Thats the best scenario i have seen so far,that seems feesable.

 But,id bring up Heyward ,Shaffer,Flowers,and Hanson.I know they would have bumps and bruises but,the Braves were not a .500 club last season.Somethings got to change,let the youngster show they are eager and willing to move up.

However, I just can’t get with Griffey as an everyday RF, and cleanup hitter. Besides his age and tendency to miss time, he really needs to be in a platoon. Not effective at all against LHP.

If we could pull off the key pieces of your plan, we wouldn’t have spent a huge amount of the available cash we have (Ludwick and Greinke would not be that expensive for the next 2 years).

I think we’d need to sign a better offensive corner OF… whether it’s Burrell, Dunn, or someone else (all of them have flaws)… but yours’ is a good start.

I like the direction and I see your vision in upgrading our offense, bullpen, and pitching rotation. I like the players you mentioned but some of these guys are possible one year wonders and old. I would however re-sign Mike Hampton, Will Ohman, and sign Burnett.

I dont how ever agree with signing Ken Griffey Jr. As much as I like him he’s done. He looked old in Cinncinatti and with the White Sox’s. Scratch him off. I would settle with Zack G. but I WILL NOT put a package together involving Jeff Frankeour, Tyler Flowers, and either Jo Jo or Morton for a pitcher who’s in my book a #3 pitcher. Everyone is entilted to a bad year year and thats what happened to Jeff. He’s still young and still has great talent. Tyler is killing it in the AFL league. I would however give them Jo Jo.

mainly because I don’t buy Ryan Ludwick’s 2008 as a measure of his real abilities. I think he’s more of a .265/25 home run hitter than a .300/35 one. That makes him a good corner outfielder, but I’m not so down with trading a good second baseman for a good left fielder. I like the Greinke idea, I’m not so sure I’d be eager to throw Flowers into it – KC has way too many 1B/DH types, and I don’t think he stays behind the plate. Maybe Gorkys Hernandez, talented but raw and something they don’t have – killer defense and blazing speed. He’s also conveniently blocked by Schafer.

Ken Griffey has a gigantic fork sticking out of his back. No thanks.

I’m all for signing Burnett, but not Dempster, who I think is probably a one year wonder.

Why not instead of going after griffey we go after Juan Rivera instead, as it would cost about the same in terms of money and commitment…..Rivera and Ludwick have both had experience in right field, and could offer more pop in the lineup than griffey could, if we did that, this would be our lineup….

1-CF-Schafer or Anderson
2-SS-Yunel
3-3rd-Chipper
4-RF-Ludwick
5-C-McCann
6-LF-Rivera-
7-1b-Kotchaman
8-2B-Prado
9-Pitcher

That is a pretty dadburn good lineup with great balance, plus we would have infante and norton and blanco on the bench, so we could have a lot of depth as well….I just think you would get a lot more value out of signing Rivera than JR

Shoot me now. The last thing we need is another left-handed bat, particularly an old, slow one. He might make a decent fourth outfielder type and bat off the bench, but that’s all he has left.

I doubt we would have to give up that much for Greinke. I’m jumping on the make-Flowers-untouchable bandwagon. We’re one torn-up knee away from having to bring Corky Miller back.

I would definitely bring Hampton back. But not for $11 million or whatever. Give him a contract based on starts and IP.

I’m almost to the point of saying, find a LF who can hit and screw looking for pitchers, unless we can afford Burnett or Dempster. Our young talent is about to bloom, and I’d rather have a long run with home-grown talent than toss it away in an almost certainly futile attempt to win now.

First, I would not trade Kelly Johnson for Ryan Ludwick. Period. Johnson is an .800 OPS player at a premium position. Ludwick, on the other hand, is significantly overvalued. He’s three years older than Johnson, is stuck defensively at a corner outfield slot, and he is simply not going to repeat last season. A guy with a career .846 minor-league OPS does not suddenly blossom at age 29 into a .950 OPS major-league player. He had an unsustainable .349 BABIP, which will drop back closer to .320, and bring his batting average down 30 points in the process. There was a great article on him from the Hardball Times: http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/fantasy/article/smoke-and-mirrors-ryan-ludwick/. Basically, he looks a lot more like a .270 hitter with 25 homers than a .300 hitter with 37 homers. This is not to condemn Ludwick; quite the contrary. I think he’s a good solution, but I would not trade Kelly Johnson for him.

You’re right that you’ll get a lot of grief about Junior as well. I’d be pretty disappointed if we couldn’t find a better use of $8 million (?) than Griffey, who is not only a huge risk to decline but also to get hurt and simply not play at all. Griffey’s numbers were helped immensely by Great American Ball Park, and I can even envision Bobby Cox hallucinating back to the glory days and deploying Griffey to play center, which, at this stage in Griffey’s career, is something not to be witnessed by children under 15. I am always wary of sentimental “solutions” like Griffey, and I really think wishcasting him as a productive corner outfielder would be a huge mistake.

I would be remiss to criticize without offering solutions; unfortunately, I think the recently-traded Nick Swisher would have been a great answer to part of our outfield needs, given his ability to play center. So what would I do in the outfield? First, I would keep Jeff Francoeur. He may never come around, but I don’t think the Braves can afford to sell low and watch him blossom elsewhere. We’re in for the long haul at this point. Second, I would sign Milton Bradley. Cox’s clubhouse has a history of suppressing guys with temperament issues, and I don’t think Bradley would be an exception. He’s a championship-caliber corner outfielder who would be a sort of latter-day Teixeira, switch-hitting behind Chipper Jones. Add in that he’ll be relatively cheap; a three year deal worth between $36MM and $39MM will probably do the trick. Bradley’s biggest risk at this point is not his hot head, but his achy body, so Frank Wren would be ill-advised not to plan on 40 missed games.

Enter David DeJesus. Maybe you get him as part of a deal for Greinke, maybe not. But DeJesus is PERFECT for our needs. He has the bat to be a full-time starting player, the defensive versatility to handle all three outfield spots, and the friendly contract ($3.6 million in ‘09) to be a fourth outfielder. I can hear the uproar already: why relegate such a talented and productive player to the bench? Well, the answer is that DeJesus wouldn’t be a bench player unless everything went absolutely perfectly, and Braves fans should know by now that such a fantasy rarely gets fulfilled. DeJesus covers left field for the five weeks that Bradley will inevitably miss. He covers center field for perhaps the first few months in the event that Jordan Schafer isn’t ready right away, and he avoids having to witness the self-destructive forces of Blanco and/or Anderson playing regularly. He covers right field in case Jeff Francoeur needs a repeat, and perhaps more extended, date with Phillip Wellman at Mississippi. And then, like I said, if absolutely EVERYTHING goes perfect (i.e., Bradley plays 150 games, Schafer hits from Day One, and Francoeur posts that .850 OPS), then he’s an expensive reserve. But let’s be real…that isn’t going to happen.

We have Prado. We don’t have a LF who can hit at all. Our entire outfield hit 27 HR all year. That’s just pathetic. We need SOMEONE to hit cleanup and protect Chipper. I’d rather see if we can get Carlos Lee or get Detroit to pick up some of Ordonez’s salary, but if we could get Ludwick for Kelly, I’d do that in a heartbeat. I hate to see Kelly go, because he is a very good player, but we have 2 good 2B and zero good LF.

I don’t understand why the Braves are so high on Prado and so down on Johnson.

Sure, Johnson is pretty damn inconsistent but in the end his numbers are solid to say the least. Even though the image of his dropped pop up vs Philly may never go away, he plays a good defensive 2b also. Johnson was the third best player on the Braves last year (ahead of Escobar).

Prado on the other hand is NOT good. Is his .320 Avg sustainable? I highly doubt it. He doesn’t walk and has zero power. His defense was borderline embarrassing and is not as good a baserunner as Johnson either. I think we can look at Matt Diaz to see how valuable a bad defensive player with no walks is when the batting average drops off a cliff. Oh yeah, did I mention he has no power?

Why can’t we get the Cardinals to bite on Prado instead of Johnson? Throw in JoJo or Morton to go with him. Whatever it takes so that Bobby doesn’t look down the bench and think he’s the answer.

Until Ken Griffery Jr.

Were you chanelling your inner Terence Moore or what? But seriously, the dude is old and doesn’t hit for power anymore. Everything else is fine though.

One quick question…have you seen Schafer play this year or are you going by what you hear??

Most of these are dumb as shit.

1. Burnett is old and a good bet not to pitch a full-season. No way in hell I’d pay $14 million+ for his age 35 season.

2. We have no above average second baseman in our system, much less ready to take over. Why trade from a position of weakness for a post-peak corner outfielder?

3. No way Greinke gets traded for that and no way I sell low on Francoeur. Get over the idea Moore is obsessed with our cast-offs. Davies turned out to be a genius acquisition and Cuevas has ridiculous upside.

4. Ken Griffey was barely average with the bat, is injury prone, and was atrocious on defense. Paying him any sum to play for us is the height of stupidity. Expecting him to be anything but dead weight in the regular lineup is ridiculous.

5. Signing Affeldt or Ohman isn’t that stupid, but relief arms are notoriously unpredictable and will be more expensive than their marginal value.

6. If you’re going to blow $5 million on high risk/high reward gambles, let’s go overslot in the draft rather than sign pitchers whose upside is to be league average starters and who aren’t likely to achieve that at all.

7. More throwing away money on risky ventures.

8. This is the only move with much merit. Restock the system.

This is a good article that summarizes Towers actions and why the deal didn’t go down. Pretty much what we already knew though. The Braves were the only logical trade partner and Towers was trying to create a bidding war to extract our best talent. I say good job Wren and when they come back Yunel stays.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2008/nov/14/padres-s15sullivan214/?padres

Very radical changes!

Trade Yunel Escobar for Trevor Cahill and Andrew Carignan

Trade Tyler Flowers, Jo-Jo Reyes, Blaine Boyer, Gorkys Hernandez and Jeff Locke for Zach Grienke

Trade Kelly Johnson, Charlie Morton, Rafael Soriano and Brandon Jones for Jermaine Dye(11 mil) and Javier Vazquez(11 mil)
 
Sign Rafael Furcal – 3 yr/21 mil contract w/ incentives.

Sign Josh Bard – 2 yr/4 mil contract.

Resign John Smoltz – 1 yr/ 5 mil contract w/ incentives, Will Ohman – 3 yr/ 12 mil contract, Greg Norton – 1 yr/ 2 mil contract, Mike Gonzalez – 4 yr/ 28 mil contract.

Re-negotiate Tim Hudson’s contract 4 yr/ 44 mil contract.

Total spent: 42 mil(includes the loss of Soriano’s 6.5 mil contract)

Lineup:
Rafael Furcal – SS
Josh Anderson – CF
Chipper Jones – 3B
Jermaine Dye – LF
Brian McCann – C
Jeff Francoeur – RF
Casey Kotchman – 1B
Martin Prado – 2B

Bench:
Greg Norton – 1B/OF/3B
Omar Infante – Super Utility
Gregor Blanco – OF
Brent Lillibridge – SS/2B/3B
Josh Bard – C

Rotation:
Javier Vazquez – RHP
Zack Grienke – RHP
Jair Jurrjens – RHP
Jorge Campillo – RHP
Trevor Cahill/ Tommy Hanson/Chuck James(sleeper) – SP

Bullpen:
Jeff Bennett – LRP
Phil Stockman – LRP
Andrew Carignan – MRP
Will Ohman – LOOGY
Manny Acosta – SUP
Mike Gonzalez – SUP
John Smoltz – CP

I know a lot of you are going to question the Cahill deal but he would be an awesome pickup for Escobar plus he’s very young and put up better number than Hanson at a far younger age plus Carignan has closer type stuff as a reliever.

I don’t think Cahill is going anywhere.

I agree with all of it but trading Francoeur, and signing Affeldt. We can’t trade Francoeur now because of all he has given to the organization and the fact that his stock is incredibly low. Why sign Affeldt? Our bullpen is one of the best in the bigs when healthy. My roster would "rosterbate to this
2B: Prado
SS: Escobar
3B: Jones
RF: Griffey Jr.
LF: Ludwick
C: McCann
1B: Kotchman
CF: Francoeur

And iffy on trading for Ludwick. Everything else I’d be ok with.

But since we’re talking about it, this is my dream scenario and what could be a realistic one too:
1.) Go hard after Burnett, as he imo is the only free agent pitcher available that is worth paying big money for. My highest offer would probably be 4yrs and $75 million, which I think is possible.
2.) Sign Tazawa. Like I’ve said before, could you imagine a future rotation cosisting of Jurrjens, Hanson and Tazawa (if he pans out of course)? Just NASTY
3.) Forget Greinke and go after Snell. Snell imo would be a LOT easier to pry loose from Pittsburgh that Greinke would be from K.C. I don’t know what the Pirates system is weak at, but I’m sure Wren could give them something sweet. Maybe Gorkys and Medlen as the centerpieces?
4.) Resign Ohman (3yrs, $10mil), J. Julio (cheap), Smoltz (1yr $8mil with an ‘10 option) and Norton (1yr, $3 mil).
5.) Look somewhere for a slugging left fielder. Milton Bradley would be my preference, but like Burnett, he will be one of those HIGH risk, HIGH reward type of signings. I don’t know what kind of deal he would be interested in, but you would have to think it would be for atleast 3yrs and $40 million. Maybe a 2yr deal worth $30 million plus options for a 3rd and 4th year would get it done.

I realize I have a fan crush on KJ, but I don’t see why you trade him for Ludwick. KJ has proven himself at 2nd base which is a more valuable position than LF. Nevermind that Ludwick has had 1 good year and is older.

If I were the Braves GM, I would look into locking down KJ for multiple years, signing Burnett, Bradley, Tazawa, and seeing what kind of incentive deal Hampton would take. Realize that you’re a few years away from competing and don’t see that as a bad thing. You have a chance if you play your cards right and don’t get anxious to bloom into something like the 2008 Rays early in the next decade. I think we can take 5 years of not being very good after 14 straight division titles.