What Would A "Fair" Freeman Extension Look Like?

I have to say, why should we extend Freeman? It's a luxury. We did it with Chipper because he was a generational player. Also was the last representative of the World Series team.

By 30 chipper had a 38.6 rWAR in just shy of 1100 games, Freeman is at 34.5 in just about 1350 games. Chipper was certainly a better player.

Freeman takes money away from other players. Freeman could represent the difference between keeping a player or trading them. And is that replacable, possibly. I think to me it depends on if the Braves think Riley is legit. If not they'll probably be forced to keep Freeman. If he's legit, then they're fine.

Braves I think they need to do a number of things to assess the future. The first is trade Inciarte. I wonder if we could do Inciarte for Toro. Astros don't need Toro with Bregman, who's arguably the best 3B in the game, and getting Inciarte would free up Springer to play RF only. Of course we'd have to include some other pieces I'm sure given Inciarte's limited contract opinion.
 
zitothebrave said:
I have to say, why should we extend Freeman? It's a luxury. We did it with Chipper because he was a generational player. Also was the last representative of the World Series team.

By 30 chipper had a 38.6 rWAR in just shy of 1100 games, Freeman is at 34.5 in just about 1350 games. Chipper was certainly a better player.

Freeman takes money away from other players. Freeman could represent the difference between keeping a player or trading them. And is that replacable, possibly. I think to me it depends on if the Braves think Riley is legit. If not they'll probably be forced to keep Freeman. If he's legit, then they're fine.

Braves I think they need to do a number of things to assess the future. The first is trade Inciarte. I wonder if we could do Inciarte for Toro. Astros don't need Toro with Bregman, who's arguably the best 3B in the game, and getting Inciarte would free up Springer to play RF only. Of course we'd have to include some other pieces I'm sure given Inciarte's limited contract opinion.
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I've been beating the trade Ender and plug Pache in drum for a while, and agree that that moving Inciarte should be one of the top priorities - not sure a Toro deal would be something appealing for Houston though. The Astros are trying to cut costs, and I'm not sure why they'd be interested in Ender unless the Braves were eating a chunk of the money or taking salary back. I'm sure they'd love to move Springer to RF full-time, but taking Reddick and the extra $6.75 million back seems too steep to fit to me.

If AA were thinking outside the box (granted it's WAY outside the box), maybe an Ender for JBJ deal would make some sense. That would keep your stopgap to Pache (if you're not ready to give him the job now) in place and add $3.75 million to this year's payroll, but wouldn't block Pache and would clear a little more than $9 million from the 2020/2021 payrolls. You could cover the extra money you'd be paying JBJ by cutting Duvall loose (or trading him to someone for a bag of balls). Ender would bridge the CF gap in Boston until Jarren Duran or Gilberto Jimenez is ready. They've got a platoon partner for Ender in Pillar if they're competitive and games are played this season.
 
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clvclv said:
I've been beating the trade Ender and plug Pache in drum for a while, and agree that that moving Inciarte should be one of the top priorities - not sure a Toro deal would be something appealing for Houston though. The Astros are trying to cut costs, and I'm not sure why they'd be interested in Ender unless the Braves were eating a chunk of the money or taking salary back. I'm sure they'd love to move Springer to RF full-time, but taking Reddick and the extra $6.75 million back seems too steep to fit to me.

If AA were thinking outside the box (granted it's WAY outside the box), maybe an Ender for JBJ deal would make some sense. That would keep your stopgap to Pache (if you're not ready to give him the job now) in place and add $3.75 million to this year's payroll, but wouldn't block Pache and would clear a little more than $9 million from the 2020/2021 payrolls. You could cover the extra money you'd be paying JBJ by cutting Duvall loose (or trading him to someone for a bag of balls). Ender would bridge the CF gap in Boston until Jarren Duran or Gilberto Jimenez is ready. They've got a platoon partner for Ender in Pillar if they're competitive and games are played this season.
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JBJ? Jon Bon Jovi? I wasn’t aware he was playing outfield right now. Maybe we should all agree to only use acronyms for Braves players and not random other MLBers so people can actually know who we’re all talking about.
 
Skeeter31 said:
JBJ? Jon Bon Jovi? I wasn’t aware he was playing outfield right now. Maybe we should all agree to only use acronyms for Braves players and not random other MLBers so people can actually know who we’re all talking about.
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You've never heard Jackie Bradley, Jr. referred to as JBJ?
 
Some of y'all are spoiled by having had a legit great first baseman around so long. I remember well the Braves' long-term "cheapo" plan for first base between the Big Cat and Freeman, and I have no desire to return to that time. What leading lights we saw:

Rico Brogna - .248/.297/.335, -1.0 WAR
Wes Helms - .234/.287/.423, -0.6 WAR
Ken Caminiti - .222/.306/.380, -0.9 WAR
Robert Fick - .269/.335/.418, 0.6 WAR
Scott Thorman - .222/.260/.407, -1.0 WAR
Craig Wilson - .172/.304/.259, -0.2 WAR
Casey Kotchman - .267/.346/.378, 0.6 WAR
Troy Glaus, .240/.344/.400, 0.2 WAR

Just like a literal decade's worth of hot garbage.

Oh there was the Tex Interregnum (a horrible deal that was a direct reaction to the cheapo policy) and Laroche was cromulent for a while, but by god we've had some terrible 1B over the years because we though it was a position where we could save money.

Never Forget, we had to dig up the corpse of Julio Franco and reanimate it for years with the power of prayer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-H9JHdsn-EQ
 
Metaphysicist said:
Some of y'all are spoiled by having had a legit great first baseman around so long. I remember well the Braves' long-term "cheapo" plan for first base between the Big Cat and Freeman, and I have no desire to return to that time. What leading lights we saw:

Rico Brogna - .248/.297/.335, -1.0 WAR
Wes Helms - .234/.287/.423, -0.6 WAR
Ken Caminiti - .222/.306/.380, -0.9 WAR
Robert Fick - .269/.335/.418, 0.6 WAR
Scott Thorman - .222/.260/.407, -1.0 WAR
Craig Wilson - .172/.304/.259, -0.2 WAR
Casey Kotchman - .267/.346/.378, 0.6 WAR
Troy Glaus, .240/.344/.400, 0.2 WAR

Just like a literal decade's worth of hot garbage.

Oh there was the Tex Interregnum (a horrible deal that was a direct reaction to the cheapo policy) and Laroche was cromulent for a while, but by god we've had some terrible 1B over the years because we though it was a position where we could save money.

Never Forget, we had to dig up the corpse of Julio Franco and reanimate it for years with the power of prayer.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-H9JHdsn-EQ
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That’s a nice selective list you’ve got there. Out of all of those players listed, only a few of them actually handled the 1B duties as the regular starter and only for a single year each. And some of your WAR numbers are skewed over multiple seasons, not the actual numbers they posted in the year they were starting. LaRoche was our starter for 3 straight years and put up semi-decent numbers. Plus, the only 2 seasons during the Big Cat-Freeman drought where we had losing records were seasons where LaRoche or Tex were the starter. So obviously plugging in a below average 1B didn’t hurt us too terribly (post season not withstanding but Freeman has been hot garbage in the postseason so that’s moot anyway).
 
Skeeter31 said:
That’s a nice selective list you’ve got there. Out of all of those players listed, only a few of them actually handled the 1B duties as the regular starter and only for a single year each
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Yes, I understand how it would be comforting to think these were random outliers I painstakingly selected from among actual gold, but unfortunately, every one of those players was either handed the job as some point or part of a cheapo platoon with one of the others. Thus, they were all tried out as a "solution." None of them lasted very long because they were obviously terrible, but... that's the point. You can go look at the lineups on BB-Ref yourself. It's not like I cited Mike Hessman and Barbaro Canizares.

2001
- Brogna was the starter coming out of the gate in 2001, splitting time with Helms, but was terrible and cut.
- Caminiti was the "solution" in the second half of 2001.
- When they gave up on Caminiti, back to Helms for like a week before the Braves resorted to the power of prayer
- Jesus Juice came in to close out the season.

2002
- BJ Surhoff(!) actually had the job coming out of ST, didn't make it out of April.
- Helms was given the job in late April (started 26/33 games) and lost it in late May.
- Jesus Juice takes over again (Aided by the lesser Franco, Matt; this ended up being an okay amalgam).

2003
- Fick was the starting 1B for basically all of 2003, with the Francos occasionally spelling him.

2004-2006
Laroche was cromulent, as I noted. That's why I didn't list him with the disasters. But we thought he was MUCH better than he actually was because we had been deprived of even a mildly competent 1B for so long. He put an end to the chaos, but he was not actually very good: over those three years and 1415 PA he put up 1.7 WAR. On a rate basis, that's worse than Fick. Our contentment with LaRoche honestly shows how desperate we were for just the most basic steady production out of 1B.

2007
- Thorman started as the lefty part of a platoon with Wilson and ended up starting 54/68 games at one point in 2007.
- Wilson started the year as the righty part of a platoon with Thorman but barely made it out of April, losing his job to Chris Woodward (lol) and Salty and yet another round of Jesus Juice.
- This situation was so awful we traded our hopes and dreams for Tex.

2008
- Kotchman replaced Tex as the everyday 1B after the trade

2009
- Kotchman started the season as the regular, but was eventually traded for the sweet comfort of Laroche 2.0.

2010
- Glaus spent most of the season as the regular but was eventually replaced by what was left of Derrek Lee (who was pretty alright).

2011-2019
Nine glorious years of consistent and good baseball from one first baseman. Praise be unto him.
 
Metaphysicist said:
Troy Glaus, .240/.344/.400, 0.2 WAR
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DOn't you badmouth Troy Glaus. I'll dig up Boomstick meme for you.

Anyway, I think acknowledging that replacing freeman being difficult and not wanting to pay a 30+ year old 1B 20M a year are mutually exclusive. I think Freeman is super is a great player. And we won't replace him easily. Similarly to how we've struggled to replace Chipper at 3B. where we've seen guys like Adonis Garcia,Ramiro Pena, and Chris Johnson feature heavily. Our best 3B including players with lots of time was Josh Donaldson.
 
Speaking of LaRoche, just how bad was the NL field in 2012 if he finished 6th in MVP voting with an .853 OPS and 4.2 WAR?
 
Carp said:
Speaking of LaRoche, just how bad was the NL field in 2012 if he finished 6th in MVP voting with an .853 OPS and 4.2 WAR?
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I mean he wasn't that good. FWIW notable guys below him by rWAR

David Wright 7.1
Kimbrel 3.2
A. Ramirez 5.6
R.A. Dickey 5.7
Votto 5.9 (only played 111 games)
Kershaw 6.8
Bourn 6.0
Prado 5.4
Stanton 5.4
 
chop2chip said:
Same. I remember thinking highly of Craig Wilson at the time.
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He was a heck of a hitter for a few years with the Pirates. Stat heads at the time loved him. WAR shows that defense and baserunning sapped most of his value, and he was obviously shot by the time he got to Atlanta.
 
A guy at TC did a pretty good (though a bit long winded and rambling) job of breaking down a Freeman extension:

https://www.talkingchop.com/2020/4/27/21224628/atlanta-braves-extension-candidates-freddie-freeman

The basic points can be summed up in a few quotes...

"the 5 year/$130M commitment to Paul Goldschmidt would be a sensible and accurate model as a blueprint for Freeman’s extension"

"it simply seems unwise for teams to make these type of commitments"

"it remains clear that Atlanta should remain significantly committed to him as one of the faces of the franchise for the foreseeable future"

and then settles on "a plausible prediction for a Freeman extension could be $120M-$125M over five years."

This is a pretty well written piece, but I disagree with the conclusion. If Freeman is willing to stick around on a series of high dollar 1-2 year extensions with options, fine. If he requires an additional 5 years, let him walk. By the time Freeman's contract expires, he is very likely to be given and accept a QO, which could give the Braves another year of control over him anyways.

There is no point in locking big dollars long term into an aging 1B, as has been demonstrated by almost every single such contract in recent memory...including the Goldy deal that should serve as the blueprint for Freeman's. We've seen this story play out several times, and it always ends the same way.
 
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Who could have predicted this conversation 3-4 years ago?

Oh, right, that was me.

The Braves are now in a position where they almost have to let the Freeman contract play out since there is really no circumstance where a trade now makes sense and any contract extension would likely become a brutal detriment in 3-4 years. They are also now constrained by fan expectation as to what to do with Freddie. It's unfortunate, but management's best hope is that Freeman's performance will slowly decline over the last two years of his current contract, without significantly damaging on-field performance and results, so that when his current contract expires, it's clear to all, even Freddie, that a long, lucrative new contract isn't and shouldn't be in the cards.

The Acuna and Albies extensions (best thing AA has accomplished by far, so far), help mitigate the risk a little.

But, my original point from years ago remains: by the time the team really gets good, Freeman will be in his decline phase and will become a detriment due to age/pay/fan optics. They should have traded him years ago and hopefully brought back building blocks that would be blossoming now at a cheap price with years of control. Now, it's too late and the only choice is to ride it out.
 
Enscheff said:
A guy at TC did a pretty good (though a bit long winded and rambling) job of breaking down a Freeman extension:

https://www.talkingchop.com/2020/4/27/21224628/atlanta-braves-extension-candidates-freddie-freeman

The basic points can be summed up in a few quotes...

"the 5 year/$130M commitment to Paul Goldschmidt would be a sensible and accurate model as a blueprint for Freeman’s extension"

"it simply seems unwise for teams to make these type of commitments"

"it remains clear that Atlanta should remain significantly committed to him as one of the faces of the franchise for the foreseeable future"

and then settles on "a plausible prediction for a Freeman extension could be $120M-$125M over five years."

This is a pretty well written piece, but I disagree with the conclusion. If Freeman is willing to stick around on a series of high dollar 1-2 year extensions with options, fine. If he requires an additional 5 years, let him walk. By the time Freeman's contract expires, he is very likely to be given and accept a QO, which could give the Braves another year of control over him anyways.

There is no point in locking big dollars long term into an aging 1B, as has been demonstrated by almost every single such contract in recent memory...including the Goldy deal that should serve as the blueprint for Freeman's. We've seen this story play out several times, and it always ends the same way.
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It was an odd article, because—as you mentioned—the author does a pretty good job breaking down the cautionary antecedents and arguments against signing Freeman to a a high-dollar, long-term extension ... and then concludes, essentially, that the Braves should do it anyways, in part for sentimental reasons (leadership, PR, fan-service).

Nevertheless, I think they sort of point us in the direction of what a reasonably-palatable extension for Freeman could look like, in an aside near the end of the piece: "The Braves also could sign Freeman to a four year, $100M contract with a team option for a fifth year at a lower AAV." While I still think a four-year, $100M contract is too pricey/risky, I could see something topping out at three years and $80 million guaranteed, at a $25M AAV for those three seasons, along with a couple options on the back-end at $15M–20 AAV, hedged with $5M buyouts. If Freeman's decline is less precipitous than his profiled antecedents suggest, he could end up close to that ~$120M over five years; otherwise, the Braves are protected for his post-35-age seasons, and, if things go worst-case, Freeman still earns $80M over a three-year period.

Obviously, it'd been even more preferable if he's just willing to ride out your suggested "series of high dollar 1-2 year extensions with options", but something along the lines I suggested seems like a good way to split the difference, limit long-term exposure, and still provide Freeman with plenty of incentive to sign on.
 
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Super said:
eventually every good first baseman will get older and you'll have to decide what to do with them. i am a genius for pointing this out.
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No.

You would have been a genius if you pointed it out 5 years ago.

But you didn't. Now, you're just choking on sour grapes (g rated comment).
 
I’m not sure it’s going to be that hard to convince fans we need to let Freeman go at the end of his deal.

Last year he was the highest paid but only the 4th best player on the team.

The last things I remember from Freeman last year were his arm falling apart, him calling out Acuña who played better than Freeman all year, followed by him essentially losing the series for us in game 4 by not being able to get Acuña in with a SF and then his pathetic error in game 5.

There is a very real chance that baseball won’t be played this season and even if it is almost any performance is gonna have to be taken with a grain of salt.

That really only will leave next year to show people that Freeman is worth the money. If his arm busts again or he starts having any other injuries or decline fans could start to turn quick.
 
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