Ryan Pollack on Fangraphs

Financial considerations and other more complicated issues notwithstanding, there's a very good chance that James Shields is just rotting meat at this point. You never want to overreact to 101 bad innings, but you don't pitch as putridly as he has for Chicago without setting off warning klaxons in every front office in the league. He's putting up Don Wengert numbers this year.

There's always a price that's low enough for any player to look vaguely attractive, but in Shields' case, that price in terms of players is a complete non-entity and in terms of dollars it's not much above the league minimum.
 
Horsehide Harry said:
The assumptions are based upon Coppy following through with what he said they intended to do - add a couple of SP, address catcher, look at 3B, etc.

I'm just pointing out that this is what it means if he follows through with what he says he wants to do in effort to be competitive in 2017.

A 2 WAR pitcher is going to cost a minimum of $14M over a couple of years at least and the Braves, to be competitive with other clubs for the same talent, will likely have to overpay in terms of money and/or years to sign that talent. And Coppy's talking about 2 pitchers.

Could they go for cheaper pitchers either in FA or trade and hope for 2 WAR performance or better? Sure. But that's not what Coppy has indicated that he wants to do if I am understanding him correctly which is make a real attempt at improvement to competent levels.

A 2 War catcher would cost $14M per on a 2-3 deal, at least. If the Braves trade for McCann (as seems likely IMO), he's signed THROUGH 2018 at $17M per. The Yankees would have to pay $3M per year just to get McCann down to the number I speculated.

If the Braves sign a 3B who is significantly better than Garcia, someone like Prado, I think it will be for a minimum of $10M per year over 3 years. I only speculated $7M to provide for a little normalization if the other numbers turn out too high.

Yes, there are a lot of assumptions but they re based on what Coppy has said he will do. If he does what he's said he wants to do, then I expect the assumptions to be pretty accurate. That would mean that the Braves would be close to Max payroll commitment through the 2018 season (after which they lose Markakis and Flowers, but see raises for Teheran and Inciarte) and close to Max payroll commitment through 2019 (after which Kemp and Teheran come off the books as well as the likely ending of the FA contracts of those signed this offseason - the two SP, C and 3B).

Add to this that Markakis and Kemp, at least (maybe Prado, McCann and the pitchers as well), likely decline on baseball value vs cost due to increasing age, and you have a team with little payroll flexibility just at the time when they need it the most.
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They can sit around being pretty bad until about 2019 or they can sign some players to bridge the gap. I think they will want to have something a little more certain than what they've tried to patch together the last couple of years. They clearly don't want to have a top five pick next year, they want to show progress.

They can do that without trading away the fair or impairing their payroll for 2020 and beyond which is when things really might be hot for the Braves.

They also have a path to actually go for it, I guess, but that would probably be a poor decision. I suppose that if they acquired two front line starters through trade and a couple of bats, they could reasonably challenge for the playoffs, but the cost would be pretty high.
 
nsacpi said:
Payroll flexibility is a real issue as we move deeper into our window for contending. But I think it is more subtle than is generally realized. On the surface paying Kemp 18M per year over the 2018-2020 period does reduce payroll flexibility. But not relative to an alternative such as paying Cespedes 25M per year over 2018-2023.

Whatever additional moves we see this off-season, I'm hoping that we do try to tailor things to maintain as much flexibility going forward. For example in acquiring McCann, the issue of his 2019 option is likely to come up. But I'm hoping that we minimize the amount we are on the hook for in 2019, even it means paying more in 2017 and 2018. This is because as we move deeper into our window for contending, the young guys coming up in the farm system will become more expensive and also it will become clearer which areas we need to upgrade at market prices. We want to have the flexibility for some upgrades on a year to year basis.

After 2018, the Markakis contract comes off the books and hopefully the part of McCann's contract we are on the hook for will decline significantly going from 2018 to 2019. This would give us some flexibility after the 2018 season. After 2019, the Kemp deal comes off as will the rest of McCann's contract. After 2020, Teheran rolls off. After 2021, Freeman rolls off. I like the way this is set up. And we need to take care with any moves this off-season that we always have some flexibility each off-season.
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Kemp is up in 2019 I think. That's arguably the principal benefit of the trade, shedding Oliveria's 2020 obligation.
 
Enscheff said:
I predict the Braves trade for Shields and sign De La Rosa.
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Jaime Garcia would seem the better target. Lefty, the Cards see him as surplus, one year at 12 million and then clears the payroll. Cards maybe are too smart not to hold them up for something of value, but I think that's a pretty good acquisition target.
 
Horsehide Harry said:
I guess. It's gotten to where if you aren't straight "company line" at this point then you are just negative, not on board, and have no place in a discussion that is limited to glorying in all the variable shades of success that are just right around the corner.

As for Mac and Shields, to me it's about yearly cost and number of years. If you have both through 2018 at anything close to $10M plus per year, I think it would limit flexibility, paying declining players at a time of team ascension.
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No reason to worry about 2018 payroll, I don't think. I guess it maybe limits what you can do with creative moves eating salary, but Braves are maybe past that.

I think the Braves are in a position to spend near their budget now rather than save money for other uses.
 
smootness said:
I know this is a joke, but interestingly enough he has a mutual option for $2 million next year. If he likes the Braves and the way we worked with him, I could see him being interested, and I'd take him at that figure for sure.
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Note on Collmenter. He was DFA'd and released by ARI, so the contract he signed with them is basically void (with ARI paying him all remaining guaranteed $ except the pro-rated portion of the 2017 MLB-minimum). He'll finish shy of 6 years of service time and will be arbitration eligible. I'm not completely opposed to bringing him back, but I don't think I'd offer him arbitration.
 
Southcack77 said:
Jaime Garcia would seem the better target. Lefty, the Cards see him as surplus, one year at 12 million and then clears the payroll. Cards maybe are too smart not to hold them up for something of value, but I think that's a pretty good acquisition target.
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Garcia is a good target too.

Shields essentially has 2/24 left on his deal, and is about as durable as they come. A cursory glance at his numbers shows his struggles might be related to a sudden doubling of his walk rate. A sudden loss of control is usually related to a mechanical problem, and Roger seems to be good at fixing control issues.

If the Braves can buy low on him I think he could have a good chance to figure out his control and go back to being a 2-3 WAR pitcher.
 
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