The Braves announced they’ve designated veteran reliever Tyler Thornburg for assignment. The move clears an active roster spot for Dylan Lee, who has been recalled from Triple-A Gwinnett. Atlanta’s 40-man roster now sits at 38.
Thornburg signed a $900K contract with Atlanta over the offseason. It was a bit surprising to see the righty command a guaranteed deal after he’d missed all of last season recovering from September 2020 Tommy John surgery. The Braves were confident enough in his ability to bounce back to devote him a big league roster spot, but he’ll lose that job after just nine appearances.
The 33-year-old worked 9 1/3 innings during his relatively brief stint, allowing six runs. He struck out ten batters against five walks, maintaining his pre-surgery fastball velocity but only generating whiffs on 8.5% of his offerings. It was far from a disastrous performance, but manager Brian Snitker had been deploying Thornburg in extremely low-leverage situations. After he threw 25 pitches in yesterday’s loss to the Marlins, Atlanta replaced him with a fresher arm in Lee.
Thornburg has more than five years of big league service, so he couldn’t be optioned to the minor leagues without his consent. Once the Braves determined to replace him on the active roster, they had to designate him for assignment even though Lee already occupies a spot on the 40-man roster. They’ll now have a week to trade Thornburg or place him on waivers.
That $900K guarantee isn’t much higher than this season’s $700K league minimum salary, so it’s not inconceivable another club could add Thornburg to the middle innings. If he goes unclaimed on waivers, he’d have the right to refuse an outright assignment in favor of free agency while still collecting the remainder of his guaranteed salary.
Welcome to the Athletics
I would imagine Thornburg gets claimed. I’m just not sure if Lee is any better than Thornburg.
Lee is Considerly Better!
Where are the Braves reinforcements coming from this year? If they don’t show a sign of life soon, I see them making the sort of knee jerk trade that (along with that haul they gave up for Olsen) will set them back for years to come. Looking forward to it.
Never count out Braves. As a Met fan, that team is my biggest worry.
NYM just released Cano from owing him over $40M, but you’re holding your breath for AA to have a knee-jerk reaction and undo his future building. Keep holding your breath, MF22.
@Run – I’ve been accused of being 10+ accounts. Now “MF22”. It’s pretty sad that you let someone live rent free in your head so much that you’re seeing ghosts every time someone posts something incompatible with your own views. Believe what you want though. After all, that’s what desperate people do when they have no real points to debate.
basically the go to here if you don’t like someone is to accuse them of being MF22.
The commenting style is almost identical between books and MF. Also MF has disappeared about the same time books handle started.
Wasn’t there a MadBum account in between lol
Sorry to disappoint you, but you’re mistaken. Nice to know I’m living in your head though.
@soco. You must mean the Bumgarner equals NLCS account which I’m fairly sure is one of Duvall fans burners.
Check!
I was hoping for affirmation. MF22 never took me up on me buying them a beer at Citi to watch them raise the 2021 flag celebrating Missed WAR. I miss their unabashed delusion.
I don’t even know what that means.
At least they’re not living in your’s. That’d be a tough row to hoe.
sorotka is due back by June. I wish the braves had offered Kershaw or Greinke a contract. KC is going nowhere, July trade? They’ll be one of the oldest starting pitchers staff, with Grienke and Morton..
Freddie Freeman was much more than his stats, he was the clubhouse leader, the field leader, can’t be replaced by a similar stat guy. Matt Olsen is great, but he’s not Freddie. All the analytics in the world cannot read leadership skills and trading for a bucket of Soler’s, Pederson’s, Rosario’s and Duvall’s won’t work like it did last year. Reinforcements without a leader is just a bunch players, not a team.
What does a player clubhouse leader do differently from the manager and all the bench coaches?
Relevant
yeah, you guys are right, Munson meant nothing to the 70’s yankees, Jeter meant nothing to the 90’s-2000’s Yankees, leadership on field and in the clubhouse is meaningless. Managers handle that……….and yes, totally Freeman’s fualt he left, greedy greedy, nothing to do with AA or that he was worth the money the Braves didnt want to give him. Guess Dansby is next, out the door this winter when it’s decided he is greedy for going for the best contract.,,,
Last season it took the Braves until August to get above .500, so yes if they don’t turn it around soon they’re doomed. They’ve got Rosario & Kirby Yates coming back sometime in July/ August and maybe Mike Soroka too.
Freeman didn’t want to be a Braves or would have been a Braves. He was chasing money.
Duvall if you look is still towards the Braves leaders in runs batted in. So he is not doing as horrible of a job as his batting average shows.
If you watched the Braves last two series a couple timely hits; not giving up a run on a wild pitch and Atlanta could have easily gone 6-1 on the trip.
Atlanta will be in the play off hunt this year and because to them moving from Freeman there will be more future monies to re-sign or sign other players. I think this team will be just fine
Stop the Freddy didn’t want to be here nonsense. Just because he went somewhere else does not mean he didn’t want to be here.
@John Smoke
Meisterstück Glacier Classique Fountain Pen (F) White USD $730
Well blame Freddies agent and quit harping on it like the Braves were the ones at fault.
Under Freeman’s leadership last year, the Braves’ record at this point in the season was almost identical to their record this year without him. Apparently you CAN replace that kind of leadership with a similar stats guy.
It’s fair to say the Braves have underachieved this far; however, it’s not realistic to assume the Braves can replicate what they did last season. That’s a once in a generation run they want on, kudos to them. Won’t happen again this year or next.
At this point last season no one thought it was happening for them either. My advice: This is baseball. I’ve been watching it for more than half-a-century. Saying “it won’t happen” in May is a sure-fire way to find yourself embarrassed in October. It would be foolish to assume the Braves will reclaim the title, but it’s equally foolish to assume they won’t. Say “it’s unlikely” or “it would be challenging” or “it would be surprising”, but never say “it WON’T happen.” Baseball karma is real. Beware! Beware!
So once in a generation that the Nats out did them on their way to a World Series title. Off the top of my head, since 2000, every team in the division not named the Mets has won at least one World Series.
A lot of other variables factor in, but you’re generally right that no player is un-replaceable.
Who ends up with Thornburg?
Hopefully no one. I saw him pitch while a member of the Red Sox. He was AWFUL!!! Afraid to throw a strike. Obviously no confidence with his ability to get outs.
Caveat Emptor!
We were down Acuna for a few weeks. Rosario out, Morton had rough start. Bullpen issues can usually be fixed.
Freddie’s leadership obviously didn’t work for Acuna, so not sure that’s the x factor.
Maybe the East is tougher?? Mets & Marlins are definitely a lil better.
I think the bullpen is being miss used. One run down in the late innings and we put in mop up pitcher
Braves because of the lock out are in a position where they have 17 straight games without a off day so you can’t destroy the bullpen and use your big arms every day.
We don’t want to be in September and October with overworked pitchers with too many early of year innings.
I suspect with all the games and limited off days this year that mlb is trading pitcher injuries for revenue instead of cancelling the the first two weeks of games lost
B/c you can’t uses your best guys everyday. It’s not a coincidence that Matzek is on the injured list and pitched in almost every single playoff game.
This move was unnecessary. They have been bouncing Lee back and forth (like Jacob Webb) – Lee will likely be the next guy DFA’d/traded.
What this team needs is to overhaul their lineup. There is no hope in Duvall, Ozuna, Albies, and whatever they decide to play in RF (not named Acuna).
When am I getting called up?
@drew. No room on the roster unless they dfa Demeritte which is doubtful. It does appear Waters may finally be near ready though.
When you stop striking out 3x per game like everyone else in the Braves lineup
Saving the bullpen for September and October is probably the reason they can’t play 500 beginning of the year. I think we can do a better job of both.
Red sox comeback
June will decide what is happening in the tough NL East. The Braves are going to have to pick it up and start scoring with men on, and start hitting behind each other. Giving Contreras a go in the line-up is a good move for now if he can sustain the way he has been swinging the bat, but that’s doubtful. Duvall, Riley, Albies, Olson all need to pick it up. Moving Olson down the line-up is a good move. But if the Braves go .500 in June they can’t catch the Mets, end of story. The Mets are playing and hitting really well, whereas the Braves are not putting scores up.