Atlanta Braves Rumor update: Giants shopping relievers for an outfielder?

Difficult decisions

There may have to be some hand-wringing going on here in the Braves’ front office.  Imagine the internal discussions:

Let’s suppose that they actually have the intent to get Craig Kimbrel signed up… but not until after the Draft.

• Can they wait that long (June 5-7 or so)?
• Can they wait that long before he actually throws a competitive pitch for you (perhaps 2+ weeks after that)?
• Which is better:  to sign Kimbrel or to give up a significant prospect… Kolby Allard… maybe more… to get somebody who could be in uniform and pitching for you within the next 2-3 days?  Oh, and there’s a stat sheet showing a record of real success.

The Braves also have this problem of having been the Bridesmaid-but-never-the-Bride with multiple deals they tried to pull off during the Winter.  So how aggressive to you go now?

Let’s say the Phillies or Nationals could up with a Giants trade deal involving relievers instead of the Braves… would that put a dagger in the season.  Conversely, maybe you want to be the one wielding that dagger to year NL East rivals instead.

I don’t have a formal trade proposal to offer here… this is difficult enough to diagnose from afar, but the varied circumstances that San Francisco might entertain simply expands an already wide net.  Regardless, there will likely be a stiff price to pay for whoever takes the bait first.

But I would like to offer a couple of guidelines for the Braves:

• Don’t include Bumgarner… at least not at this time.
• Do include an offer for two of the Giants’ relievers.
• Don’t delay.  The hole is still shallow, but playing ‘catch-up’ later is going to be tough to do.

Frankly… based on the Blevins deal… I’d have to rate any pending trade idea with the Giants as “remote”.  If you’d like a bit more optimism than that, then maybe you could think of Blevins as a bridge to Kimbrel… at least hang onto that thought for as long as you can.

Of course as I write this, Kevin Gausman just gave up 5 early runs, which almost certainly means ‘extended exposure’ for the Braves’ relievers again today.