re: The ATL Thread: 2021 World Champion Atlanta Braves Offseason Thread

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Dear God, woman, we just won the World Series, and we literally cannot sign Freddie at this moment

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I never insinuated we could.

I was talking about people already thinking about alternatives.

LOL at you trying to spin not resigning Freddie. It's awesome that we won the World Series, but it would be a colossal failure if we let a top 5 hitter in baseball walk after he said he wants to stay here and all of the rumors before the lockout were that the hold up was on years, not money.

Again, Freddie at 38 is still going to be a all-star caliber player, especially with the DH now in play. Give him the extra year and keep the Acuna/Albie/Freddie core together. There are more opportunities to win rings with those three together.

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Again, Freddie at 38 is still going to be a all-star caliber player, especially with the DH now in play. Give him the extra year and keep the Acuna/Albie/Freddie core together. There are more opportunities to win rings with those three together

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I think we are all in agreement here. This core has a chance to go if not on a dynastic run at the very least a mini-dynasty. I can see them winning 2 more WS in the next 5-6 years IMO if they stay together.

We don't have to worry about Riley moving to 1B/DH for at least another 4 or 5 years.

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We don't have to worry about Riley moving to 1B/DH for at least another 4 or 5 years.

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Oh, I agree if we re-sign Freddie. He won’t have to move off 3rd for a while. I was just thinking a Plan B if we don’t re-sign Freddie could be moving Austin to 1st and signing a 3B. I’m not who all’s available there, but there’s got to plenty of guys that would make MUCH more sense than moving Dansby there and signing Correa.

So with the DH coming to the NL and Ozuna being back, it makes it interesting which of the late-season additions they’ll try to re-sign. Am I correct that we have an option on Duvall, so he’ll be back if we want hm? And I think his ability to play CF probably makes him the most valuable. I don’t think Soler re-signs without a guarantee he’s in the everyday lineup. While there is a way to get Soler, Duvall, and Ozuna all in the everyday lineup, you’d be sacrificing a good deal of defense and leaving no room in the OF for Pache or Waters. Decisions.

So I actually think Soler probably played his way out of Atlanta—he made himself more money in the post-season than the Braves can responsibly afford, I imagine. Unless they can somehow move off of Ozuna, which I would love. Nothing to do with his legal problems, it just seems to me like 2020 was a pretty huge outlier for him. How a professional hitter can continuously pull off every pitch for months at a time without making any sort of adjustment is mind boggling. He literally runs out of bat on anything on the outer 3rd. He can only hit mistakes.

But he doesn’t seem to give enough of a shite to work on it or adjust. Hey, a-hole, grab a tee, set it up deep in you stance, and ONLY work on hitting the ball the other way. Anything left of center is a frick up. Or, you’ve got a teammate who may be the best power hitter in the game at letting the ball travel and pissing on it the other way. Maybe say, “Hey, Freddie, I love how much gap-to-gap power you have and how you’re able to let the ball travel like that. How do you prepare and would you mind showing me a couple of your favorite tee drills.” Whatever. Something like that. You have probably the best resource in the game having tremendous doing the exact opposite of what you do wrong as a teammate in the same dugout. fricking use it.

Sorry, didn’t realize I hate this much pent up Ozuna hate. I actually came to lightheartedly post the over/under on Max Fried ABs this year at 10. I think he’ll be right around there and may even take the over. And I’d take literally nothing for Ozuna as long as a team would bail us out of his terrible contract and allow us to sign Soler. That’s if I’m right about how big of an outlier Ozuna’s 2020 was and even though I was a huge proponent of re-signing him after it at almost any cost.

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Am I correct that we have an option on Duvall,

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The Braves exercised his option before the lockout. He is back.

I don’t think Joc Pedersen is a very good professional hitter. He’s got a lot of pop and will certainly run into some every now and again, but I don’t think he’s an every day player on a good team. He’s valuable as a 4th OF who can give you spot starts here and there and occasionally DH against a RH starter, but his most value probably comes as a LH pinch hitter who can come in at the end of a game down by 2 or 3 and try to tie it up with one swing. But I don’t think he’ll accept getting paid like that. Which is fine. “Hey, thanks for helping us win the World Series. You got some big hits and that douche juice you brought seemed to really work in small doses. We appreciate all that, but how ya doin’, keep it movin’. Good luck to you wherever you land.”

So the question becomes what is the plan for Pache and Waters and how does that affect them re-signing—or attempting to—Duvall, Soler, and Joc or maybe trying to move off Ozuna? (I think he’s just about untradeable at this point, though). Do they keep both of the young guys? Package one or both in a deal for starting pitching? Hedge their bets by keeping both and not choosing, just starting 1 in Atlanta and the other in AAA? I think they both need to play every day, and I can’t see that with the big club without some injuries. I’d like to see how waters handles major league pitching. I really thought Pache was ready last year and was gonna play Gold Glove CF and hit around .250, but with 20+ homers. But he didn’t even hit when got sent back down did he?

Anyway, getting excited about baseball coming up—I think the beautiful weather here mis too this week had something to do with it. But I’ve got some caffeine -fueled pre-Super Bowl excitement, so I apologize for these long-arse rambling post—that was not my intent. No big deal if you TL;DR’d it. Snit, I’m sure I would have too. If you did read any of it, though, thanks for tolerating it, and I hope you respond to at least some. I love the Braves, but don’t read anywhere close to as much about their organization inner workings as any of you. In fact, I probably get 99% of my info from you guys on this board, and I greatly appreciate it.

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I think the outfield is pretty much set. Duvall in LF, Pache in CF, and Acuna in RF with Ozuna being the DH.

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You think they’re penciling in Pache already? I’ve been super high on him and thought he was ready last year to really cement himself as one of the core guys on the team for the next decade. But man, he had a disappointing season. Was it just 1 year too soon or is he maybe not that guy? That’s why I’m so glad Duvall is definitely coming back. I had no idea he could play such a solid CF. I don’t think he’s in any kind of danger of winning a GG there and certainly isn’t a long-term solution, but his being able to play there does give you some flexibility if you need to figure some things out.

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I think the front office isn’t making any moves until they figure out first base.

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Oh, for sure. They really can’t. It changes everything, and not just monetarily. If Freddie leaves, are you able to better replace some of that production with another 1B, do you move Riley over and go after a 3B? Are there worthy free agents at either of those positions or do you have to make a trade? 1st, we had to know about the DH. Couldn’t really fairly construct the roster without knowing that. Now, we’ve got to figure out Freddie. Can’t really construct a roster without knowing that now either.

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Bump. World fricking champions.

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I’m also hearing some rumors that we might in fact be those motherfrickers

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