Report: the Atlanta Braves made an offer to Acuna

On the heels of both the Scott Kingery extension announced by the Phillies and our analysis from this morning, this is an interesting add-on.

According to information from a Canadian Sports Management professional via twitter, Ronald Acuna, Jr. was given an offer by the Atlanta Braves recently – one that would have trumped the $24 million guarantee that Scott Kingery just received from the Phillies.

The translation is conveniently provided for us.  He went on to suggest in a separate tweet that Atlanta ‘wanted to do something like what Philadelphia did with Kingery.’

The Business Aspect

As we suggested this morning, Kingery’s contract may have established a benchmark for the Braves to at least begin a conversation with.  However, the base that I started with was $35 million – with options that would have led to $89 million.

The translation for this:

"“Those who do not understand the offer to Acuña would serve a good dose of @endorfinasradio to understand what the management and agents are doing in these confusing years of the CBA and in anticipation of a possible strike in 2021.”"

(Sure – it’s a plug for his professional work, but hey:  we’re using his stuff for free here… and besides that:  he’s right.  Some players may in fact want to position themselves with guaranteed contracts to insure they are taken care of… just in case.)

But in case you don’t buy that info coming from him…

While we clearly don’t know all of the terms of this Atlanta offer $30 million would seem to fall well short of Acuna’s perceived value… even at this point in his career, prior to any major league service time.

As it is, there were multiple agent reports (cited this morning in our earlier post) that called Kingery’s deal a big win for the Phillies.  I can only imagine their reactions should Acuna have accepted “only” a $30 million guarantee.

Now with all of this information, we do need to pump the brakes a bit:  here we have one source who also had one source.  We cannot confirm this story at this time.  Nonetheless, it is true that Mr. Marcano has a significant following to his work and happens to be located in Toronto, which could give him a link back to the Braves new front office.  So take all this in when evaluating what you are reading here today.

>> See (multiple) Tuesday updates below

Lots of Unknowns

To that point, there is still a lot that we don’t know:  Among the questions I would want to know answers for:

• We can guess that this offer was made post-Kingery, but … maybe not.  If it preceded the Phillies’ deal, then it is quite reasonable that the Braves would recognize that their number will have to be raised to have any chance for acceptance.
• Acuna was sent to the minor league camp over a week ago now; it is possible (though again unknown) that an offer would have been made prior to that event.
• We don’t know if such an offer were countered by his agent.
• We don’t know if there is any common ground between the parties that might portend the establishment of a deal in the near future.  In other words, are they simply too far apart to even bother continuing to talk?
• While the Braves certainly have great financial flexibility coming up in 2019, we don’t know where their options lie for 2018.

Also as guessed this morning, the signing of both Ryan Flaherty and (especially) Peter Borjous would seem to have closed the door on an early contract… the Braves are effectively spending money that could have gone directly to Acuna instead.

So this is … very interesting, but frankly:  if the offer was indeed made within the past 24 hours or so, then I would argue that it was a weak effort on the part of the Braves, and that Acuna’s side would have been right to reject it.

TUESDAY UPDATES 1 and 2:

…but there is a refutation:

Now, the idea of contacting Acuna’s family sounds sketchy – and if I’m his agent and found out, I might be furious – but I don’t know that this would be illegal by MLB Rules.  Unethical?  Ill-advised?  Perhaps.  But it is does sound like the Braves could have been trying to get around an agent that might have expected to deliver the offer with a message of “you’re going to reject this offer, but…here it is.”

Meanwhile:  Mr. Marcano source is already sounding like he has sufficiently detailed information to believe his initial report… more so than the Braves’ denial.

So there’s that…

Next: Setting the Framework for an Acuna contract

Yes – it would have easily been a record-setting deal at $30 million, but I believe the Braves are trying to save some future money in a manner than will ultimately cost them a lot more.