House That Hank Built
Fansided

Atlanta Braves start spending with a bang of their own trash can

By Alan Carpenter

DENVER, COLORADO - AUGUST 03: Pitcher Will Smith #13 and catcher Buster Posey #28 of the San Francisco Giants celebrate the last out in the ninth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on August 03, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images)
DENVER, COLORADO - AUGUST 03: Pitcher Will Smith #13 and catcher Buster Posey #28 of the San Francisco Giants celebrate the last out in the ninth inning against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on August 03, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Matthew Stockman/Getty Images) /
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DENVER, CO – JULY 15: Stephen Vogt #21 of the San Francisco Giants celebrates a 2-1 win with Will Smith #13 of the San Francisco Giants before the bottom of the ninth inning during game two of a doubleheader against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on July 15, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Dustin Bradford/Getty Images)
DENVER, CO – JULY 15: Stephen Vogt #21 of the San Francisco Giants celebrates a 2-1 win with Will Smith #13 of the San Francisco Giants before the bottom of the ninth inning during game two of a doubleheader against the Colorado Rockies at Coors Field on July 15, 2019 in Denver, Colorado. (Photo by Dustin Bradford/Getty Images) /

We won’t have any idea how much the Atlanta Braves intend to spend this off-season, but the early signal is… surprising.

In an Atlanta Braves story from Wednesday, Tim Tucker of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution broke down the pieces of the most recent Liberty Media filings that we opted not to get into on Monday’s look at their revenue and profit report.

In it, he noted something that echoed our concerns:  that profitability waned even though revenues were up.

"The team’s total debt increased $70 million between June 30 and Sept. 30, rising from $470 million to $540 million."

That’s a big change… and it’s enough that we should collectively be concerned that MLB might choose to do what it did a couple of years ago:  step in and impose restrictions to force Atlanta to reduce that debt load.

So far, there’s been no hint of that from either the league office or from the financial filings made by Liberty Media.  For the moment at least… it will be business as usual, and hopefully the items that have been increasing that debt — Battery Atlanta, the Stadium, and the new Spring digs in North Port, FL — will start generating more cash on the positive side of the ledger in 2020.

In the meantime… Alex Anthopoulos hasn’t started off like he’s a man with a tight wallet.  With bullpen performance clearly being a league-wide priority, he went out immediately and secured the best relief pitching free agent available in Will Smith.

It’s the first major signing of this off-season and perhaps a statement that this team isn’t going to sit around and wait while they have holes that need to be filled.

Maybe MLB Players Association head Tony Clark will now back off the investigation he wanted after this same GM spoke perhaps a bit too glibly this past week?  Yeah… probably not.

Let’s then revisit the numbers that were generated a couple of weeks ago and see where things stand today.

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