FanPost

Furcal to Braves, other discussions

Since starting a fan post to announce this one signing would be against the etiquette of fan posts, I have some other things to talk about to go along with the wierd news that the Braves already with a very good young SS signed another high priced SS. I also wanted to include how elvis andrus and max ramirez are doing in the tough-to-hit-in venezuelan winter LG. And a couple trade possibilities i have floating around in my head.

VWL Stats for Elvis and Max:

Andrus: 143 ABs, 24 runs, 37 hits, 2 HRs, 29k/23bb, .259/.359/371 OPS: .731

Ramirez: 144 ABs, 10HRs, 45k/17bb,  ..271/.360/.556 OPS: .916

The VWL seems to be much tougher on hitters than the crazy dominican winter lg where Salty, Nellie, and Borbon are all hitting over .350. A couple positive things about these stats, Andrus' walk rate looks really, really good. A 100 pt difference bt BA and OBP is a big difference, his contact rate is down, but im interested to see if he can continue to improve on his plate discipline. Maxram is showing some serious power as well; I hope that stat line is signs of things to come. I wouldnt be suprised if he put up numbers not to far away from that line in the Majors. Maybe slightly less power, but around a .870 OPS doesnt seem too far fetched.

 

On the Braves signing Furcal: Does this make Escobar expendable to them? I wonder this b/c if we were to work out some type of deal to send Milly to the braves, could we possibly expand such a deal to include one of Byrd or Murphy to get Escobar back in return? I like Escobar (he was third in the ML among SS with over 200 ABs in On Base % and has a career OPS over .780) and think that if we could get him, we'd solve our 3B solution by either putting him there or MY there starting next year. It also would give us the flexibility to deal Andrus in some type of deal for more young pitching and it would give us another option besides just sitting on Andrus and hoping he becomes good enough that we can cover 3B by getting andrus to the majors and MY over to 3b. Just a thought, b/c i know atlanta still needs OF help and we can supply that as well as Milwood.

It would make things interesting starting next year as it would allow us to sign Sheets, improve our defense (i guess thats a little presumptious of me, but id assume moving MY to third would upgrade our 3B and SS defense), give us a pretty solid replacement at 3B and give us more options in trading for even more pitching.

Maybe its a little to far fetched that the braves would settle on Milwood plus + Murphy for Escobar, b.c im sure they are gonna try to get a really good SP for him. However, if they are unable to find a deal for a really good SP involving Escobar, we could possibly interest them in a deal like this as it gets them two things they'd be looking for. Just throwing that out there.