It was a fun day yesterday for followers of the Atlanta Braves professional baseball club as it was the nontender deadline. There wasn’t much drama or intrigue for the Braves as most of the guys that were expected to not get tendered a contract ended up getting removed from the roster earlier in the offseason in other moves. In the end, the Braves agreed to a one year deal with Mike Soroka and designated five other players for assignment although a few of those were guys that had already started that process from moves earlier in the offseason.
One player whose fate was somewhat in doubt was the currently injured Tyler Matzek. Matzek wasn’t set to make a ton of money next year, but any time a reliever has an injury and is in their 30’s, there is a real chance their team could move on from them. However, the Braves did the right thing by their postseason hero and agreed to a two year contract with him. Fear not, Braves fans, one of the co-founders of the Night Shift is going to be around for the foreseeable future.
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In a somewhat surprising move to make room on their 40 man roster for Rule 5 protections earlier this week, the Braves opted to designate William Woods for assignment. Woods is a high upside bullpen arm with a big-time fastball, but he has struggled with injuries and his command. However, it was still surprising to see the Braves choose him to remove from the 40 man and not surprising at all that he didn’t make it through waivers as the Mets of all teams snagged him from the Braves off the waiver wire.
Elsewhere on the site, we had an article go up yesterday that posits all the reasons why the Braves are going to repeat as NL East champions next year. It is honestly funny that barring some real outlier “other NL East team(s) go crazy in free agency” situations that the Braves are probably just favored to repeat regardless of what happens at shortstop for them this offseason (they should still absolutely try to get someone good to play there before you start yelling).
Finally, the season review series rolled on with Bryce Elder providing some key starts for the Braves during the 2022 season even though the beginning of his major league career did not go to plan.
MLB News
The nontender deadline was the biggest news yesterday and it has certainly altered the landscape of the free agent market. Some well-known names that got non-tendered and are now free agents include Cody Bellinger, Brian Anderson, Dom Smith, Jeimer Candelario, and Luke Voit.
The Minnesota Twins announced their new team logo re-design and while one of their designs looks an awful lot like one of the Marlins’ designs, it is still nice to see them spicing things up on the uniform side.
One of the biggest names on the free agent market is Aaron Judge and the Yankees very clearly do not want him to go anywhere. Yankees general manager Brian Cashman confirmed that the Yankees have made a new offer to Judge to keep him in the Bronx. While the amount isn’t known, it is fair to say that it is likely significantly more than the seven year, $213.5 million extension offer they gave him before the 2022 season.