Just back from Atlanta where I exposed my baseball-ignorant bride to a first-place tilt with the Padres at the Ted. She read a book starting in the seventh inning. Philistine.
The home team took two of three, largely because, while both clubs sport deep starting pitching, superb relief and excellent defense, the Braves bring bats to their contests.
One player whom I was particularly interested in watching was freshly minted Native American, Alex Gonzalez. Atlanta swapped their uber-talented young shortstop, Yunel Escobar, for the bloated half-year stats of a 33-year-old journeyman. On the face of it, Braves GM Frank Wren got taken for a ride on MARTA. But there's more to this trade than meets the eye.
Escobar is brimming with ability -- a bazooka arm and on base talent has earned him 12 wins over a replacement player in the two full years of his career prior to 2010. In the first half of this year, his VORP tumbled 180 points and his longball power evaporated.
In exchange, the Braves bit on a guy with 12 years of .295 OBP and intermittent power who suddenly in 2010 started banging the ball around the Rogers Centre. It sounds like the ultimate buy high/sell low proposition that made teams like the Pirates and Astros the Triple-A powerhouses they are today. Didn't you think the Braves are smarter than that?
They are. The mercurial Escobar is a prodigal child who was killing Atlanta defensively and causing agita in the clubhouse. Worst of all, managerial icon Bobby Cox had consumed all the Yunel he could handle, and was ready for a blander course that he could more easily stomach.
No doubt Gonzalez is a short term solution. But for a team with World Series aspirations, he brings proven defensive aptitude at a key position and a hale-fellow clubhouse persona. Moreover, what Bobby wants, Bobby gets, for as long as he fills out the lineup card. No one's going to argue with a first-ballot Hall of Fame skipper.
In the game I watched, AGon demonstrated in vivid hues how a guy can play 13 Major League seasons collecting outs at a 70.5% rate. Three of his at-bats were American Legion quality, including a couple where he chased sliders into Gwinnet. His all-or-nothing approach may pay dividends in Toronto, but it'll simply be all nothing if he applies it to the Senior Circuit.
On the other hand, Cox didn't have to reach for the antacid every time a ball traveled his shortstop's way. (Actually, Cox was serving a one-game suspension, so he didn't even have to watch. But you get the point.) In a pennant race, there's a lot to be said for a team's ongoing emotional health.
So what seemed like a poorly-conceived sacrifice of future value for a league-average present may turn out to be more evil Bobby Cox genius. The converse, however, is not necessarily the reverse. This deal still benefits the Blue Jays, who have less chance of beating the Yankees, et. al. than Robert E. Lee. (In fact, Lee took an early lead and kept it close longer.) They might as well flip their rent-a-shortstop for a chance to sip at the emerging star cup at below-market prices.
There is one small coda to this: In his first 30 plate appearances for Atlanta, AGon's been raking to the tune of .370/.433/.519. Maybe opposing pitchers ought to consider throwing more sliders into the Atlanta suburbs.
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