A so sad Atlanta fan.

[tiger88 934]

The aol/time warner dismantling of the braves appears to be complete now. So sad to see the braves turn into the team that trades off good players as soon as they can throw the white flag up after the break. What is up with the injuries as well?

I'll still watch them and pull for them, but it is sad to see. They need new ownership (and a manager) as bad as any club out there.

[SouthLink02 8]

I think brave fans will be VERY happy with Casey Kotchman who IMO has a very bright next few years ahead

Love his K/BB and his potential power

Needs to stay healthy though

[TitanTiger 20,499]

Time Warner doesn't own the team anymore. They sold it to Liberty Media, I think it's called. Sold it before last season.

Honestly, I can't blame them for trading Tex though. He's a free agent after the season and they've just got too many injuries this year to make a run. Smoltz, Glavine, now Hudson, plus Chipper and the others. Just too much to overcome.

[tiger88 934]

Time Warner doesn't own the team anymore. They sold it to Liberty Media, I think it's called. Sold it before last season.

Honestly, I can't blame them for trading Tex though. He's a free agent after the season and they've just got too many injuries this year to make a run. Smoltz, Glavine, now Hudson, plus Chipper and the others. Just too much to overcome.

I did not know that.

I'm just bummed because of the current situation. I wish they would have another arthur blank/ted turner type to buy the team and make some real moves like in the past. This ownership by company thing sucks.

I see your point on tex, but it just sucks to see them throw in the towel. This team needs some serious re-vamping. If trading off tex results in some good signings in the off season then that will be cool.

[AUesquire 1]

I actually looked at this roster as the season started and thought that if the old guys in the rotation could hold up, this team might be pretty darn good. I heard the same thing from the Baseball Tonight guys the other night. Killer starting lineup to start the season with Kotsay, Johnson, Yunell, Chipper, Tex, McCann, Francouer etc.

Look at the box scores these days. Do you recognize half the names? Ed Norton? Wasn't that Jackie Gleason's....never mind. There are some talented young players to build around like Escobar and McCann and others. But, it's time to free up some payroll, lose Bobby Waddles Cox and start the rebuilding process.

[tiger88 934]

But, it's time to free up some payroll, lose Bobby Waddles Cox and start the rebuilding process.

Amen. I hope he doesn't turn into baseballs joe paterno.

[Defense(clap clap) 4]

I actually looked at this roster as the season started and thought that if the old guys in the rotation could hold up, this team might be pretty darn good. I heard the same thing from the Baseball Tonight guys the other night. Killer starting lineup to start the season with Kotsay, Johnson, Yunell, Chipper, Tex, McCann, Francouer etc.

Look at the box scores these days. Do you recognize half the names? Ed Norton? Wasn't that Jackie Gleason's....never mind. There are some talented young players to build around like Escobar and McCann and others. But, it's time to free up some payroll, lose Bobby Waddles Cox and start the rebuilding process.

I agree with all of that except for Cox. These injuries and the fact that we have no bullpen because they won't spend any money is why we are where we are. Our best two starting pitchers are out for the season now, not including Moylan. Glavine and Acosta are on the DL. Chippers on the DL. Diaz has been on the DL for weeks now. That's an absolute killer. When healthy, the lineup is very solid. I'm also a big fan of Gotay, Blanco and Prado. I think those guys have done a great job off the bench this year. We have to spend money in the offseason to build up our pitching staff. Have to. If we don't, we can expect another year like what's going on now.

As for Texiera, I'm glad they did it. Kochman's a solid all around player and we can resign him for much much less than Texiera will get. Kochman's not really a big drop off from Texiera by any means.

It comes down to pitching though. I guarantee you, we get a strong bullpen and we win at least 50% of those one run games we've lost and we're right back in the running.

[Defense(clap clap) 4]

Very promising article:

Braves have money to spend, rebuild

By Jeff Schultz | Wednesday, July 30, 2008, 10:36 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Given that the line between sports and accounting blurred years ago, the Braves could be excused if they viewed this off-season much like Ms. Peebles in bookkeeping. Never mind the names, the Q-scores or the legacies of exiting players. How fat are the paychecks?

The $14 million pitcher has probably run out of medical miracles.

The $15.975 million pitcher is back from the dead, but too late to resuscitate the banking industry.

The $12.5 million first baseman was dumped for somebody younger, cheaper and not represented by Scott Boras.

The $8 million pitcher has an elbow screaming for retirement.

The $7 million outfielder: an expiring stopgap.

Make way. The Braves are about to head somewhere they haven’t really been in years. The mall.

“It’s a situation we relish, and we’re looking at this off season with great enthusiasm,” said Braves chairman Terry McGuirk.

Let me translate: Nordstrom!

“We know with the kind of money we have coming off the books, we can talk to anybody we want in the marketplace,” McGuirk continued. “There’s certainly a healthy bit of skepticism about the efficiency and the effectiveness of the free-agent marketplace. But we have the ability to go out and get a real horse who can help take us to the top.”

No more plugging holes with slight irregulars or Corky Millers.

Hello, C.C. Sabathia or Ben Sheets?

The Braves might lose five of the top seven salaries from this year’s payroll: Mike Hampton, John Smoltz, Mark Teixeira (already traded), Tom Glavine and Mark Kotsay.

There are different ways to interpret the numbers. In terms of straight salary and bonuses, those five players earn a combined $57,475,184. The Braves have it as something closer to $47 million (and the total payroll as $90-92 million, not $102,365,683). They count only $8 million of Hampton’s $15,975 million salary because that’s their prorated share of his contract, which also has been paid by Colorado and New York. They’re paying only $2 million of Kotsay’s $7 million (Oakland picks up the rest).

No matter. Either way, it’s corporate-weasel nirvana.

Which brings us to Liberty Media. The Braves’ owners really haven’t been tested yet. Their brief tenure hasn’t been the they’re-only-here-for-the-tax-write-off disaster many had forecasted. But neither has the team broke the bank on spending. The Braves’ payroll is up $10 to $12 million over the past two years after holding at about $80 million (Braves’ computations) for three seasons.

What’s to stop a Colorado-based media company from looking at next season with a sense of doom and thinking, “What a fine time to shift some of those millions to marketing porcelain dolls (or pitchers) on QVC?”

McGuirk: “They don’t get involved.”

An owner not involved?

“Liberty Media owns the team. But they’ve allowed the management of the Braves to determine those answers. It’s totally left up to us — 100 percent. They’ve chosen to not have any operating activity. There’s no second-guessing whatsoever. I’ve said that before but people don’t believe me.”

When asked if that meant the Braves were free to balloon the payroll to $200 million, McGuirk said: “I have some sense of what would be the right thing to do. I’m not going to do something stupid.”

McGuirk speculated the team’s payroll would rise slightly next season. But even at status quo, the Braves suddenly have flexibility. That hasn’t been the case since it more than doubled from $50 million in 1997 to $106 million in 2003. That was the year the franchise lost $35 million.

“We had about five years of dwindling attendance and rising payroll,” McGuirk said. “It didn’t take an economic genius to know something had to change.”

So began the slashing. A perfect storm of broken down bodies and expiring contracts has killed the season but plowed the field.

McGuirk calls it “the first time we’ve really had the chance to have a rebuilding effort.” And $47 million will buy a lot of parts.

[bellefay1 1]

I was about to give a breakdown but that article said it all.

AOL/Time Warner owned the Braves in the mid-late 90's when people actually used AOL. They had money to spend and when a McGriff or whoever was available, they acted on it. To act like they're on some money saving spell is wrong and the whinning about Tex proves that point. The Braves were ready to be buyers last season and brought in Tex. He was offered big money but if you didn't know, he has an agent by the name of Scott Boras. He can play the market and say he leads/helps the Angels go deep into the playoffs, he's going to make bank. The Braves didn't have much to gain by offering him some speculation based max deal on a season where we weren't going to make the playoffs. I'll take some pitching and an outfield over a slow starting 1st base.

Liberty media has made the commitment to increase spending on the roster and the Braves have an intelligent staff that has found some gems in the minors or in free agency. If you're a true Braves fan, crack open a cold one tonight, grab your radio and give a listen as the Braves pay tribute to Skip...Just like the ol NL West days, watching baseball into the late night.

[tiger88 934]

Oh boy, the "true fan" card has been played. Let's all back off and let the big dogs whizz, lol.

I am still watching the braves and hoping that the off season brings some exciting news. I still long for the days when we were owned by a person with a passion for the game and not a number crunching corporation.

You are wrong about mcgriff. Turner brought him in. The fact is that when turner was there the braves were up to #2 in salary behind the yankess and under aol/time warner that number constantly shrank until a couple of years ago or so. Could you please list trades you are referring to when you say aol was throwing around money?

The team they put together this year was sad to look at for me. I made comments in the baseball thread about how old the pitching staff was and was attacked. Chipper Jones (who seems quite lethargic at times himself) commented that it looked like last years team so he expected the same results. Unfortunately he was wrong and the results are much worse.

This is a sad sight to me to see the braves throw inn the towel so quick and it looks like they may freefall now. Hopefully not. Not that big a deal overall because we are talking sports and not real life, but sad in a way.

I look forward to next season as long as Liberty shows that it knows what the hell its doing. Maybe someone will also shove a spark plug up cox's butt if he decides he needs to continue to hang on.

[bellefay1 1]

Oh boy, the "true fan" card has been played. Let's all back off and let the big dogs whizz, lol.

I am still watching the braves and hoping that the off season brings some exciting news. I still long for the days when we were owned by a person with a passion for the game and not a number crunching corporation.

You are wrong about mcgriff. Turner brought him in. The fact is that when turner was there the braves were up to #2 in salary behind the yankess and under aol/time warner that number constantly shrank until a couple of years ago or so. Could you please list trades you are referring to when you say aol was throwing around money?

The team they put together this year was sad to look at for me. I made comments in the baseball thread about how old the pitching staff was and was attacked. Chipper Jones (who seems quite lethargic at times himself) commented that it looked like last years team so he expected the same results. Unfortunately he was wrong and the results are much worse.

This is a sad sight to me to see the braves throw inn the towel so quick and it looks like they may freefall now. Hopefully not. Not that big a deal overall because we are talking sports and not real life, but sad in a way.

I look forward to next season as long as Liberty shows that it knows what the hell its doing. Maybe someone will also shove a spark plug up cox's butt if he decides he needs to continue to hang on.

I'm not sure why you mocked my true Braves fan comment when it was in terms of watching/listening Joe/Pete's first game after Skip died. I didn't mean to come across as whatever it was I think you were making me but if so, I apologize. I've read, watched, listened to a big gulp of Skip and I guess my comments came across as arrogant or whatever.

I was wrong about McGriff as well. I guess I'll try and cite the both Grissom trades and the Braves staying in the top 10 in the payroll of the MLB to this day. I don't really care.

[tiger88 934]

Oh boy, the "true fan" card has been played. Let's all back off and let the big dogs whizz, lol.

I am still watching the braves and hoping that the off season brings some exciting news. I still long for the days when we were owned by a person with a passion for the game and not a number crunching corporation.

You are wrong about mcgriff. Turner brought him in. The fact is that when turner was there the braves were up to #2 in salary behind the yankess and under aol/time warner that number constantly shrank until a couple of years ago or so. Could you please list trades you are referring to when you say aol was throwing around money?

The team they put together this year was sad to look at for me. I made comments in the baseball thread about how old the pitching staff was and was attacked. Chipper Jones (who seems quite lethargic at times himself) commented that it looked like last years team so he expected the same results. Unfortunately he was wrong and the results are much worse.

This is a sad sight to me to see the braves throw inn the towel so quick and it looks like they may freefall now. Hopefully not. Not that big a deal overall because we are talking sports and not real life, but sad in a way.

I look forward to next season as long as Liberty shows that it knows what the hell its doing. Maybe someone will also shove a spark plug up cox's butt if he decides he needs to continue to hang on.

I'm not sure why you mocked my true Braves fan comment when it was in terms of watching/listening Joe/Pete's first game after Skip died. I didn't mean to come across as whatever it was I think you were making me but if so, I apologize. I've read, watched, listened to a big gulp of Skip and I guess my comments came across as arrogant or whatever.

I was wrong about McGriff as well. I guess I'll try and cite the both Grissom trades and the Braves staying in the top 10 in the payroll of the MLB to this day. I don't really care.

No biggie either way. To be honest I thought the braves had slipped further in payroll than they had at times. They stayed around the top 10 most of the time time warner/aol was there. They did fall to 15th in 2007 which helps explain the recent complete demise.

I just miss the days of free spending ted having them in the top 2 or three consistently. He spoiled us and to ask for another owner like that is asking a lot. They were powered to their world series appearances by those days. Don't worry about verifying any trades if you don't want to, although grissom also came the first and most significant time to atlanta during their stretch run that led to the ws championship in 1995 under ted.

[tiger88 934]

The braves a re showing some fight out there on the road in arizona. It could be an exciting year next year if they can get rid of the dead weight and spend wisely.