Prospects of a Contender

When I was in grade school, there was a vibrant trade market at the lunch table, and I usually had a valuable trade chip - Gushers. I can't explain why or how they were valuable, but people in my grade loved them. I loved them, too. And most of the time, I would eat them.

There were days, however, where something trumped those Gushers. These were the stuffed crust pizza days. While most grade school lunches were the abominable messes we all remember, stuffed crust pizza days were the joyous times that gave our young minds hope and love. And there were kids who didn't like them - they'd eat the pizza but rip off the crust. And those kids had amazing trade chips.

So on those days, I had a decision to make - Gushers or the stuffed crust - and the decision was easy - stuffed crust. There were kids who thought I was crazy, but most of them were jealous that I was the one who could actually pull off the trade. I got two stuffed crusts, but I did have to part with the Gushers to make this happen.

As the Braves head into the offseason, they face a similar dilemma - continue racking up young players and letting them develop or start focusing on the major league roster by trading some of them away. It's not an easy decision, and whichever side they choose, they will have an opportunity cost - choosing one way naturally prohibits going the other.

The first item up is looking for that coveted young starter. Whether it's Chris Sale, Chris Archer, or Sonny Gray, the Braves are going to have to part with a substantial amount of young talent, and whether they should is up for hot debate. Let's first take a look at the farm system from an organizational standpoint.

The above chart is to give us an idea of where all of the prospects are. The ones highlighted and in bold are the key trade pieces - you can build a deal around them. The ones in bold have trade value, but they're likely add-on pieces, and the others are solid pieces that could play a role at some point - they're mostly there for a future project. 

As you can see, the Braves have a number of intriguing prospects, and while it's a little hard to fathom the value of this without a comparison, it's a good basis. So now let's discuss what the system looks like post-Sale/Archer/Gray.

I will start by saying that trading one of Dansby Swanson or Ender Inciarte is a no-go. Why? Because the MLB team isn't set up to withstand that kind of a loss. It would essentially be like trading one hole for another, so while one of those pitchers is certainly worth trading one of those players for them, it doesn't make sense in this particular instance for the Braves. They don't have a high-quality replacement ready - sorry, Mallex Smith and Ozhaino Albies don't count. 

The deal needs to be made from the farm system, which means giving up a number of players. For Cole Hamels, the Rangers had to part with Jorge Alfaro, Nick Williams, Jake Thompson, Jerad Eickhoff, and Alec Asher. Either Sale or Archer will cost as much and probably a little more. A comparable deal for Atlanta would be Albies (Alfaro), Acuna (Williams), Soroka (Thompson), Toussaint (Eickhoff), and Sims (Asher). My guess is that the White Sox would force Newcomb instead of Soroka, and they'd probably still not be entirely satisfied - mostly because I think I'd be okay with that deal. So what does the farm system look like now?

 

The number of elite prospects has significantly dwindled, and (the reason why I used this chart) the number of good prospects close to the majors has dwindled significantly. If the Braves make a move like this, it has to be with the understanding that there is no immediate help coming from the farm. Demeritte and Peterson are nice, and Weigel came from nowhere. While the Braves have a significant amount of depth in good-to-solid prospects, they lack real elite prospects, and the best of their prospects are far away, leaving a two-fold problem - lower-level prospects are too far away to help the MLB team and don't have a ton of trade value.

So far, we've looked at the current roster construction, and we've found it lacking about 15 wins. Then we tried to figure out if there was enough money to add the necessary amount of wins. The idea at that point was that the Braves had the resources necessary - grab Sale and a couple free-agents - to make a run at the playoffs in the first year of a new park. But that was always going to require more than just money.

The Braves definitely have the resources to pull off a deal for a front-line starter, but it will significantly hurt. One, the White Sox may not want this deal - trading a controllable ace means they will want a lot back - and they may force the Braves to part with a young player off the roster. We talked about Swanson and Inciarte being non-starters in this discussion, but we didn't discuss Mike Foltynewicz. Moving Swanson or Inciarte leaves the Braves with a SS or CF, but moving Folty means replacing him with Sale. The Braves still need a 5th starter, but they have internal options (Matt Wisler and Aaron Blair). 

The second issue is sustaining the success. The Braves would likely lose Bartolo Colon and RA Dickey, and Matt Kemp and Nick Markakis aren't getting any younger. Beginning the charge now would force the Braves hand in following seasons. Making the push now likely doesn't just affect 2017. It affects the Braves moves in 2018 and 2019. Making further trades would only cut further into the farm system.

So what should the Braves do? There is no easy answer. Fans would enjoy an aggressive off-season, and the Braves have the means to make a run for it. But it would significantly diminish their farm system - both in trades and likely picks surrendered for free agents. 

My ultimate guess is that the Braves are checking in on their options, and if they can line up a series of moves like the ones we've discussed, they could strike. Otherwise, there are plenty of reasons to let 2017 be a transition year.

Payroll of a Contender

So I'm getting married in about 17 months (Why 17 months from now? Tulips. Tulips are why.), and it feels weird saying that. And as anyone who has ever been in this position knows, one tries to put on a pretty big and expensive party. It is more or less expected. You spend 12 or however many months planning it - picking the venue, picking the date, getting the vendors, coordinating those vendors and the venue, inviting everyone, and then getting all of those people to actually respond to those invites. Everything builds up to this one (hopefully) joyous day ... and then life basically goes back to normal.

The Braves are essentially in the same situation. They've gotten engaged to Cobb County, and now they're planning their big day - April 3rd, 2017. Over the past however many months, they've been getting ready - picking a site for a new stadium, building the stadium, contracting vendors, coordinating those vendors, and sending out season ticket packets to all those loyal Braves fans. And we'll get all of that build up ... to basically go back to normal.

But in that lead up to the big day, they still have to decide on how big of a party. Do they go the budget-conscious route, risking that going for it in 2017 might hamper future endeavors? Or do they go for it, believing that they can give us a season to remember?

The answer remains unclear, but we talked the other day about what it would take to get to that point. As currently constituted, I think the Braves can win somewhere between 75-80 games next season, which means they need to add about 15 wins this offseason. Again without saying whether they should go for it or not, I mentioned that we need to add context.

Adding players requires resources - in money, players, or both. Acquiring 15 wins worth will likely cost the team a significant amount of both. For today, we'll stick to the money. The first thing we have to ask is how much money are they already spending.

Glad you asked. I just happen to have this chart handy.

The above chart shows the current 40-man roster and their salaries over the next 5 seasons. Anything in purple is from MLB Trade Rumors and Matt Swartz's projections. Anything in red is a team option and is mostly there for visual affect. And everything in black is either confirmed or a small enough number to not significantly skew the totals if I'm off on what they actually agree to.

For 2017, the Braves essentially already have $100-105 million dollars committed to the roster, and they've taken up 36 spots. Last year according to Cot's Contracts, the Braves spent about $108 million, which means that they've basically run up against last year's total. That, of course, leads us back to the beginning - they're entering a new stadium and about to throw a party. That should mean a significant increase in payroll, right?

I went back 10 years and looked at the teams that opened new parks. Again using Cot's, I looked at the year prior to their opening and the year they opened the new park. When you take a look at the data, it averages to an increase somewhere around 12% of the previous year's payroll, and that means that the Braves would see a boost to about $120-125 million dollars. If I did my math correctly, that means the Braves can spend (carry the one ... ) about $20 million for the rest of the offseason (I've already accounted for Bartolo Colon and RA Dickey).

Of course, not everyone fits in that average. We have a pretty wide range of numbers there - from essentially no gain by the two New York teams (which makes sense because they already spent a lot anyway ... this was before the Mets bankrupted themselves) to over 45% by Minnesota and Miami. IF we use those teams as our comparable, the Braves can get up to about $150 million, which leaves like $45 million.

The difference between $20 million and $45 million is pretty significant, but looking at the teams above, I think the Braves are more like Miami, Minnesota, and Washington - teams that should expect significant increases in revenue as attendance numbers rise. The New York teams already spent tons of money, and while they should have seen revenue increases, there was reason not to expect them to spend too much more, and while St. Louis got a new park, they were already selling out the old Busch stadium. So something in the $40 million range makes more sense. Is that enough?

I suppose it depends. If the Braves were interested in someone like Jose Bautista or Yoenis Cespedes, they'd have to trade Matt Kemp or Nick Markakis to make room, meaning they'd likely add about $15 million there. Two FA targets I like are Justin Turner (predicted at $17 million a year) and Ian Desmond ($15 million) because they fit needs, but that would instantly take up about $30 million right there, leaving us with $10 million to play with. If the Braves were to acquire Chris Sale ($12 million) or Chris Archer ($4.75 million), that would further eat into the budget, leaving about $5 million or so for another upgrade around the roster (Brett Cecil - $6 million - maybe?).

But let's stick with the big picture for now. The Braves currently have about $100 million committed in some form or fashion for 2017, and by looking at recently built stadiums, teams have generally either not gained much or gained 35-40% of payroll. My guess (and our hope) is that the Braves are the latter. If not, adding Sale would deplete the remaining payroll, which we've already discussed not being enough to put the team into contention. But it appears that the Braves have about $40 million left to spend this winter, and that's enough for probably 3 significant players, which should be enough to put the Braves in range.

They could, however, choose to go more toward the trade route to reduce costs and deplete the prodigious farm system, which (as you might expect) will be our next topic.

Anatomy of a Contender

Making changes is always hard. I've spent most of the past 3 years traveling for work, but about six months ago, I got a promotion that allowed me to stay home more. The catch - I had to move to Dayton, Ohio.

The thought was exciting - I wanted off the road, would be moving in with my now fiancee, and would be beginning the next step in my career. The future looked promising. The catch - I still had to move. This meant getting a moving truck, buying a new house, selling a new house, buying a new car (because they took away my fleet car ... bastards), and settling into a brand new position. Exciting but also terrifying.

I often wonder if that is what it was like in the Braves front office. They made the decision to rebuild (agree with it or not), and the thought must have been ... exciting and terrifying. Exciting because ... I mean ... you get to build an entire organization in the way you want to - OOTP-style. Terrifying because you know the work ahead of you - trading players, dealing with unhappy fans, developing younger players, and trying to make the team into a consistent winner. And that last item is where we start.

Building a contender is obviously difficult, but I think it's harder than most people expect. You have to get 90 wins out of 25 roster spots. Given that a replacement-level team is considered a 48-win team (we'll just go with it for now ... this is mostly a theoretical exercise for now), that means you need 52 wins out of 25 spots, meaning a little more than 2 wins a spot. Sounds easy, right?

The issue, of course, is that all roster spots are not created equal. There are bench spots and bullpen spots that have a hard time even getting to 1 win. I took the liberty of compiling a sort of expected roster and what their WARs would look like.

There are several columns to this. The first is an optimistic take on what that player could reasonably be in 2017 - not probable. The second is what they did last year. The third is what Steamer currently projects for 2017. And the fourth is an average of those. Is it scientific? Not exactly, but I think they balance out some of the negatives each column has - optimism is great but rarely do you see everyone hit their ceiling at once, last season was last season, and projections sometimes miss observational things that might lead us to think a player can be better (or worse).

And I think the average column is pretty reasonable - 77-78 wins. Now, that's with no additions other than the octogenarians the team added to the rotation. I also left a few areas blank, but I did that assuming what we would add internally would be essentially replacement-level. But even my optimistic take didn't quite reach that magic number.

Then came this week. Rumors have been swirling about the Braves aggressively looking at just about everything. The consensus seems to be that the Braves aren't ready to make that leap, and looking at that 77-78 win projection here, they're right ... ish.

If the Braves were to make a move like trading for Sale/Archer/Gray, I would assume they plan on being aggressive elsewhere. So I also made a chart should the Braves add a number of new players - Sale, Jason Castro, Justin Turner, and Ian Desmond. I'm not saying they should do this. I'm simply using this as a sort of best-case scenario. Remember, we're having a more theoretical discussion for now.

Alright, now we're talking ... sort of. The average projection has now been increased to 89.6 wins, which puts the Braves on the cusp of being contenders. It also took a lot of effort to get there. Adding several good players moved the needle about 12 wins.

We can argue about each player's projection, but for now, I'm not sure that matters a whole lot. 88, 89. 91 wins. The particulars don't matter. But the range around that 89-win projection seems reasonable, and that makes everyone right so far. The Braves aren't close enough to just add Sale/Archer/Gray. They'd have to add one of those players as part of a master plan to add other significant talent this offseason - again, the particular players don't matter as much as the necessary talent needed to be added.

And again, I'm not currently arguing whether they should go for it or not. I have an opinion, but I think it'll take a little longer to flush that out. The argument also needs more nuance - you can't simply add players. Adding players means adding payroll, losing prospects, or both. And the question becomes whether the Braves can do that and what that would mean for the organization.

To find that out, you'll just have to wait 'til next time.