Eddie Rosario rebounded from a 2022 season lost to vision problems to become, well, Eddie Rosario again. His final line was .255/.305/.450, nicely back in line with his career averages of .268/.305/.460.
Rosario started 122 games in left field for the Braves, and in 478 at bats hit 21 homers, scored 64 runs and drove in 74. Eddie batted mostly out of the 7th spot, but also with significant time in the 5th and 6th spots. He was also named as a finalist for the Gold Glove award for left field, which must have come as a big surprise to Kevin Pillar. Overall, Eddie was awarded 1.1 bWAR for his efforts.
The Braves hold a $9M option on Rosario for 2023. Eddie turned 32 in September, so his ceiling is pretty well defined at its current level. There is some sentiment that Rosario should have a platoon partner, but while there is a fairly significant difference in his slugging percentage, his career on base splits aren’t especially dramatic. (.268/.307/.483 against righties and .269/.301/.395 against lefties.)
I think there’s a pretty good chance Eddie can have another season similar to 2023 if the Braves don’t want to upgrade the position, and that would certainly be fine for the 7th spot in the order. I will guess the Braves will focus on upgrading the pitching and we’ll see a lot of Rosario in left field again, unless they switch gears and pivot to Vaughn Grissom.
I don’t expect Rosario to change his approach at this point in his career, but he is a very talented hitter, like Albies, who could be a lot better if he were a bit more selective. It just seems like this kind of hitter bails out a tough pitcher when he’s gotten into a little bit of trouble. If there have been a couple of walks in a row, they seem to just go up there thinking “boy I’m really gonna wail on this first pitch” and do the pitcher a favor and chase one on their shoe tops.
Of course, I want Bellinger, but if that’s off limits, I would much rather sign Kiermaier for the same dollars we pay Rosario. Same offense and much better glove. If it’s possible to trade Ozuna, though, it sure would be cool to use the money for him and Rosario to sign Bellinger. The dollars would be a wash, and you can then use the DH to get Murphy and Grissom more ABs.
OK, so I watched the analysis here at the 4 minute mark and I no longer want anything to do with Cody Bellinger. The eye test fooled me.
Roster trimming begins!
I’m not sure I want AA to exercise the club option on Eddie. I’d rather he went out and got an everyday left fielder, but I don’t want that player to be Adam Duvall or Cody Bellinger. I just don’t! Duvall’s best work with the Braves came after he had played most of a season with other teams, and Bellinger has two good years…2023 and the year he won the MVP. Otherwise he is below average and I don’t think the clubhouse would enjoy him. I didn’t click on the video above, I just know what I’ve seen and heard from the Dodgers’ chaplain…we don’t need him.
TLDR: All of his peripherals are terrible. His barrel rate and exit velo is bottom of the league. I have no idea how he had such good counting stats. Just BABIP miracles. What always impressed me about him is how difficult he was to strike out in his good seasons including this one.
Yeah, I don’t care if he’s good “value” at $9M. You can only play one LF at a time, and he sucks. I would cut bait on him and just spend more to get an actual good LF. As I mentioned in another comment, I think this lineup has structural flaws that are masked against mediocre pitching, but you don’t see mediocre pitching in the playoffs.
I’ve always thought that Jesse Winker would be a good fit in Atlanta. His glove is decent enough, and he hits for some power.
I think we have too many power-only hitters as it is. 2 years in a row your power-only guys providing no power in the postseason has me wanting to look at structural changes to the lineup, including getting rid of power-only guys like Rosario, Albies, and Ozuna.
Joe Jimenez is back on a 3-year, $26M deal. Overall, Jimenez had a pretty solid season, but the Braves didn’t seem to have much confidence in him, which makes this signing kind of surprising to me.
The average leverage index when Jimenez entered a game (gmLI) last year was 0.85 – not super low, but not as high as you’d expect for someone who had previous experience as a late-inning reliever and closer. Jesse Chavez (1.42) and Kirby Yates (0.91) both had higher gmLI’s than Jimenez. Heck, even Michael Tonkin (0.86) was used in about the same number of high leverage situations, which just doesn’t seem right.
It will be interesting to see how they utilize Jimenez going forward. With Iglesias, Minter, and Pierce Johnson forming the back of the bullpen, Jimenez may continue to see action in the middle innings. It may be that this really is the best role for him; he did have a pretty ugly 9/10 shutdown/meltdown ratio and had some issues with the long ball in 2023. It’s just not what I was expecting when they initially traded for him last offseason.
I do not like this deal, but it’s not grossly out of proportion for what Jimenez brings. My problem with it is that I think that $9M per year can be better utilized than on a “pretty good” reliever. I’m a replacement value guy, and I think spending on marginal talent is how you get an expensive mediocre roster. JJ has 0.0 career WAR at age 28. There’s a good chance his best years are ahead of him, which is what makes this deal decent, but I would rather not pay for what may be.
https://x.com/Braves/status/1720080906399232329?s=20
I have reached a certain level of fan bitterness where I just don’t care that you built a juggernaut for 6 months. In the case of Murphy, he smashed for the most inconsequential period of time (April through June). I just don’t care about how this team racked up a bunch of stats by smashing through crappy SPs and bullpens only to turn into a pumpkin 2 years in a row when it matters.
I really think baseball has a huge problem here. Lowest rated World Series in however long because Arizona didn’t belong. People can blame it on markets and there’s some truth to that, but at the end of the day, the best teams weren’t in the World Series. I know that I’m tired of it.
I think Texas was a legitimately good team. I’m fine with the World Series not featuring the “best” teams so long as it features legitimately good teams. The Rangers underperformed their Pythagorean a bit (90-72 vs. 96-66). They had a +165 run differential and only Houston really gave them a fight in the playoffs. The Diamondbacks were not a good team (80-82 Pythagorean) — indeed, a negative run differential and had multiple stretches of bad baseball over the summer. They’ve shown flashes of future promise in 2023, but they were not objectively deserving of a spot in the World Series. I think they’re the case study for how you can exploit the chaos and randomness of the current MLB playoff format. It’s a nice story, and nice for their fan base, but baseball really needs to make the regular season mean more. A team with a negative run differential and a sub-500 expected W/L could have won it all. It is hard for MLB to legitimize its 162-game regular season that means almost nothing when the calendar turns to October.
I wanted the Braves to pick up Chapman at the deadline and he was pretty cheap. The Rangers got him. I wonder what the difference might have been with Chapmen pitching against Harper (and Schwarber and Marsh, etc…) instead of Hand who was about the biggest bust I’ve seen in a while. To me it was obvious which lefty reliever was the best deadline rental. I noticed that Chapman pitched a clean inning in the final WS game.
If Matzek and Lee can come back healthy and strong, a bullpen of Iglesius, Minter, Johnson, Jimenez, Matzek, Lee, Daysbel +1 or 2 is not so bad. The Night Shift was Smith/Jackson/Minter/Matzek. I think Iglesias/Johnson/Minter/Matzek is just as good, And I’d keep Yates, too.