The Atlanta Braves are already seeing players filter into their Florida spring training facilities as spring training officially begins in just a matter of days. The mandatory report dates are in the middle of next week and we FINALLY get to see some actual baseball happen.
It will be interesting to see both some new facts in camp as well as how much both the new arrivals for the Braves impact the roster as well what effect their departures will have as well. The Braves had several free agents leave for different organizations this offseason, so here is a quick rundown of where they all ended up.
More Braves News
We have had some really fun history articles go up on the site recently and yesterday was no different. Oddly enough, the Braves organization had a hand in popularizing "flipping the bird" thanks to Boston Beaneater pitcher Hoss Radbourn. If you ever wondered what the earliest photographic evidence was of someone flipping someone else off, we have you covered.
Mark Bowman also did his annual pass at trying to predict the Braves' Opening Day roster. Very interestingly, he does not have Vaughn Grissom making the club right out of camp, although he notes that if he plays well in spring than he could easily make it. Bow typically doesn't just pull things out of thin air, so it looks like we will need to continue to keep a close eye on the shortstop situation.
MLB News
As we posted about earlier this morning, several members of the Atlanta Braves are participating in the World Baseball Classic this year. All of MLB is going to be well represented in the WBC this go around and with rosters now officially announced, here is a look at all of the big league players participating with a team by team breakdown. Team USA is loaded on the offensive side of the ball while the starting pitching, well, it leaves something to be desired.
We also had a big contract extension yesterday as Yu Darvish signed a six year extension worth $108 million with the Padres. Darvish will be 42 years old when that deal is done, so it is fair to say that several outside observers were surprised to see him get a contract of that length at his age. That said, Yu has been awesome for a while and hopefully his impressive arsenal of pitches can keep him effective for at least a while.