SB Nation - Xavier Nady

Braves Not Interested In Big Name Outfielders

gondeee — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 21:22:06 -0000

A couple of disappointing and revealing tweets from David O'Brien about the Braves direction post Vaz-trade (first):

[Matt Holliday is] too pricey for Braves, but there's at least a slim chance they make a run at [Jason Bay].

Scratch that Bay possibility for Braves. I was just assured that Braves are out of that pursuit.

"Assured!" Nuts! This just puts the dagger further in this already disappointing day. We've got the dough to go after Bay... well, that's only somewhat true. I've taken a realistic look at the Braves salary situation, and we've got the dough this year to go after big-money free agents, but after this year we start to get hamstrung with our salary commitments. In 2011, Yunel Escobar, Martin Prado, and Jair Jurrjens all enter their first arbitration year. That same year, our currently signed stars, Brian McCann and Nate McLouth, see big raises in their salaries. All of this with virtually no money coming off our books from any other players.

If there's one thing we're about to learn from the way in which the Braves conduct themselves throughout the rest of this off-season, it's that they are very aware of this fact, and they're not going to commit any more long term money to free agents. I believe all that we're going to get this off-season are one-year stop gap fillers until Jason Heyward and Freddie Freeman are fully ready.

This is why I expect the Braves to sign Xavier Nady before the end of the year, and maybe one other small to medium sized free agent, but we're not getting into the big names or even the second tier names since the players in both of those categories would require deals of more than a year.

It's a cold reality Braves fans, but we pretty much have our team, save for one or two more folks, none of whom will be big names.

Braves Re-Acquire Jeff Francoeur... in the form of Melky Cabrera

gondeee — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 16:32:36 -0000

More photos » by Julie Jacobson - AP

For better or worse, Melky Cabrera is now a member of the Atlanta Braves.

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This is going to be a trade that's talked about for some time, along with the moves the Braves have made over the past year. If there is one constant in the moves the Braves have made in the past year, it is all about trimming money from the payroll.

In today's deal the Braves sent Javier Vazquez and his one-year $11.5 million salary to the Yankees along with Boone Logan and his $1.5 million likely arbitration figure. In return they get a rookie left-handed pitcher in Mike Dunn, an A-ball prospect in Arodys Vizcaino (two no-cost players), and outfielder Melky Cabrera, who will likely make around $3 million in arbitration. Ryan Church was scheduled to make around $4 million in arbitration, but by most accounts he's a better player than Cabrera. He's certainly not as highly thought of, but when healthy he hits for much more power than Cabrera likely ever will.

This begs the question, "did we trade away Jeff Francoeur (.743 career OPS) last year to acquire the better Ryan Church (.787 career OPS), only to release Church, and trade for Melky Cabrera (.716 career OPS), who is likely not as good as Francoeur?" Seems to me that the Braves end up on the short end of that outcome. Of course Cabrera is probably still "projectable" as a major leaguer, but how long did we say that about Francoeur?

There are two ways in which this trade will look good. First is in the money we will save and have available to potentially get a free agent bat that we've been needing. A rough total of the Braves salaries for next season currently comes to around $80 million (we only have one arbitration eligible player left, that's Peter Moylan). That would leave us with around $15 million to spend on a big bat... a nice sum, which should get us a good bat. The second way this trade will look good is if Arodys Vizcaino pulls his own version of Neftali Feliz in two or three years. We could also use him to acquire that big bat via trade, that would be an alternate way in which the trade would look good.

As it stands now, the Braves pattern the past year has been to strip salary. Kelly Johnson and Ryan Church were non-tendered, instead of being paid around $4 million a piece. Boone Logan was swapped for the cheaper Mike Dunn. Tim Hudson was re-signed at a more affordable salary than the now-traded Javier Vazquez. Billy Wagner and Takashi Saito will make less than Rafael Soriano and Mike Gonzalez.

All of this salary conservation has led up to this final purge from the books, and now the team must make a move that brings a big bat here, and they should have the salary room to do so. Perhaps with $15 million to spend, they can aim higher than Johnny Damon or Xavier Nady, and zero in on Jason Bay or Matt Holliday. For some fans, that's the only way the team will win them back after another tumultuous off-season of questionable moves.

Braves Sign Joe Thurston; Vazquez Won't Cross the Rocky Mountains

gondeee — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 20:18:30 -0000

More photos » by Bill Boyce - AP

Utility man Joe Thurston, formerly of the Cardinals, has signed a minor league deal with the Braves.

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A few tidbits of information today. First off, from Mark Bowman we learn that the Braves have signed light-hitting utility man Joe Thurston, who last year was with the Cardinals, to a minor league deal with an invite to spring training. Thurston is mainly a second baseman, but he's made himself more valuable in recent years be learning to play the outfield and most recently learning to play third base (though, not that well). He's played a tad bit of shortstop in the minor leagues, but mainly he'll be in camp competing for the second utility infield position.

In the same blog post, and later in a front page post, Bowman quotes a source who confirms that it is highly unlikely that Javier Vazquez would waive his no-trade clause to go to a West coast team. I tackled that rumor and debunked it last night, albeit with out a "source," I instead used logic. It's good to know that Javy is still interested in remaining in Atlanta beyond next season. I'd like to see that happen, but of course, all of this is predicated on the Braves moving Derek Lowe.

Speaking of Lowe, I expect that we'll begin to hear another team mentioned more frequently in trade rumors with Lowe -- the New York Yankees. They seem to be tackling one off-season priority at a time, and after acquiring Curtis Granderson and now signing Nick Johnson, many people expect them to focus on starting pitching. The Braves are rumored to have long been interested in Nick Swisher. If they can swing Lowe for Swisher, then that may free up the Yankees to go back and try to re-sign Johnny Damon, another move that is seemingly in the Yankees interest.

Another team that may be looking for more starting pitching is the Cubs, who just freed up a bunch of money by trading Milton Bradley. I'm not sure how they would match up in a trade with the Braves, though, as they don't seem to have any surplus at a position the Braves need to fill.

I also continue to hear that free agent Xavier Nady and the Braves are close to a deal, and that only lingering medical questions about Nady are holding up the deal. Getting Swisher and Nady would seem to wrap up the principal needs of the Braves off-season, and set us up with a good and deep team heading into spring training. One name that I haven't heard mentioned with the Braves, but one I'd like to hear mentioned is Troy Glaus. He's a year removed from a fantastic season, and while he would primarily play first base, he would be an excellent third base insurance policy against Chipper Jones getting injured.

The Braves front office also officially announced, via a press release, that the team has signed six minor league free agents this off-season. The list includes left-handed pitcher Mariano Gomez, catchers Orlando Mercado and J.C. Boscan, infielder Joe Thurston and outfielders Brent Clevlen and Mitch Jones. They join right-handed pitcher Scott Proctor, who signed in November.

Jeff Clement Penciled in at First

Charlie — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 10:03:59 -0000

by Kathy Willens - AP

The Bucs are comfortable waiting until late in the offseason to target free agent corner players like Xavier Nady.

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The Post-Gazette has an interesting item about Jeff Clement and the first base job. The Pirates seem not to mind that some of their top targets for extra corner players (Xavier Nady and Rick Ankiel in particular) are unlikely to sign until late in the offseason. This means they're probably relatively happy with the players currently at the top of their depth chart (Clement at first, and Garrett Jones in right) and want an extra guy mainly to provide competition and to guard against a flameout by Clement or someone else.

This seems sensible. As a fourth-outfielder / insurance policy, Nady is actually fairly interesting to me, since he's right-handed. But Ankiel is a lefty like Clement. And it's not really clear that Nady or Ankiel are better than Clement right now anyway. ZiPS, for example, predicts Clement will have an .801 OPS next year. (Incidentally, it also predicts Matt Capps will have the lowest ERA on the staff. Oops.) Nady is at .780. I don't think a ZiPS projection for Ankiel has been published yet, but Bill James has him at .763.

Now, both Nady and Ankiel would be doing the Pirates a service by keeping Jones out of the outfield, so they provide more defensive value than Clement probably would. And certainly projections can turn out to be wrong, particularly with injury magnets like these three guys, etc. etc. etc. (Don't think you're being original by pointing that out, either.) The point, though, is that if the Bucs have resigned themselves to second- or third-tier free agents like Nady and Ankiel (as is probably appropriate at this point), they're right to not feel much urgency about this. Clement might well end up being better than the available options anyway, and if things get bad, there's also Steve Pearce, Delwyn Young and Brandon Moss--and possibly Jose Tabata and Pedro Alvarez--to fall back on. An additional benefit of starting Clement is that the Pirates can control his rights for several years if he succeeds, and since Tabata and Alvarez could begin to complicate things staring in about July, it behooves the Bucs to see what they have in Clement.

The best reason for the Pirates to sign a free agent outfielder or first baseman is not to replace someone currently penciled into the starting lineup, but to guard against a complete failure, and I don't just mean by Clement. Not to take a shot at someone who thoroughly proved me wrong throughout 2009, but last season Jones played like he knew how to fly. Maybe he really can fly, but given his lengthy and undistinguished history, the Pirates also have to consider the possibility that instead of flying his legs were just moving really fast for a few seconds, like Wile E. Coyote running off a cliff. Clement, Jones and Lastings Milledge should all be in the starting lineup, but if possible there should be legitimate fallback options too.

New York Yankees news & notes: Forget that Damon discount

Ed Valentine — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 13:29:33 -0000

It has been clear for weeks now that the New York Yankees want Johnny Damon back, but for no more than two years at around $10 million per season.

Damon made it clear Tuesday he wants more than that -- and he fully intends to allow agent Scott Boras to find a team willing to pony up his asking price.

Damon is still seeking a three-year contract without taking a pay cut - that would put a deal at $39million - believing that his performance last season was good enough for him to continue earning an annual salary of $13 million. And after watching Mike Cameron - who is almost a year older than Damon - ink a two-year pact with the Red Sox, Damon sees no reason for him to settle for less than three.

"Players out there are getting multi-year deals," Damon said. "(Andy) Pettitte got a raise at 37, even though it was only one year. Cameron is 37 (he turns 37 in January) and he got two years. We're not going to know much until we start negotiating with teams, but that should happen soon."

Damon, who doesn't seem to be in any rush to get his situation settled, said that the Yankees have not started negotiating with his agent, Scott Boras.

"I've been too busy with the kids to worry about it," Damon said. "We're just going about our business and our life. I'm not really too concerned about it. We'll find a team elsewhere if the Yankees don't bring me back."

My take: I can't blame Damon for wanting as much as he can get, but the Yankees can't do that. And GM Brian Cashman seems to feel that way, too. Three years from now Damon will be a very expensive broken-down ex-outfielder who can only DH. The Yankees don't need that. If Damon wants to play hardball, the Yankees just need to move on.

If the Yankees need a replacement for Damon -- and Hideki Matsui -- they don't appear inclined to pursue Jason Bay as that guy. I'm OK with that, too. They can use Melky Cabrera in left, let Xavier Nady and Jason Hoffman compete to be the right-hand hitting alternative, and spend their money on adding a little more pitching.

Speaking of Matsui, I came across a couple of excellent articles regarding the former Yankee outfielder/DH.

WFAN's Sweeny Murti penned (typed?) an excellent tribute to Matsui that had more to do with Matsui the man than Matsui the baseball player.

I can’t imagine I’ll ever have the privilege of covering a player like Hideki Matsui again. The word "unique" is thrown around too much, but this was indeed a unique experience, right from Day One.

Matsui’s Yankee legacy will be that he was an extremely professional hitter, a clutch hitter who saved his best for last, 6 RBIs in the World Series clincher to take home the MVP trophy. And his nickname, Godzilla, is wholly ironic, for there is nothing about his personality or work ethic that suggests a fire-breathing monster. He was just a model Yankee from the first day, literally to the last.

It is nearly impossible to demonstrate how impressive it was to see a man move half way around the world and not only become the first successful power hitter from Japan, but do it in New York for the Yankees, in a place where greater players have come and failed. We often say there will never be another Derek Jeter or another Mariano Rivera. He’s not in same Hall of Fame level as those two, but Matsui is much more. He is in an elite class all by himself, simply the most unique athlete I have ever known.

The New York Times looks at how the loss of Matsui will affect the Yankees off the field.

ESPN's Rob Neyer loves Boston's decision to replace Bay with Cameron. And Sabermetricians will love his reasoning.

He certainly isn't as expensive. As for productive ... Well, that depends on how you define "productive."

Over the last two seasons, Cameron produced 8.4 wins above replacement.

Over those same two seasons, Bay produced 6.4 wins above replacement.

The Red Sox are going to pay Cameron roughly half of what someone's going to pay Jason Bay.

We try to make these things so complicated. But they're not, really. The Red Sox have figured out how to simplify everything. And I just can't wait to read all the columns in the Boston newspapers questioning Theo Epstein's intelligence and ownership's commitment to winning ...

The Atlanta Braves Weekly Wrap

gondeee — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 22:11:17 -0000

More photos » by Gregory Smith - AP

This week turned out to be all about Rafael Soriano for the Atlanta Braves.

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Here's a look at the major stories in the world of the Atlanta Braves for the week ending on December 13th:

In the Press...

There were early rumors, then more rumors, and finally Rafael Soriano decided to accept arbitration from the Braves.
Soriano was quickly traded to the Tampa Bay Rays in exchange for another bullpen arm, Jesse Chavez.
There were early reports at the Winter Meetings that Kelly Johnson was in high demand on the trade market, but apparently that was not the case as the Braves non-tendered Johnson yesterday.
Ryan Church was initially DFA'ed to make room for Soriano on the roster, and then he was non-tendered later in the week.
The Braves have shown some interest in free agent Xavier Nady.
Matt Diaz was re-signed for the 2010 season by the Braves.

At Talking Chop...

For a complete and detailed recap of the Braves happenings at the Winter Meetings, click here.
I penned a post hoping that the Braves stay away from Mike Cameron.
CB previewed the Rule 5 draft, and correctly called that Edgar Osuna would be the guy off the Braves roster who was selected. He was selected by, surprise, the Royals. Those Royals also signed two other ex-Braves players.
Talking Chop got the exclusive scoop on all the Braves minor league and international free agent signings.

Notable FanPosts and FanShots...

jdunk asks the if trading Derek Lowe will make the Braves better.
Meanwhile, JKowalek thinks the Braves and Cubs should make a swap involving Lowe.
And AndrewWK wants the Braves to swap Lowe for a speedster.

Coming up tomorrow on Talking Chop, the combined community top-25 Braves prospects.

Braves at the Winter Meetings... Wha' Happened?

gondeee — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 23:02:29 -0000

More photos » by Darron Cummings - AP

Atlanta Braves manager Bobby Cox was one of the main attractions when he gave a pres conference at the Winter Meetings.

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It was such a tumultuous few days, some of us may have forgotten what exactly the Braves did and got out of baseball's Winter Meetings. Here's a recap:

Rumors coming into the meetings had Rafael Soriano "leaning" towards accepting the Braves offer of salary arbitration, instead of declining like he should and netting the Braves 2 draft picks.
Those rumors increased once folks got to Indianapolis.
We had a fun first-day rumor about Yankees reliever Brian Bruney possibly heading to the Braves, but he ended up going to the Nats.
The Braves had interest in Nats outfielder Josh Willingham, but the Nats weren't willing to part with him.
There has been a lot of interest on the trade front in Braves second baseman Kelly Johnson, but nothing else was mentioned after that first day.
After a night of sheer agony and waiting, Soriano finally set the rumors right and accepted arbitration from the Braves.
Because of that decision, the Braves had to DFA Ryan Church, whom they still have not traded (nor likely will).
Like clockwork, Soriano's agent asks the Braves for a trade, thusly skirting the free agent compensation system.
There was some rumored interest by the Braves in free agent Xavier Nady.
But the trading of surplus pitching dollars was top priority over anything else, and our Meeting's were seemingly put on hold until the Soriano situation could be resolved.
Finally, in the middle of the night, we learned that Rafael had been moved to the Rays for a mighty return of... Jesse Chavez.
As if the Braves had not been slighted enough during the meetings, they lost promising lefty Edgar Osuna in the Rule 5 draft to none other than the Royals.

The Soriano trade is not yet official, the two sides are apparently awaiting the medical files or pending physicals to consummate the deal. Tampa Bay got a steal of a closer for next season at a reasonable $7 million-plus. A condition of the deal was that the Rays agree in principal to sign Soriano before the deal was complete.

The good news for the Braves is that we apparently don't have to send any money to the Rays, and thus the whole Soriano Surprise was just an unpleasant distraction that netted us a durable middle reliever for our bullpen next year. Jesse Chavez won't blow anyone's socks off, but in a pen where Cox likes to run people out there day after day, Chavez seems to be a guy that can be abused in that way. He's also a childhood friend of Jo-Jo Reyes, and was good friends with Nate McLouth when they were teammates with the Pirates.

The Soriano Surprise may have been a sour point for some fans, but the original thinking was that the team would not offer him arbitration, and it was only a few days before the deadline that we learned they would. Wren knew the risks, and instead of not offering him arbitration and ending up with nothing, they rolled the dice and ended up with a serviceable and affordable major league middle reliever. As weird as that is, I'd call it a win. Especially since we likely needed another middle bullpen guy like Chavez anyway.

Osuna was not a huge loss in the Rule 5, and the Braves usually do one of the best jobs of any organization of scouting their own players, so while he has talent, the Braves obviously thought more of some of the other guys they protected.

We have to believe that the main goal accomplished at the Meetings for the Braves was to lay the groundwork for a future trade of Derek Lowe. They should know the full market by now, and whether they need to wait until after Lackey signs or not. Hopefully we'll see some movement on one of those fronts soon, and hopefully he can bring back some sort of more valuable return than a Jesse Chavez, though to clear payroll, I may be willing to accept such a return if it means we can sign a bat.

Braves Interested in Free Agent Xavier Nady

gondeee — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 01:44:39 -0000

In his latest blog notes column, Mark Bowman says that the Atlanta Braves may have interest in outfielder Xavier Nady. The Braves are attempting to ascertain the status of Nady's surgically repaired elbow after he underwent Tommy John Surgery last year. Nady is apparently also interested in the Braves, so once Atlanta determines if his elbow is healthy a deal could be worked out quickly.

Nady has played both left and right field, so he could be an option to fill one of the power voids at the corner outfield spots. He has also played some first base in his career, and the Braves may be looking at him for that role, especially coming off of elbow surgery.

Nady would be a low-cost right-handed bat for the Braves. While not ideal, he could serve as the Braves cleanup hitter, but he has mainly hit fifth or sixth in his career.

Arbitration decisions today

Travis G — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 19:16:23 -0000

[Note by Ed Valentine, 12/01/09 7:33 PM EST : From LoHud comes news that the Yankees have declined to offer arbitration to anyone.]

Of the four major names, how many will be offered arbitration? There's Johnny Damon (type A), Hideki Matsui (unranked), Andy Pettitte (B) and Xavier Nady (B, somehow).

Joel Sherman expects the Yankees to decline to offer arbitration to Damon, Matsui and Pettitte. I could see that. Damon and Matsui are aging stars that would likely accept arbitration (and Matsui doesn't even offer the benefit of bringing back a draft pick). With Pettitte, the Yanks probably feel they can retain him for another 'discounted' year.

Nady will be an interesting decision. He would be worth offering arbitration, because if he declined, he would bring back a second-round draft pick, and if he accepted, we would get a good left-fielder for 2010 (at a decent cost because he barely played this year). However, if the Yankees think he can't stay healthy (he's coming off Tommy John surgery), then obviously it's not worth it. I don't know enough about his medical condition to declare him healthy or unhealthy. Hopefully the front office knows more.

Poll

Who should be offered arbitration (if you had to choose one)?

Damon

103 votes

Matsui

49 votes

Pettitte

163 votes

Nady

157 votes

472 votes | Poll has closed

What About Depth?

Charlie — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 03:04:21 -0000

Sorry for the absence of updates the past few days; it can be hard to post when there isn't much news coming out.

Anyway, there was some interesting discussion of the BA top prospects here, and the basic take-away criticism (particularly from Mike Emeigh, a smart long-time Pirates fan and critic) is that the Pirates' farm system still isn't that strong yet. If you look only at the ten-player list BA published, I think that's true, but I don't think a list of ten players tells the whole story.

Frank Coonelly and Neal Huntington have been on the job about two years, and thus have had two drafts to improve what was essentially a barren system. They've also fixated pretty intensely on high school talent after the first round in those drafts, at least in the guys to whom they've paid big bonuses. Lots of them have considerable upside, but given their age, understandably haven't done enough to make it into the top ten yet. And so any evaluation of the Pirates' system that doesn't take guys like Robbie Grossman, Quinton Miller, Jarek Cunningham, Colton Cain and Trent Stevenson into account just isn't really getting it done.

Then there's the fact that the Pirates traded away most of their starting players, and only three players acquired in those trades (Jose Tabata, Tim Alderson and Gorkys Hernandez) fit into BA's top ten--and even then, including Hernandez was probably a stretch. The problem was that besides Jason Bay, the Pirates didn't have anyone particularly good to trade. The Pirates' return for Bay was mediocre, which hurt, but it was counterbalanced by the fact that they got a very good prospect (Tabata), a good starting pitcher (Ross Ohlendorf) and another interesting player (Dan McCutchen) for Xavier Nady and Damaso Marte. That trade was, it turns out, a steal for the Pirates.

Beyond that, the Pirates' problem has been that teams are increasingly unwilling to trade genuinely excellent prospects. It's a hard enough sell to get two great prospects when you're trying to trade Cliff Lee. When you're trying to trade Jack Wilson, it's pretty much impossible. As a result, a lot of the players the Bucs got in trades fit into the #11-#30 bracket. This includes Jeff Locke (from the Nate McLouth deal), Brett Lorin and Nathan Adcock (from Wilson and Ian Snell) and Josh Harrison (from John Grabow and Tom Gorzelanny).

All of which is to say that the Pirates have done pretty well with the options available to them, and given the obstacles they've encountered in getting obvious impact talents, they've done well in building a farm system that's 30 deep, not just ten deep. And there's really nothing wrong with most of the guys they've acquired, either in the draft or in trades, and it wouldn't be at all surprising if several from among Grossman, Miller, Cunningham, Cain, Stevenson, Locke, Lorin, Adcock, Brooks Pounders, Victor Black and Justin Wilson broke out and joined the top ten next year.

The top ten still does look a bit thin right now. But I'm not sure how Huntington and Coonelly could have acquired a bunch of talent much faster. Getting more for Bay would have been great, as would signing Miguel Sano. And reasonable people can disagree about the Pirates' strategy in the first round of the 2009 draft. Overall, though, I think their plan and execution have been quite good. And I think that if Dave Littlefield had done his job and left some interesting guys in A-ball who'd just now be graduating into the top ten themselves, there wouldn't seem to be a problem. Huntington and Coonelly have been placed in the awkward position of having to acquire lots of those sorts of players themselves and then wait for them to develop.