tonight podcast had dob and Klaw on.

I think Klaw is a coppy guy so know that bias. That said Klaw made it sound like the braves have done nothing wrong. The implication is that this is an internal tipoff to fire coppy for cause and ruin him.

 

[JxnMissFan]

IMO scouting is best for amateur talent and finding under the radar MLB talent who you think you can fix. See Jared Wright for one of many examples in that area. Analytical decisions should be prevalent on major trade and FA signings for established MLB talent.

IMO you are absolutely correct. Hope the next GM has your opinion.

The big problem with the team the last few years has been evaluating the MLB talent.

 

[BeanieAntics]

IMO scouting is best for amateur talent and finding under the radar MLB talent who you think you can fix. See Jared Wright for one of many examples in that area. Analytical decisions should be prevalent on major trade and FA signings for established MLB talent.

This. Also analytics are widely available at the minor league level too, and should always be favored when making decisions on which prospects to commit to and which to trade away.

 

[JxnMissFan]

Baseball tonight podcast had dob and Klaw on.

I think Klaw is a coppy guy so know that bias. That said Klaw made it sound like the braves have done nothing wrong. The implication is that this is an internal tipoff to fire coppy for cause and ruin him.

They didn't need to start an investigation to fire Coppy. All they had to say is the team regressed this year. It's year 3 of a rebuild built on pitching but to date there has not been a pitcher really step up and show he is a sure thing. It's easy to fire someone.

 

[GeorgiaGirl]

The stuff about how Dayton Moore values undervalued players doesn't seem so bad as what I really complained about with the Braves was how they didn't try to get underrated players that could possibly help the Braves play better now while still having a very good future.

I just wonder if whether his voice is even going to help. I have doubts. The higher ups not believing in defense is how you get a guy like Nick Markakis in Atlanta. An OBP guy is a great idea, but can we make it a guy that can also play at least slightly above average defense without just going by back of the baseball card stats? (which Markakis has never been in Atlanta)

 

[TheBravos]

BIG QUESTION:

How do you pay guys under the table unless everyone knows and is covering. It would have to be more than Coppy. Accounting would need to be involved. No way if it happened, that it was one or two people involved.

 

[GeorgiaGirl]

BIG QUESTION:

How do you pay guys under the table unless everyone knows and is covering. It would have to be more than Coppy. Accounting would need to be involved. No way if it happened, that it was one or two people involved.

Schuerholz isn't a scumbag (and neither is Hart), but it's exactly like the recent Louisville situation. Hart and Schuerholz can deny until they're blue in the face, but they are "Coach-2". They know and don't care. They just didn't want Coppy in Atlanta.

What I JUST read actually doesn't sound so bad if he takes it. Moore to President of Baseball Ops, his highly regarded assistant to GM, and Hart and Schuerholz pushed out the door.

 

[dak]

Baseball tonight podcast had dob and Klaw on.

I think Klaw is a coppy guy so know that bias. That said Klaw made it sound like the braves have done nothing wrong. The implication is that this is an internal tipoff to fire coppy for cause and ruin him.

Yeah, Law was pretty direct with his opinion that the publicly known info on what the Braves did on the international and amateur markets should not have led to Blakely or Coppolella losing their jobs. The premise was that almost everyone does these things, and Boston and SD misdeeds were similar. He's the first media figure I've seen take that stance publicly. If I were Mannfred, I'd get a little harsher on this stuff and leverage the owners into an international draft.

Most entertaining parts of the podcast though were during the DOB interview. Buster mentioned that he know multiple GMs who had blocked Coppy's number due to his unrelenting texting habits. DOB seemed to come clean that he had no idea that Coppy was very widely disliked across the industry for multiple years.

 

[nsacpi]

They didn't need to start an investigation to fire Coppy. All they had to say is the team regressed this year. It's year 3 of a rebuild built on pitching but to date there has not been a pitcher really step up and show he is a sure thing. It's easy to fire someone.

Maybe it is a distinction without a difference, but Coppy resigned.

 

[thewupk]

This. Also analytics are widely available at the minor league level too, and should always be favored when making decisions on which prospects to commit to and which to trade away.

Agreed. Those are becoming more available as well and should certainly be used in the decision making process.

 

[50PoundHead]

Nick is who he is. We paid market value for him and that's essentially what we are getting. The whole argument, for the most part, was should the Braves be paying market value for players like that. As it turns out it doesn't matter since they aren't close to contending while he's been here. Like Dickey and Colon it simply doesn't matter with where the Braves are as a team. The problem was if the Braves really were contenders in 2017. A contract like Nick's would have hurt the team since they are a mid market team with a limited budget.

Hindsight on the Heyward contract is nonsense really. Anybody can be right in hindsight and nobody saw Heyward declining to this level on offense. It was always his defense that people thought would dramatically decline which gave them pause about a long contract. Anyone saying otherwise is lying. And to me, like always, it's about the process and not the results. Signing a 26 year old FA who is a stud defensively and a good hitter to a big contract isn't a bad process even if the results stink. Trading for a 31 year old OF who is among the worst defensively and average to above average offensively is not a good process. If the team makes good process decisions they will get back to winning even if some of them have bad results.

I agree with most of what you say, but not with the two bolded sentences. I would counter that anyone who thought Heyward would somehow return to being a solid .800+ OPS guy were lying to themselves. I think holes had been uncovered in his offensive game and he simply has been unable to make adjustments. His isoOBP has tanked from his early career and he hasn't hit for much in terms of power since getting beaned. And I get what you're saying about process, but that just puts too much into the lame "luck" explanation to me. I agree that the bottom line is talent and making the most out of the talent one has and the Braves have done a poor job during this rebuild on both of those fronts.

 

[thewupk]

I agree with most of what you say, but not with the two bolded sentences. I would counter that anyone who thought Heyward would somehow return to being a solid .800+ OPS guy were lying to themselves. I think holes had been uncovered in his offensive game and he simply has been unable to make adjustments. His isoOBP has tanked from his early career and he hasn't hit for much in terms of power since getting beaned. And I get what you're saying about process, but that just puts too much into the lame "luck" explanation to me. I agree that the bottom line is talent and making the most out of the talent one has and the Braves have done a poor job during this rebuild on both of those fronts.

I don't know if many thought Heyward would be the mid 800 OPS guy he was as a rookie going forward. But from 2012-2015 he posted a 781 OPS with a range of 109 OPS+ to 117. I think most people expected something in that area and not the 68 and 85 OPS+ he's had in the past two years.

Yes sometimes teams simply have bad luck. Like the run of quality starting pitches getting injury after injury for the Braves during the Wren era. I still believe that overall if you have the right process you will see success.

 

[Southcack77]

There clearly are old battle lines drawn around Heyward that I don't understand. This doesn't even really feel like a debate to me.

I through it was pretty established that 1) the Braves tried to sign him to below market deal 2) determined that they could not afford a market rate deal and 3) traded him to get longer term contracts with control, that they then flipped for even longer term, cheaper assets.

I don't have an issue with that process.

Even if you think Hayward was worth the market rate contract, why would have thought it was a good idea for the Braves to sign him to that amount of money? That was 20-25% of their payroll at the time and there was no realistic way they could have filled their other holes if they'd put their money into him.

If your process ignores financial realities and then also ignores the actual results after the fact your process is jacked.

This feels like some jabberwocky covering up some personal love bias.

 

[striker42]

Baseball tonight podcast had dob and Klaw on.

I think Klaw is a coppy guy so know that bias. That said Klaw made it sound like the braves have done nothing wrong. The implication is that this is an internal tipoff to fire coppy for cause and ruin him.

I listened and I didn't get the feeling that the implication was an internal tipoff to fire Coppy. If they wanted to fire him theyd just do it. They could cite his draft night blow up and bad relationship with other execs.

What KLaw was saying was the stuff he was able to confirm isn't really firing stuff so we'll need to wait on this investigation to develop.

 

[Horsehide Harry]

Nick is who he is. We paid market value for him and that's essentially what we are getting. The whole argument, for the most part, was should the Braves be paying market value for players like that. As it turns out it doesn't matter since they aren't close to contending while he's been here. Like Dickey and Colon it simply doesn't matter with where the Braves are as a team. The problem was if the Braves really were contenders in 2017. A contract like Nick's would have hurt the team since they are a mid market team with a limited budget.

Hindsight on the Heyward contract is nonsense really. Anybody can be right in hindsight and nobody saw Heyward declining to this level on offense. It was always his defense that people thought would dramatically decline which gave them pause about a long contract. Anyone saying otherwise is lying. And to me, like always, it's about the process and not the results. Signing a 26 year old FA who is a stud defensively and a good hitter to a big contract isn't a bad process even if the results stink. Trading for a 31 year old OF who is among the worst defensively and average to above average offensively is not a good process. If the team makes good process decisions they will get back to winning even if some of them have bad results.

A rebuilding team that isn't competing doesn't need a guy like Markakis unless you believe in some kind of veteran presence value for players who aren't even in the ML yet - face it, the Braves didn't have any position players of note for the first two years of Markakis really unless you believe in Jace and Adonis, etc. He really had no upside. It was all hope for status quo or get downside. By and large they've gotten status quo, so in a way lucky. But it should have never come to it. His 2 wins didn't mean anything real in either year.

The $11M per year that they committed to him could have been used elsewhere, hopefully on flippable guys, most likely bullpen guys.

And, BTW, I always said Heyward was going to be massively overpaid and was roundly abused for that belief.

 

[Carp]

It's hilarious that folks are willing to cook up all these machinations the FO did to save face on bad trades and "the business side of things", yet refuse to believe they did the same sort of thing firing Coppy.

They heaped praise on Coppy after slamming Wren. Now they can't go back and say they were wrong and Coppy sucked too.

It would look just as bad as simply paying HO to go away.

Comical that you guys defend the Kemp trade as a saving face trade rather than a poor scouting trade, and then can't figure out the Coppy firing was also done to save face haha.

It doesn't have to be either or. But you're making it that way. It's entirely possible (actually likely to be more accurate) that it's a combination of these things.

 

[Jaw]

It doesn't have to be either or. But you're making it that way. It's entirely possible (actually likely to be more accurate) that it's a combination of these things.

I hate to play the conspiracy theorist, but I'm with Enscheff on this one. This whole thing stinks to the treetops.

We've heard for years that Coppy was a rising star, but suddenly that was never true.

He was the most forthcoming with fans and media, but now no one ever liked him.

He was as active in trades as any GM outside of Seattle, but supposedly alot of GMs blocked his number.

He had two experienced guys above him supposedly showing him the ropes, and involved enough to "convince" him to promote a prospect he didn't think was ready. But when allegations of cheating come out those 2 guys are shocked-SHOCKED!-that this was happening, they had no idea!

This all just happens to go down when the Prodigal Protege looks ready to bolt from his empty cupboard in KC.

It's just too crazy not to think something fishy went down.

 

[Oklahomabrave]

The power struggle definitely isn’t over. JS has all his media guys like Shanks clamoring for Hart’s head. From what I gather, if JS wins Moore will

replace Hart. If Hart wins, another young guy will come in and GM under Hart. Shanks says “if Hart makes the pick Doug Harris has a chance.”

Shanks also mentions Hart has McGuirks ear.