The Braves have been active this offseason, but not in the way fans would like. Instead of free agent signings and trades, Alex Anthopoulos has been cutting payroll.
It began when Jorge Soler was traded to the Angels, ridding the Braves of the remaining $32 million left on his contract. It continued when the club restructured the contracts of Reynaldo Lopez and Aaron Bummer, which preceded the Braves surprisingly declining Travis d’Arnaud’s $8 million option.
Finally, the Braves non-tendered several arbitration-eligible players, including Ramon Laureano and Griffin Canning, saving the club well over $10 million. In total, the Braves have cleared around $45 million of salary, but why? Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic shined a light.
“The team faces a considerable amount of uncertainty, from left-hander Max Fried and righty Charlie Morton possibly departing to righty Spencer Strider and right fielder Ronald Acuña Jr. starting the season on the injured list to setup man Joe Jiménez potentially missing the entire year. President of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos is trying to save wherever he can,” Rosenthal writes.
The Braves came into the offseason with a couple of tasks on their to-do list, but that quickly grew with news of Joe Jimenez’s surgery, and Acuna and Strider not being ready for Opening Day. Combined with the potential departures of A.J. Minter, Morton, and Fried, the Braves now have a laundry list of to-do’s this winter.
“But the free-agent class is deep in outfielders who might offer comparable production to Laureano at a lower price.
The Braves’ preference is for a left-handed hitter — Harris, Kelenic, Matt Olson and switch-hitter Ozzie Albies are currently their only options from the left side. If the better fit is right-handed, so be it. The market includes numerous options beyond the four outfielders expected to command the biggest contracts: Juan Soto, Anthony Santander, Teoscar Hernández and Jurickson Profar. With Acuña expected to return a month or two into the season, the Braves need not shop at the high end,” Rosenthal continued.
“The left-handed hitting free agents include Michael Conforto, Ben Gamel, Jason Heyward, Travis Jankowski, Max Kepler, David Peralta, Michael Tauchman, Alex Verdugo and Jesse Winker. The right-handers include Mark Canha, Randal Grichuk, Austin Hays, Connor Joe, Manuel Margot, Andrew McCutchen, Tyler O’Neill, Tommy Pham and Michael A. Taylor.”
The Braves have a ton of options to bolster the outfield. It shouldn’t be difficult to find suitable solutions; however, as Rosenthal continued, Anthopoulos could be much quicker to pull the trigger on pitchers.
“Anthopoulos typically addresses his offseason needs quickly. He figures to be aggressive in the starting pitching and possibly the relief markets. But with the outfielders, he need not rush. The secondary options likely will need to wait for Soto and Co. to come off the board. And given the number that is available, bargains eventually should emerge,” Rosenthal finished.
As it stands, one of the top MLB insiders is expecting the Braves to be active in pitcher markets early but wait on the outfielders.
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Photographer: Justin Berl/Icon Sportswire
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