Dansby Swanson

My favorite anecdote about Dans isn’t really about Dans, but about an early opinion of Dans from a man whose opinions I respect more than pretty much anyone else’s when it comes to baseball things.

Backstory: As I think everyone now knows, Dans went to Marietta High — “Dansby” is his mother’s maiden name; his father, a grown man, willingly goes by the name of “Cooter” — where he played both baseball and basketball well. He had some low-major offers to play college hoops, but when The Vanderbilt Baseball Machine offered him a chance to play shortstop in college, he jumped at it. He actually wasn’t that highly regarded as a recruit, especially by current Vanderbilt recruiting standards. (He ended up being ranked the 151st high-school player in the country by Perfect Game due in large part to the fact that he chose Vanderbilt, but when he committed, I don’t think he was even ranked in their top 500.)

Anyway, the kid comes into the program behind (prestige-wise) Carson Fulmer, Rhett Wiseman, and Walker Buehler in his own class, and with high-profile future pros like Tyler Beede, Kevin Ziomek, Connor Harrell, Mike Yastrzemski, Philip Pfeifer, Conrad Gregor, Tony Kemp, John Norwood, Jared Miller, and Adam Ravenelle already on the team. It’s early fall of his freshman year — there have been some summer workouts and the first intra-squad scrimmages, but nothing off-campus, and there will be no real games until February — and my buddy is having dinner with Tim Corbin (VU’s baseball coach). My buddy, expecting to hear that it’s Beede, or maybe Gregor, or maybe even Wiseman or Fulmer, asks, “Coach, who’s the most likely future major-leaguer on the team this year?

Corbs, without hesitating: “Swanson.”

Three-plus years later, as we know, he was the first player taken in the draft. I’m not going to give an in-depth scouting or statistical report, because those are available elsewhere. You can also find lots of highlight videos on YouTube. (And I would encourage you to do so.)

In short: He can hit; he can run; he’s an outstanding defensive shortstop with range, hands, and a good arm. His “makeup” — his character — is off the charts; he’s a great teammate. He has remarkable hair. He was the leader (on and off the field) of two elite, Championship-Series-participant teams and the College World Series Most Outstanding Player as a sophomore on the one that won it all. He’s about as likable as a baseball player can be.

If I had to guess, Dans will first appear in Atlanta sometime in 2017. For someone with such a good hit tool, he’s too strikeout-prone, but apart from that one red flag, I have high hopes. I hope he doesn’t bust if for no other reason than that I want Braves fans to get to enjoy his personality on the big stage for as long as possible.

Author: Stu

Jesus Christ is my Lord and Savior. I've been married since July 17, 2004 to my beautiful wife, who also doubles as my best friend. We have an almost-three-years-old Boston Terrier named Lucy who's also pretty awesome. My wife and I both graduated from Vanderbilt University in May of 2004. I graduated from Law School at the University of Georgia in May of 2007 and am now practicing in Nashville, Tennessee. I really, really love the Atlanta Braves.

169 thoughts on “Dansby Swanson”

  1. So, if it is “Dans,” does this make more jokes on the “Bills” and the “Dans” and how we have to have extra roster spaces for the extra people?

  2. Samsonite? Samson-lite?

    So did we have a chance at Blash and pass? He looks like an Adam Dunn, and I mean that in a good way

  7. John @ 2

    trying again..

    Gloria (Sunset Boulevard)
    Gloria ( in EXCELLis)

    gender’s wrong of course but what the heck.

  8. Mine is a “Dumb and Dumber” reference (Jim Carrey misremembered Mary Swanson’s last name as ‘Samsonite’) and also a reference to his long locks from which he derives his preternatural hit tool. But I think everyone already knew that.

  9. @3, Might as well make the most of it. Anybody have anything uneducated to say about him or did you all get it out of your systems in the last thread?

  10. OK, everyone’s favorite MLB Scrabble just upped its game yet again, claiming Evan Rutckyj from the Yankees in the Rule 5 draft.

    Foltynewicz
    Pierzynski
    Rutckyj
    Burawa
    Vizcaino

    Egads, that’s a lot of potential spelling errors lurking for next season’s recaps.

  14. Way too early Rosterbation effort:

    Inciarte
    Aybar
    Markakis
    Freeman
    Pierzynski
    Olivera
    Garcia
    Peterson

    Flowers
    Bonifacio
    Beckham
    Bourn
    Swisher

    Teheran
    Norris
    Wisler
    Foltynewicz
    Perezii

    Vizcaino
    Johnson
    Banuelos
    Withrow
    Marksberry
    Winkler (Rule 5)
    Rutckyj (Rule 5)

    Winkler can be shipped back to the minors midseason, I believe without having to offer him back to whichever team we drafted him away from (Colorado, I think). That would let either Shae Simmons or Grilli back in the majors if their injuries are healed.

  15. I can’t wait to see Chip’nJoe try to pronounce that name. I bet it’s something dull like ‘Ruckidge’ and not nearly as bad as it looks.

  16. @15 – I’m with you. I’m guessing “Rut – kidge” like, Rutlidge, with a K instead of an L.

  22. San Diego still needs a shortstop, too — let’s get Aybar in this deal. And Hunter Renfroe.

    (The Padres have added four [4] Rule-5 guys today and are about to trade for an out-of-options player. Minimal roster flexibility is the new market inefficiency.)

  24. I can’t figure out why the Padres, of all teams, want Bethancourt. They have Derek Norris and their own all-glove, no-hit former prospect Austin Hedges.

    Unless Hedges is coming back, which would make sense only if he has options left, and I don’t know the answer to that.

  25. I like our apparently new policy of trading with dumb GMs. We should stay away from the Dodgers, however.

  26. Heard this morning the Braves were open to spinning Ender Inciarte. One exec said he was told 12 teams have called on him since the trade -Jayson Stark

  27. This in an interesting article detailing the rift between Yasiel Puig and the rest of the Dodgers – it features, among other things, an unnamed former Dodger stating that Puig “is the worst person I’ve ever seen in this game”.

    I’d be happy to see the Braves acquire Puig at the right price, but I seriously doubt it’ll happen.

  28. @26, Everybody who has a post-TJ #3 starting pitching prospect must be saying, “We can’t let the Braves get away with this heist.”

    Don’t screw this up, Copp.

  30. ‏@Ken_Rosenthal 4 hours ago
    Sources: #Braves have received numerous inquiries on Inciarte since acquiring him, including from #Cubs. Not engaging in trade discussions.

  31. Why spin Inciarte? I like the idea of him and Mallex for a few years together. Depends on the return I guess

  32. I mean, if the Cubs love him enough to part with something reaaally good, then fine. But this guys got 5 years of control left, there’s no rush. Unless you really don’t believe in his bat, and you’re scared his value will crater with exposure.

    But I don’t want to move him for a similarly valued RF or LF just for the sake of positional diversity. We can break Mallex in easy and see which guy we want long term, and we have several years before we have to make that decision.

  33. I agree. Heyward light will make a fine CF. Mallex needs a year in AAA.

    An Olivera Iciarte Markakis outfield (assuming that Olivera hits) isn’t all that bad on paper.

    I am going to think that Markakis will hit with a little more power next season now that he is a year away from neck surgery. If Olivera (big if) for real hits anything like Travis Fryman then the outfield looks pretty good from an offensive stand point.

  36. They’re projecting some BABIP regression, which seems perfectly reasonable, and some defensive regression, which is hard to say.

    But part of that low estimate seems to be based on a very low playing time projection, since he was a platoon player in Arizona. If he plays a full year with us, he’ll log more counting stats.

  39. The difference between Fangraphs WAR and bbref WAR is worth noting. I’ll definitely take a 2 fWAR CF at a cut-rate price. And I don’t see why his defense or base running would decline anyway.

  41. Inciarte does have some troubling splits – career .309/.345/.421 vs. RH (that’s good!), but .250/.289/.299 vs. LH (that’s bad!) and .266/.301/.359 away from the friendly confines of Chase Field. That said, the dude is only 25 years old and he’s not a big guy; I don’t see why his defense and base running would decline in any meaningful way between 2015 and 2016.

  42. Game Blauser at 41,

    It is not that they think his defense will get worse, it is that there is an insufficient record to feel comfortable that he is really nearly otherworldly as an outfield defender. So if you treat him as barely above average, he comes down.

    I know of no reason to take his base running down unless his minor league stats were much worse and they think it was a fluke.

  44. He looks like a 4th OF at best on a real team. He’ll do fine on our team. Let’s see what we got. It’s not like our alternatives are any good either.

  45. @43, the toppings contain potassium benzoate!

    @44, lol–a 3-5 WAR “4th outfielder”. lol. and that’s the “best” case. lol.

  47. You could pretend that, in fact, I was the one making some sort of extreme absolutist statement. You could pretend that…

  48. krussell’s dream team:

    1B Boog Powell

    2B Dan Uggla

    SS Derek Jeter

    3B Bob Horner

    LF Pete Incaviglia

    CF Jim Edmonds

    RF Willie Stargell

    C Ted Simmons

    Defense? Who needs any stinking defense?

    Actually, there is enough offense in that team to offset some with bad defense. Edmonds isn’t a “bad” defender, just that his bat outshines his fielding. But batting average against on that squad would be tough.

  52. I don’t think Bethancourt will be on the team. I feel like they decided he doesn’t have the right inter-personal skillset to work with our young pitchers that are on the team and the ones coming in the next year or two.

    (Whether that’s fair or not is probably debatable, just saying that’s the conclusion)

  53. @38, the projections that bb-ref offers are just Marcels — it’s basically a dumb algorithm based on regressing past experience, with an age factor. It makes no attempt at learning from past performance. I wouldn’t put much stock in it. It’s literally just looking at his last couple of years and figuring he’ll do something sort of like that.

  61. @55, my no-defense team is full of guys that mash the ball. CBeth doesn’t mash the ball. So no.

    Klesko gets a bench spot. Kevin Mitchell would be in the mix. My team would be fun to watch, for a variety of reasons.

  64. #48
    There are some others that could make the list or come close (Howard Johnson at 3B, Lonnie Smith in LF, Dave Kingman at 1B/OF & Nomar Garciaparra at SS — he made a ton of errors when he was at his hitting peak), but the all-time poster boy for that lineup might be Greg Luzinski.

    If career dWAR means anything to you, Luzinski scored a -20.9 in LF. That’s not an easy thing to do. He could mash, but it was like the Phils were putting a sumo wrestler in left.

  66. If the collective thinking is that Heyward will inevitably be overpaid… why wouldn’t we want him to go to our hated rival? That’s his plan all along! To help the Braves by getting himself overpaid by our division rival! Brilliant!

  67. Braves acquire RHP Casey Kelly and C Ricardo Rodriguez for C Christian Betancourt

  69. I will always remember Casey Kelly as the guy the Padres traded Adrian Gonzalez to get. The return was so lopsided that people were speculating that it was a result of Jed Hoyer, who at the time had been recently plucked from the Red Sox organization to be the GM of the Padres, still being infatuated with “his guys” to the point where he didn’t thoroughly investigate other offers and took a worse package.

    That trade ended up being a fat nothing for all the hot air it produced — Gonzalez was traded again after a year and a half in Boston for salary relief, Kelly got hurt and flamed out, and the other major prospect in the deal, Anthony Rizzo, was traded again before establishing himself as a big league regular.

    Anyway, it looks like the actual prize of the deal is the young catcher, who appears to have some potential but is only 17, so it’ll be years before we know what he is. Kelly’s just a guy at this point.

  70. Stu’s writeup was one of the things I was most excited about with this trade. I knew he’d be ready to leave Mrs. Stu at this point.

    I just can’t stop being excited about one of the best trades in Atlanta-era Braves history.

    I miss you all.

  73. @71, if that graphic is properly sourced (a variant of the Furcal rule, call it the Facebook infographic rule, applies here) – it’s confirmation of everything I’ve been snarking about on this board since the beginning of The Rebuild.

    I’ve long suspected Liberty were squirreling a Marlins-esque amount of money away and this would tend to confirm my suspicion that giving them any more of my own money would not have any effect on their expenditure on the on-field product.

  74. @72

    To be fair, that was before they bought Cahill, Bourn, and Swisher and shed CJ’s money. If I’m not mistaken, that means the Braves would be around 44%, which while terrible, isn’t as bad as that graph.

  75. @72 – I don’t know what that graphic is really supposed to tell me. The bottom third of the league starts with a tie of the Yankees and Athletics…

  76. Dear Evan Rootski
    your origins for us are somewhat moot, see?
    arriving through the fifth rule
    we don’t really care where you went to school.

  77. catching a pitch

    longitudinal
    latitudinal
    and if you don’t mind
    attitudinal

    nurtured
    nursed
    pandered
    cursed

    shame

    bye

  78. It doesn’t surprise me that Casey Kelly has had Tommy John surgery. The team seems to collect those.

  79. Casey Kelly
    they took a muscle from his belly
    then wrapped it round his arm
    but none of this in any way affected his great charm.

  81. Ricardo Rodriguez
    do please ‘ava cado he sez
    my life as a vegan
    demonstrably better than when i was pagan.

  83. Wonder what the plan is to cut (at least) two from the 40-man. I’m surprised they took back someone in the Bethancourt deal that had to be rostered, especially after taking someone in the Rule 5 draft.

    Gonna DFA some of the more marginal relievers like Cunniff, Cabrera, or Marksberry? Toscano? Another trade or two in the works?

    Gotta make room for Flowers and Bonifacio, and they’ve talked about adding another veteran SP, too. Interesting.

  84. Casey Kelly signed to play football with Phillip Fulmer at Tennessee. That was like three coaches ago.

  85. @70, same.

    Considering that the Johns have traded away something like 15 relievers over the last year and change, I imagine they’d have absolutely no compunction DFAing a reliever or two, or trying to flip them for a marginal prospect or cash, like they did with Varvaro (who was a much better pitcher than Cunniff or Marksberry).

    I fully recognize that the sourcing of an imgur GIF is not ironclad, but it smelled right and made me mad, so I posted it without doublechecking the numbers. But they actually look right: http://www.forbes.com/mlb-valuations/list/

  86. A game (that will drive you mad): Count the number of times Peanut uses the word “gain” in a given article.

    And it looks like there are going to need to be four cuts from the current 40-man, because they keep mentioning bringing KJ back, too.

    Anybody know when the 60-day DL becomes active? Can they move guys there even now to get them off the 40-man? If so, they can certainly move Paco Rodriguez to get one spot and can almost certainly move Shae Simmons to get another. I have no idea where Chris Withrow is in his recovery, but that might be a third. Hopefully, Grilli and Folty are too close full health to be worth moving.

  87. @86

    He is slowly starting to become the mouth piece of the FO. I wonder if DOB’s feelings are hurt. If so, I imagine he will take it out on commenters on Twitter.

  88. Peanut’s always been the primary mouthpiece. That’s where “Peanut” came from. DOB has just transitioned from reporter to second mouthpiece.

  89. If anyone would like to read a very complimentary article scouting Dansby Swanson (“offers tons of upside on both sides of the game… skill set is already good enough to get him to the big leagues”) and Aaron Blair (“ceiling for three plus or better pitches, with his changeup having the highest chance of developing to that level… great control, with command gains needed to reach his ceiling as a mid-rotation starter, possibly even a No. 2 type”), here it is.

    It’ll be interesting to see how the Braves handle Swanson and Albies next year – as a highly-polished college player, I suspect ol’ Dansby won’t have any trouble with A-ball pitchers, and will likely handle AA competition well too. Albies (who is 3 years (!) younger than Swanson) logged 439 successful PAs in single-A last year, though his season ended in August with a hairline thumb fracture. It’s easy (and fun!) to dream about the two of them reaching the Majors by some time in 2017.

  90. I still bet Dansby will play in Turner Field. They gotta do something to sell tickets. Hometown boy making his debut will do that.

  92. @90 If the Braves are that desperate to juice their 2016 ticket sales, I’d rather they sign Bartolo Colon and bring back Andruw Jones. Keep Swanson in the minors at least through the first couple weeks of the 2017 season so the Braves get an extra year of team control (see: Jason Heyward).

  93. @90

    It being the last season at the Ted, I think they will use that to sell tickets. I would like to go to the last game, but I bet they make me buy a four pack.

    If Dans isn’t ready, they aren’t going to rush him. Stunting his growth and starting his clock to sell tickets in 2015 isn’t worth it.

  94. Dansby Swanson
    Had more than great hair in common with Don Johnson
    When the Braves’ steep asking price
    Put the pitching-poor D-backs in quite a Vice

  95. Leaving aside the 40-man, I don’t think there’s a spot on the 25-man roster for KJ unless someone is moved. Presumably the bench is Swisher, Bourn, Flowers, Beckham & Bonifacio.

    Also would hate to see them burn a year of service time for Swanson before he’s ready just to sell a few tickets in a lost year.

  96. If the Swansby rakes at A ball, rakes at AA, and rakes at AAA, he deserves a call up. If he doesn’t, you have Eric Aybar.

  99. Between Peterson, Castro, Beckham, and Bonifacio, we have some guys who can play or fake short. I won’t be surprised if Aybar is traded this month. I’ll be a little surprised if he’s on the Opening Day roster.

  100. There is no way we don’t move Aybar at some point. I just wouldn’t bring Swanson up and start his clock yet for a team that doesn’t expect to compete for two years.

    For me Swanson would have to be killing AAA for 2-3 months.

  101. Because Dansby isn’t a real name, I really want to call Swanson by his actual first name, James. Little Jimmy Swanson.

  105. Pretty sure that the only reason that we got Aybar is because the Angels didn’t need him any more.

  107. I’m seeing reports that JHey signed with the Cubs – contract terms aren’t public yet (that I know of) are believed to be less than $200M (maybe 8/$192) with an opt-out after 3 or 4 years.

  108. @106 was trying to process whether or not it would be a good thing if he went to the Nats, but they had to give him ‘all the money’. Glad now that I don’t have to.

  111. @109 who do the Braves trade for Soler, though? The only good win-now assets we have that would fit with the Cubs’ roster are Teheran and Vizcaino. I feel like Vizcaino’s not enough to get Soler (plus the Cubs just traded him back to us a year ago, so it would be weird to acquire him again so soon) and Teheran is too much to pay.

  112. They still need a real CF like Inciarte. Imagine what we could get for an Inciarte-Teheran package…

  115. Aybar might be the most likely guy in the whole league to get traded around the deadline next season. He is both too good to take a short-term stopgap contract to give Swanson/Albies more time, but not good enough to give a longer-term, real-money contract. He isn’t worth the risk of him taking the QO, so you can’t hold onto him for draft picks. He plays a position that a lot of teams are going to have an eye on upgrading. He plays for a team that isn’t likely to compete with him. If the Braves DON’T flip him, I’d wonder what they were thinking with the Simmons trade even more than I currently do.

    There are only two scenarios where I see the Braves hanging on to Aybar for the whole season: 1) The Braves are unexpected contenders (and legit ones, not “Hey, maybe if two or three teams completely collapse down the stretch we can steal the second wild card” contenders) or 2) Aybar collapses as a player and no one wants him (unlikely, but stranger things have happened).

  119. Also, I would like to note that both Heyward and Zobrist turned down higher offers from the Washington Nationals, so it seems like word’s getting out about what a tire fire that organization is.

  122. I know it’s a pointless exercise, but I do wonder what would’ve “gotten it done” with Heyward in early 2014. Freeman’s deal–8/135? I’m pretty happy with how it worked out for us at any rate.

    Now, I wonder what the Nats would give up for Inciarte…

  123. I thought it had been established that the Braves offered the same deal to Heyward that they offered to Freeman, but Heyward rejected it.

  124. @122

    I have to think we approached Heyward with an offer or two and he indicated he wanted to test the market.

    It paid off for both sides.

  125. Heyward’s a perfectly fine defensive center fielder. The reason the Braves shifted him to right field, as I understand, is that he had a reputation for fragility even coming out of high school, and they wanted to preserve his legs.

  126. @123, all I know is that the Braves brass said he wasn’t “a 100 million dollar player”, though I don’t think they meant that literally. Some speculated he was offered Freeman money.

    @122, or maybe the Nats want Nick Markakis

  127. Out of high school, he was viewed as an OF/1B; I don’t think very many scouts foresaw “credible or better CF defense in the majors” coming. And I still don’t think anyone knows whether he’s a perfectly fine defensive center fielder, since no one’s given him an extended look there. I doubt the Cubs will, either.

  128. If I signed a 26 year old to an 8-$185 million deal, I’d put him in the best spot to succeed. CF on the north side of Chicago with Soler and Schwarber would not be the best place for him.

    I have to think the Cubs move one of those two for another arm or lots of depth.

  131. I do recall belief that he’d fill out and outgrow the outfield. I remember 1B projections. I don’t remember how EXPERT those opinions were, but I remember them.

  134. @48, 64: Bill James on Greg Luzinski: “Greg Luzinski was the worst outfielder I ever saw, bar none….Luzinski was a tremendous hitter, but in addition to being a big, slow guy, he had no arm at all. He couldn’t throw the ball across a room. It wasn’t just that he couldn’t run or throw though….Luzinski, even operating within his limitations, was just a bad outfielder. He had dreadful hands, he had no confidence in his ability to make a play, so he played everything timidly except the wall, which he seemed to be in denial about. He was always fighting to avoid the sun. He played with his back turned to center field, sort of officially notifying Maddox that he considered anything hit to his left to be Maddox’s responsibility. If a ball was hit deep he had no idea whether it would hit the wall and come back or not, so he would chase fly balls to the wall only see them rocket past him on their way back to the infield. Everything hit out there was a surprise to him; nothing was ever easy. It was like having Herman Munster playing left field.” One of my favorite Bill James recaps from the old Abstracts.

  136. @133 Thanks for linking that Perfect Game profile! Just for giggles I checked out Perfect Game’s top high school prospects for 2007, here’s the top of the list:

    Rank Name Pos Ht Wt B T High School Hometown St Col.Commitment Travel Team
    1 Rick Porcello RHP 6-5 195 R R Seton Hall Prep Chester NJ North Carolina Farrah’s Builders
    2 Jason Heyward OF 1B 6-4 220 L L Henry County McDonough GA UCLA East Cobb Astros
    3 Josh Vitters 3B SS 6-3 190 R R Cypress Anaheim CA Arizona State USA
    4 Matt Harvey RHP 6-4 195 R R Fitch Mystic CT North Carolina Legion
    5 Madison Bumgarner LHP 6-5 220 R L South Caldwell Lenoir NC North Carolina Legion

    Considering you’re talking about projecting high schoolers – that’s a pretty impressive list! All five have played in the majors; you’ve got two #1 starters, an excellent OF, one underperforming mid/end rotation guy, and one bust (Vitters).

    Interestingly, #6 on the list is Josh Vitters, who was also an East Cobb player (though on a different team than Heyward).

  137. How many Heyward profiles said he would be a light-hitting, elite defensive right fielder? Probably not many. The evaluations from when he was in HS are out-dated because of how much he changed as a player. His body type and his game are almost contradictory to each other, that’s why the CF thing makes sense and doesn’t make sense.

  138. Metrics didn’t seem to hate Lonnie Smith (career -2.6 dWAR). In fact, in his inexplicable 8.8 WAR season for us (’89), he was supposedly worth 2.0 dWAR. Fangraphs had him 17 runs better than average in the field that year. That’s gold glove level defense. Yes, caveats about old d-metrics apply, but that’s a heckuva outlier season.

  139. If you ever saw Lonnie Smith play outfield, you’d be shocked that he could ever cross a busy street without falling down.

    Hell, he fell down running out of the batter’s box a couple times a week. That’s why they called him “Skates.”

  140. The huge year-to-year variance in defensive numbers is pretty much why I ignore them. I don’t think it makes sense for youthful OF’er to fluctuate from good to poor to great. It’s all about small sample sizes and the very limited number of opportunities to make great plays.

    I’m pretty convinced that all MLB teams have access to better defensive data sets that track the actual batted-ball velocity and trajectory, positioning, and ground-covered. The public stuff is just a little bit better than useless. The private stuff is probably pretty darn interesting.

  141. @136 Do you mean to say Josh Vitters? He’s third on the list there.

    EDIT: I didn’t realize the link had the entire list.

  142. @141 Nope, I meant to say that Josh Smoker (#6 on the ’07 list) was also an East Cobb guy. Got my Joshes all mixed up.

  144. Just a very weird player. And, it’s true, he was on another planet in ’89. That bunch was woeful, but Lonnie was reason enough to watch that year.

    I’ll never forget a mid-summer game vs. the Mets. Sid Fernandez was mowing down the Braves left & right, had 16 Ks with a confounding heater that seemed to rise.

    But the game was somehow still tied going to the bottom of the 9th. Lonnie promptly hit a walk-off blast. A small triumph, but a memorable one.

  145. @122 and @124 The Braves literally – meaning literally – did not make Heyward an offer before the 2014 season. They didn’t even suggest a number or ask him to discuss what it’d take for him to consider a contract extending beyond FA. Very surprising, and speaks volumes about Jason, considering the number of times he ended up on the ground or against the wall chasing a ball he knew he’d be unlikely to catch.

  146. I love Lonnie Smith. He was pigeon toed, which is why he was clumsy when running full out. He also tried to murder John Schuerholz in Kansas City.

  148. Just because it takes more than a season to build up a reliable sample doesn’t make a stat worthless. I don’t hear the same complaints about ISO — actually, what I heard was that Heyward’s power was in steep and unavoidable season-to-season decline in his last year as a Brave, and lo and behold, it rebounded last season.

  149. I’d take the Lonnie Smith 8.8 WAR season from 1989 out of any of our guys this year, but methinks that ain’t happening.

  150. The stat may not be worthless if you are trying to compare players across eras after their career is done…but I can’t see it being worth much when trying to fill out your roster for the upcoming season.

  153. Julie Dicaro – #Cubs looking at Span & teams that may have a CF to trade. Rays’ Jennings possible. Believe can get Inciarte from w/ Soler if necessary

  157. “I think that’s the number one thing that’s missing, I think, in the game is speed. You know, with the need for minorities, you can help yourself — you’ve got a better chance of getting some speed with Latin and African-Americans. I’m not being racist, that’s just how it is.”

    –Dusty Baker

  163. I think Coppy has to thank the marlins for their demand on Fernandez. Their demand made ours seemingly so much more reasonable…

    …and I honestly don’t know if I really want Solar…

  164. Yeah, if we trade Inciarte for Soler we’re back to a giant hole in CF and overall an almost guaranteed collective bad defensive OF.

  166. @148, 165. Not really. It increased all of 33 pts from ’14. It was still easily the second worst of his 6 yr career and well below avg for a corner outfielder

  168. @167 Schwarber is basically like a younger, better-hitting version of El Oso Blanco – unless you can stick him at catcher (which the Cubs seemingly stopped doing last year) or perhaps 1B (Cubs are set there) he’ll destroy a good chunk of his value blundering around in LF.

    This is not to say that Schwarber isn’t a good player or that I wouldn’t want the Braves to trade for him – but it is a roundabout way of saying that my guess is *if* Schwarbs gets traded, it’s to an AL team.

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