Braves News Rundown: Dansby gets QOed, Xander Bogaerts, and more
Well, the inevitable became reality yesterday for the Atlanta Braves. Yesterday was the deadline for contract options and for giving qualifying offers before the free agent bonanza. It was wildly know that if the Braves couldn’t extend him before the deadline, Dansby was a mortal lock to get the QO so that if he were to sign elsewhere, the Braves would at least get a decent draft pick in compensation.
The deadline came and Dansby was indeed one of the 14 players to receive qualifying offers from across the league. Unless the Braves work out a deal with him quickly, Dansby is also assured to reject the qualifying offer and hit the free agent market where some pretty big dollar figures could be flashed in his general direction.
More Braves News
Elsewhere in Braves news, the Silver Slugger Awards were announced and while the Braves had several finalists in 2022 (hardly a surprise given how good the offense was), not a single Brave took home hardware.
The Braves did do some roster shuffling as well, although the impact was very minimal. The Braves added a pair of minor leaguers (no, these were not the roster moves to protect players from the Rule 5) to the 40 man roster as well as activated Huascar Ynoa and Manny Pina from the IL. As a result, the 40 man roster is now full…although it would pretty easy to make room as needed.
We did have some original content go up on the site. The “what to do about shortstop” debate rages on with the case for signing Xander Bogaerts being featured yesterday. He certainly has some defensive questions, but there is no denying his bat. We also heard overnight that the Braves do not seem to be afraid of any contract terms (AAV or years) although it is fair to be skeptical.
We also had some discussion of why the Braves should sign Jacob deGrom. The payroll may not allow that to happen, but it is fun to entertain the idea especially if the Braves decide to go a cheap route at shortstop. Finally, our season review series rolled on with Travis d’Arnaud who had himself a sneaky good season in 2022.
MLB News
As mentioned about, the Silver Slugger Awards were announced on Thursday evening. If you wanted to see who beat out the Braves finalists and get mad (all were very deserving winners imo), here is who took home the trophies.
The Padres got the signing frenzy started as they decided to lock up one of their key bullpen arms. The team agreed to a five year, $46 million deal with Robert Suarez. Suarez was a key late inning option for the Padres, so locking him up for $9 million-ish a year seems like an easy choice.
We also had a trade as the Pirates snagged Ji-Man Choi from the Rays for minor leaguer Jack Hartman. This is worth monitoring going forward if for no other reason than to see if the Rays found a way to swindle another team.