Atlanta Braves Future: Securing Ozzie Albies and Dansby Swanson
By Ryan Cothran
Securing the Atlanta Braves Future
My proposal is this: 10 year/100 million dollar contracts that start in 2017 for both Dansby and Ozzie.
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Nothing back-loaded, no signing bonuses, no opt-outs: just 10 million each year for 10 years.
Many will point to the years of control where first 3 years are cheap, then the arbitration process for the next 3 years being cost-controlled, so why do this when it’s not cost effective for the long run? Let’s break the numbers down, shall we?
*This is an educated guess based on performance and projection for the arbitration years*
Traditional
Year 1-3: $600K/year ($1.8 million)
Year 4-6: let’s estimate on a high-end of arbitration: $5 million, $8 million, and $12 million ($25 million)
4 Free Agent years: $18MM/year (72 million)
Total cost: 98.8 million
The non-traditional, 10 year/$100 million dollar deal
Benefits:
- Spreads cash out evenly making it easier to sign free agents any given year.
- Buys out 4 free agent years of each player.
- Going traditional, there’s likely no way Braves could keep both guys around after arbitration years.
- A guaranteed cost and no headache of potentially going through arbitration with cornerstone players.
- Biggest benefit, in my opinion, peace of mind within the fanbase.
An Alternative
Since there are stuck-in-the-mud baseball elements that will nonetheless insist on doing some things in more-or-less in the same ways, there’s still a way to get this accomplished:
The still non-quite-traditional, 12 year/$105 million dollar deal
Year 1-3: $600K/900K/1.5M ($3 million)
Year 4-6: $3M / $6M / $9M ($18 million)
6 Free Agent years: 14MM/year (84 million)
Total cost: 105 million
Even with this contract structure (which would begin in 2017), Swanson finishes the deal in 2028 at age 34; Albies would be 31 years old after that season. This retains much of the same benefits as above, but in a more progressive form.
One could argue that Mallex Smith is also deserving of a deal like this. While I’d be tempted to say yes to that, his projections haven’t been as kind. I’d be more comfortable discussing that after a solid year of getting on base.
Our Atlanta Braves…
…will likely continue this stream of starting pitching coming in, pitching 4-5 years then getting traded for prospects. Maybe they’ll keep a few around after arbitration years or maybe they’ll extend some young ala Julio Teheran. Who knows? There’s pitching depth all through the system and it’s not ending anytime soon as Braves will continue to build with pitching. The position players are still thin compared to the elite systems, and I think it’s wise to keep familiar faces at 1st, 2nd, and SS for many years to come.
Next: Watch Some of Swanson's Work
Let’s say it together..1, 2, 3….
Go BRAVES!!!