Simmons dealt to Angels for two top pitchers, Aybar

bravesfanMatt said:
so we have 3 elite prospects then.

Ozzie/Newcomb/Hector.

Do you think many teams have 3 elite prospects and a whole lot of 'almost' elite talent ..
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My earlier post was about how many elite pitchers we have traded for. But you are correct that with the acquisition of Newcomb we now have 3 who were on BA's mid-season Top 50. I imagine they will all still be in the Top 50 when BA puts out its list during spring training. 3 is pretty good.
 
...and we have the #3 pick in the draft, are in on some good international players, will have a crap ton of money to spend when we decide to do so, and arguably the top farm system.

I'm excited. Just a matter of time before we are competitive again.
 
Dunit24 said:
...and we have the #3 pick in the draft, are in on some good international players, will have a crap ton of money to spend when we decide to do so, and arguably the top farm system.

I'm excited. Just a matter of time before we are competitive again.
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It really is. The future is bright even if its a few years off.
 
Dunit24 said:
...and we have the #3 pick in the draft, are in on some good international players, will have a crap ton of money to spend when we decide to do so, and arguably the top farm system.

I'm excited. Just a matter of time before we are competitive again.
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The farm system is strong by numbers, but is skewed somewhat by the number of pitchers. If there is a minor league system ranking that splits by pitchers and position players, I would imagine we'd be close to the top on the former and near the bottom in the latter. What bothers me (and I think many others) is that we seem to be addressing one side of the equation and completely ignoring the other, and we seem to be running out of tradable assets to use to get the system in balance.
 
sturg33 said:
The future was great after 2013 when we won 96 games with the youngest team in baseball.

But two months of bad play in 2014 decided to blow everything up and set us back 6-7 years
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I really just threw up in my mouth. it tasted strange.. like old conversation regurgitated..

end of 2014.. two players we can afford, one player who had no where to play
ALSO, one guy no longer on team getting paid the most money, another player getting paid equally as much who was sucking..
ALSO, we had one pitcher and another one (wood) who hopefully wouldn't blow his elbow out. 2 pitchers gone on second TJ surgery and another who wouldn't pitch a pitch in 2015..
ALSO, zero in the minors except Jose.. a slap hitting second baseman..

ALSO....
never mind.. it was last nights spaghetti..
 
UNCBlue012 said:
Shh, some people in here who are negative for no reason will hear you.
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If that was the gameplan we were being told I wouldn't have as much of an issue. But the talk of 2016 won't be as bad as 2015. We will compete in 2017. None of these are true. I thought the whole idea of last offseason was to trade those not in future plans (pending free agents) and to rebuild quickly to get ready for the new stadiun. 12 months later we are still trading established players with plenty of service time left for prospects.
 
Again I really see this as a solid trade even though I wanted a better secondary piece. Honestly, we're not downgrading much with Aybar (upgrading offensively/downgrading defensively) and get Newcomb who is hands down the best SP prospect we've acquired.

But the moves that just still make zero sense to me are signing Markakis and the Olivera trade.
 
Aside from the fact that Olivera has years and years of international experience, it seems to be his time with the Braves in September was enough to eliminate him from prospect status and categorize him as a major leaguer. Main reason I refuse to put him in my top 30.
 
50PoundHead said:
The hands at the Triple J ranch are just getting too impulsive for my tastes. Simmons really needs to do something about his approach at the plate, but he's still a premium defender at a premium defensive position. I'm not saying the return is horrid and maybe it was the best that was on the table, but there's no harm in waiting a bit if they were intent on moving him. I've said several times that Simmons may be a luxury on a team that doesn't hit much, so I'm not shocked by the move.
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Completely understand these questions, and I've been listening to Steve Phillips and Todd Hollandsworth continually ask the same question on XM since 7 AM.

Here's the thing (for me at least) - it was an extremely light market for Shortstops to begin with, right? Desmond was far-and-away the target for everyone not willing to trade prospects, but he's going to cost you $30+ million more than Andrelton did to keep them. Between his offense and the prospects I can see arguing many teams would be better off just spending the money. Beyond Desmond, the only free-agent that even marginally profiles as an everyday guy is Alexei Ramirex coming off a meh season (and declining).

Not only did the Braves get a potential "Ace" (potential - we all understand the risks), they got an additional prospect that cracks our Top 10 AND (potentially more significantly) the opportunity to shop the next best now available option to Desmond while those teams that need a SS are kicking themselves for not bidding on Simba when they had the chance.

Aybar alone might not net us another Top 10 prospect, but you've now reloaded with at least 3 very attractive up-the-middle rentals to potentially deal at the deadline if you don't move any of them this winter (Pierzynski, Maybin, and now Aybar).

You've positioned yourself to still hold all the leverage if the Yankees or Mets or someone else comes calling for a SS in June or July if they decide they don't want to pay Desmond now. Will Aybar get you Matz like Andrelton would have? Not likely. However, we've all seen the Yankees (and others) panic and drastically overpay if they're in the hunt. Would Aybar get you Gary Sanchez in July? Maybe.

The point in dealing him this early completely depended on getting Aybar back IMO. The cash they sent made the deal salary-neutral - meaning it shouldn't affect our plans financially, and we've still got a very valuable trade chip (even if he's not as valuable as Simmons).
 
emk418 said:
Again I really see this as a solid trade even though I wanted a better secondary piece. Honestly, we're not downgrading much with Aybar (upgrading offensively/downgrading defensively) and get Newcomb who is hands down the best SP prospect we've acquired.

But the moves that just still make zero sense to me are signing Markakis and the Olivera trade.
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It's a 1-2 win gap more than likely between the two. Aybar is no scrub but again the real issue is that Aybar is here for one year (assuming he doesnt get traded) and then we have to put our hopes in Albies.
 
thewupk said:
It's a 1-2 win gap more than likely between the two. Aybar is no scrub but again the real issue is that Aybar is here for one year (assuming he doesnt get traded) and then we have to put our hopes in Albies.
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Simmons has a nice friendly contract now, but he'll be getting paid more and more as each year passes. In three years, probably the earliest the Braves would ever be competitive again he'll be making some decent money and will be almost 30. Ownership may make this moot, but it sure seems like the Braves are going to have a ton of payroll flexibility when it comes time to actually try to win.

Once the club started this tear down, the only legitimate way to go about it was to do it right. Let's see where things sit next year after another draft with lots of picks, the international signings, and the progression of the current prospects. I wouldn't be surprised if they were unanimously ranked the top farm in the league again and we'll be talking more about when rather than if. we'll see.

as for the olivera talk. well, he may not be great, but the club did get that draft pick. what did they give up? Peraza who will probably never amount to anything and wood who is showing he could be falling fast. if that's the case, then all of this moaning will have been for naught.
 
chipchildress said:
Simmons has a nice friendly contract now, but he'll be getting paid more and more as each year passes. In three years, probably the earliest the Braves would ever be competitive again he'll be making some decent money and will be almost 30. Ownership may make this moot, but it sure seems like the Braves are going to have a ton of payroll flexibility when it comes time to actually try to win.

Once the club started this tear down, the only legitimate way to go about it was to do it right. Let's see where things sit next year after another draft with lots of picks, the international signings, and the progression of the current prospects. I wouldn't be surprised if they were unanimously ranked the top farm in the league again and we'll be talking more about when rather than if. we'll see.

as for the olivera talk. well, he may not be great, but the club did get that draft pick. what did they give up? Peraza who will probably never amount to anything and wood who is showing he could be falling fast. if that's the case, then all of this moaning will have been for naught.
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don't forget Avilan Frediots lefty specialist and JJ... because those two left, we missed the playoffs.
 
Actually, I'm not so sure that the Braves didn't take a "lesser" potential package at this point in time with Simmons because they got a player back at a position of need at the MLB level to not only replace Andelton's spot on defense as well as fill the need for a potential speedy top of the order hitter in Aybar. Aybar might be somebody that we might consider signing to an extension to bridge the gap persay to Albies, or even move over to 2B later or as other's have mentioned Aybar in himself may net a pretty decent package in a market thin on shortstops at this point in time, with a number of teams looking to upgrade.

Be interesting to see how this all transpires.
 
Really not a believer in what the Braves are doing. Not going to declare this was an awful trade, I just strongly disagree with the philosophy.

(1) Pitching these days grows on trees. Hard throwing dynamic pitchers have become a commodity - not a specialty. Not to diminish the importance of pitching. It's as important as it has ever been. I just think its way easier to find hard throwing high upside pitchers than it is to find one of the three greatest defensive shortstops of all time (that's my view on Simmons).

(2) Pitching is by far the highest risk asset you can own. The hit rate on young minor league pitchers becoming successful is far from a guarantee. Even if you get lucky once the pitcher is good, the odds of them staying healthy are entirely another beast. We should know this better than anyone after watching every promising young pitcher we have had get hit by the injury bug (Medlen, Minor, Beachy, etc..). You can take the view that this only confirms why this is a smart move. i.e. given the injury risk you should have as much pitching as possible. While I can see the logic in that argument, I still am more of the view that it reaffirms why a strong position player is by far a more valuable long term asset.

(3) Shortstop is in my view the most important position in the game. Even if you disagree with this statement, its undoubtedly a crucial position and we had it locked up for years. Not only is Simmons an elite defender but his absurd contact rate leaves me hope that "eventually" he could put together some better offensive seasons. He is one position on the diamond we knew we didn't have to worry about for a long time. At his worst he is the best defensive player in baseball and worth ~4 wins per year. At his peak he turns his absurd contact rate into average to above average offensive production and is one of the 5-10 best players in baseball.

In conclusion we went from having one of our core positions locked up at a very affordable rate to just another variable to worry about down the road. We have zero aspect of building a team. The only offensive player we acquired was a 31 year old with no position and no big league experience other than a series of injuries - and we gave up a valuable lefty and one of our top position prospects for him. It's getting comical.

Trading Heyward and Upton - these were controversial trades but trades that had a methodology and clear strategy. Hate on it all you want, disagree with it all you want but at least one can see a method to trading free agent bats for good young controllable assets weighted toward pitching. But at some point to me it seems we've lost a sense of vision and now are just willing to trade anyone for a high risk pitcher (or old, injury riddled unproven bat). Curious to see how the rest of the offseason plays out but right now this one is very confusing to me.
 
chipchildress said:
Simmons has a nice friendly contract now, but he'll be getting paid more and more as each year passes. In three years, probably the earliest the Braves would ever be competitive again he'll be making some decent money and will be almost 30. Ownership may make this moot, but it sure seems like the Braves are going to have a ton of payroll flexibility when it comes time to actually try to win.
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Simmons will have a team friendly contract throughout it all. Yes his salary will be quite a bit higher the last two years but you have to understand the way contracts have been skyrocketing lately. If Simmons was a FA right now he would likely pull in 18 million a year. 4-5 years from now his market value is likely over 20 million. That's a ton of surplus value the Braves traded away.
 
thewupk said:
If that was the gameplan we were being told I wouldn't have as much of an issue. But the talk of 2016 won't be as bad as 2015. We will compete in 2017. None of these are true. I thought the whole idea of last offseason was to trade those not in future plans (pending free agents) and to rebuild quickly to get ready for the new stadiun. 12 months later we are still trading established players with plenty of service time left for prospects.
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To be fair, we don't know if those statements are true or not, though it certainly looks gloomy now. I'll withhold judgement for this offseason til after I see what is being done to actually improve the major league team.

While pitching was certainly an issue at the big league level in 2015, I don't find a good solution to fix that to be trading your best defender and one of your most valuable assets for more unproven pitching.
 
thewupk said:
Simmons will have a team friendly contract throughout it all. Yes his salary will be quite a bit higher the last two years but you have to understand the way contracts have been skyrocketing lately. If Simmons was a FA right now he would likely pull in 18 million a year. 4-5 years from now his market value is likely over 20 million. That's a ton of surplus value the Braves traded away.
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you're imagining that value. the more he makes, "team friendly" or not, you're going to limit the number of teams that could go for him and certainly limit the return. the braves got a pretty big return for this guy. yes, they're in the form of prospects, but they just got a new number one prospect in their system in a guy who is pretty close to being major league ready.

they can then at some point turn that savings into somebody else to help the club down the road. in short, this is a hell of a return for a defensive specialist who probably has already physically peaked.
 
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