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Friday, January 18, 2008
Aybar gone, Lillibridge could win job
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Nothing like a leisurely offseason to get the old baseball beat writer’s batteries recharged….
Seriously, could the Braves go a couple days this winter without a trade, signing, injury, front-office realignment, or team relocation announcement?
Last night I had plans, and again they got abruptly altered with the trade that sent Willy “Value Highly Diminished by Drug Rehab” Aybar to Tampa Bay for reliever Jeff “You Don’t Know Me, But I Throw Hard for a Lefty” Ridgway, followed soon after by disclosure that Omar Infante broke a hand when hit by a pitch this week and, oh yeah, Mark Teixeira avoided arbitration and signed a $12.5 mill contract.
Whew.
Yes, just another week of baseball coverage in mid-January. FanFest, Mark Kotsay rumors, Kotsay trade, R-Braves moving to Gwinnett, Aybar trade, Infante hurt, Teixeira signs … hey, spring training is gonna feel like time off.
Not to complain or anything, because I could be doing many, many things far more demanding today than sitting in my basement office at home listening to Johnny Cash and The Clash while writing stories and blogs about the Braves.
Nevertheless, enough. Let’s call a moratorium on news at least until pitching camp starts in a couple weeks. Whaddya say, Braves?
No? Well, OK. Just thought I’d try.
Speaking of Joe Strummer and the Clash, if you’ve not seen the movie or heard the soundtrack, you gotta hear the opening line of the Strummer biopic “The Future Is Unwritten.” Someone off-camera asks him what Strummer wants written in graphics, how he wants to be referred to when they first show him on screen.
“I’d like you to write Punk Rock Warlord,” he says in his great Cockney accent, “with Warlord being one word.”
Anyway, where were we?
Teixeira signs; what does it mean? While there was never any doubt Mark Teixeira would play for the Braves in 2008, there was still some sense of relief in Braves Nation when he signed a new contract Thursday without going through any of the potentially contentious steps of the arbitration process.
Because if agent Scott Boras and GM Frank Wren can agree to a fair-market price for Teixeira ($12.5 mill) for 2008, the final year of his arbitration-eligible period, then hey, maybe they have a decent chance of ironing out a contract extension before he tests the free-agent waters in 10 months, right?
Well, slow down, folks.
It might mean that, but Wren was careful in his conversation with me last night, careful not to portray this as anything more than it was: Teixeira signed and Boras didn’t take the Braves to arbitration because all along, the agent and the Braves’ new GM were in agreement on what Teixeira should get as a fifth-year arbitration guy.
Wren is the one who handled most negotiations and arbitration matters for the Braves in recent years while serving as John Schuerholz’s assistant, so Wren knew what Teixeira could expect to get if he took all the steps available to him in the arbitration process. No sense offering, say, $11.5 million, and having Boras ask for, say, $13.5 million. Because in that case, an arbitration panel might just as easily have chosen the $13.5 mill salary as the $11.5 mill.
And in the steps leading up to that, the Braves would’ve had to explain to the panel why Teixeira wasn’t worth $13.5 mill, etc. With him sitting in the room alongside Boras, who usually likes to have his clients sit in on the hearings and see what’s going on, what’s being said about him.
As you might imagine, that’s not the best way for a team to make a player feel motivated to compromise when free agent negotiations occur down the road.
So the Braves took a positive step in the process, and made a fair offer. Remember, from the time Teixeira was traded to the Braves, most of us have said he could expect $12-13 mill in his final year of arbitration. And he’s getting it, without having to jump through hoops or have his agent prove to a panel that he’s worth it.
But don’t be too presumptious about what this might mean in the future. It can’t hurt the Braves’ chances, and it might even help them, however slightly. But still, it’s Scott Boras, and the man is driven to get the biggest contract possible for his clients.
That said, Teixeira surely has told him how much he likes playing in Atlanta, just as he’s told anyone else who asks. And he probably told Boras to get this deal done without going to arbitration, long as the Braves made a fair offer.
The Braves can only hope Teixeira also makes it clear to Boras that he’s not necessarily out to get every possible dollar he can on the free-agent market, that if offers are close to equal, the former Georgia Tech star would like to stay in Atlanta with his Georgia-native wife for many seasons to come.
Because if he’s out to simply get the biggest possible contract, well, you gotta think the Yankees and at least a couple other teams will offer more than the Braves — perhaps a great deal more.
So stay tuned. Wren and Boras have been talking, and they got this deal done. They have a good relationship, and have probably already had more conversations this year than Boras had with Schuerholz in the past five years.
Those are all reasons to be optimistic. But don’t forget, at the end of the day, Teixeira is represented by the most successful and demanding agent in the business. Unless his client tells him otherwise, Boras tends to have an affinity for the highest bidder.
Lillibridge could make team: In my view, two developments Thursday made it far more likely that Brent Lillibridge will make the team out of spring training than I had previously thought.
First, the trade that sent troubled Aybar to Tampa Bay. Second, news that Infante broke a hand when hit by a pitch in a game this week in Venezuela.
Infante’s being examined by Braves doctors today in Atlanta, and might have to have surgery to put a pin in there and help the healing process. The Braves believe he’ll be out until the last week or two of spring training, which means he’d probably start the season on the DL.
The Braves presumably will carry two infielders/utility men, and versatile rookie Martin Prado will probably be one of them.
But Lillibridge now figures prominently in the plans. Wren and manager Bobby Cox, who loves Lillibridge’s skills and instincts, have said all winter that if they thought they could get Lillibridge enough at-bats with the Braves, they’d consider keeping him. Otherwise, they’d want him to start the season in the minors and continue his development, because he’s too good to sit on the bench in the majors and get rusty at this stage of his career.
Now, his chances of getting those at-bats have increased. And with Aybar out of the picture, I get the impression that Lillibridge could be kept on the roster even after Infante returns, that Lillibridge might get the nod over Prado.
There’s no question which player has the greater potential — Prado might always be fighting to keep a utility job in the majors, while Lillibridge could be a future standout at one of several positions, including shortstop, second or outfield.
Prado’s worked hard and had a great spring last year. But folks should keep in mind, he’s got as many errors (three) in his past 29 major league games as he has extra-base hits (three doubles) or RBI (three). He’s hit .274 with a .308 OBP in 62 at-bats in that stretch, going back to his final game with Atlanta in 2006.
Lillibridge hasn’t played the outfield since manning center during his freshman year in college at Washington, but he’ll play there plenty in spring training. Having him as a backup center fielder could give the Braves an option to play 50 or more games if Kotsay’s back acts up again.
Infante can also play center, but the Braves don’t plan on playing him on a regular basis out there; Infante’s value and role is as a veteran utililty man, primarily in the infield.
Keep these numbers in mind: .287, 10 homers, 41 RBI, and 28 steals in 33 attempts. That’s what Lillibridge did in 87 games with Richmond last season, in his first experience in Triple-A after a mid-season promotion.
In 2006 he was the only minor leaguer (any level) to post at least a .300 average, .400 OBP, double-digit homers (13), and at least 50 RBIs (71) and 50 steals (53).
The remarkably baby-faced Lillibridge, 23, will be the youngest-looking hitter in the majors, but the kid can really play. Two words usually enter the description when you ask players or coaches about him: They say he’s a “baseball player.” That’s a high compliment from players and coaches.
The fact that the Braves didn’t hesitiate to trade Aybar even after Infante got hurt made it clear they never intended to retain him after last year’s multitude of problems, when he was late to camp because of visa issues, then missed the whole season due to injuries, substance-abuse problems and a team suspension.
They never said so, but the Braves were looking for the best offer they could get for him, and they were going to take it. Before spring training. They wanted to turn the page on Aybar, not revisit that whole story again at camp.
So he’s gone, and the Braves have a lefty, Jeff Ridgway, who is 27 and has a 189.00 ERA in three major league appearances. Hey, but at least he spells his name like Stan Ridgway of 1980s band Wall of Voodoo (“Wish I was in Tijuana, eating barbecued iguana….”)
But seriously, Ridgway has a 93-94 fastball and a good curve and changeup, and by all accounts he’s a hard worker and good guy who’s kept a positive attitude through an ungodly array of injuries since his high school years.
Reconstructive elbow surgery 11 years ago, reconstructive shoulder surgery six years ago, more elbow surgery four years ago … this dude’s got a left arm that could be used for a new edition of the board game Operation.
But he’s healthy now, and the Braves’ scouts liked what they saw from him last year in Triple-A, where Ridgway had 67 strikeouts in 64-2/3 innings and held lefty hitters to a .163 average for Durham.
He also had 30 walks for Durham and was torched for seven runs, seven hits and one walk while recording just one out in three major league appearances during his first big league callup in September. So there’s work to be done.
But Ridgway has two minor-league options left, so the Braves could send him back and forth to the minors for two years if they need to. They aren’t counting on him to be in their opening day bullpen, or even expecting him to be.
Aybar was out of options - literally and perhaps figuratively as well, in the Braves’ view. They wanted to move on, and they did.
Personally, I really hope Aybar is able to deal with his problems and have a successful career. He’s a talented kid and seems like a good guy beneath that painful shyness. I just hope being traded again to a new environment doesn’t cause him any of the problems that being pulled out of his circle of friends with the Dodgers seemed to cause when he was traded to the Braves in July 2006.
Chipper wins Braves MVP: The Atlanta chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America voted Chipper Jones the Brave of the Year for 2007. Jones got 11 of 18 votes, with John Smoltz receiving the other seven.
Annual Braves banquet: Here’s some info on upcoming annual Braves 400 Club’s winter banquet, Feb. 2 at Marriott Century Center here in Atlanta, just off I-85 just north of Clairmont exit (I know because it’s close to my house).
The theme for this year’s shindig is “Celebrating 30 Years of TBS and the Atlanta Braves,” and my man Pete Van Wieren will emcee. Gotta love Pete, who’s a fan of M. Ward and other great songwriters, by the way.
The confirmed guest list includes Hall of Famer Phil Niekro, top Braves prospect Jordan Schafer, left-hander Jo-Jo Reyes, Rick Camp, broadcasters Chip and Skip Caray, among others.
The reception and silent auction/raffle of Braves memorabilia starts at 5:30 pm., with an awards dinner at 7 p.m.
The public is invited and tickets are $65 apiece, which includes dinner and a “well-stocked goody bag” (hey, that’s what they said on the release). Make reservations on the 400 Club website (www.braves400.org) or by mailing a check to the Braves 400 Club, P.O. Box 7689, Atlanta, Ga. 30309. Information is available on the website or by calling the club’s hotline at 770-416-4539.
Speaking of great songwriters….” A tune to carry us through the weekend.
”FURTHER ON UP THE ROAD” by Bruce Springsteen
Where the road is dark and the seed is sowed
Where the gun is cocked and the bullet’s cold
Where the miles are marked in the blood and gold
I’ll meet you further on up the road
Got on my dead man’s suit and my smilin’ skull ring
My lucky graveyard boots and song to sing
I got a song to sing, keep me out of the cold
And I’ll meet you further on up the road.
Further on up the road
Further on up the road
Where the way dark and the night is cold
One sunny mornin’ we’ll rise I know
And I’ll meet you further on up the road.
Now I been out in the desert, just doin’ my time
Searchin’ through the dust, lookin’ for a sign
If there’s a light up ahead well brother I don’t know
But I got this fever burnin’ in my soul
So let’s take the good times as they go
And I’ll meet you further on up the road
Further on up the road
Further on up the road
Further on up the road
Further on up the road
One sunny mornin’ we’ll rise I know
And I’ll meet you further on up the road
One sunny mornin’ we’ll rise I know
And I’ll meet you further on up the road.
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