Welcome back to contention, Braves fans. With this territory comes the regular July business, that of pondering trade possibilities and roster additions. 2018’s biggest July fish promises to be Orioles star third baseman misplaced shortstop Manny Machado. The Braves have made an offer. What would be a fair offer to have made?

First, let’s start with an important stipulation. Machado, for purposes of this exercise, has to agree to play 3rd base, for several reasons:

1. Dansby Swanson is an excellent defensive shortstop. By UZR, his 3.4 runs above average is #1 in the NL this season. By Defensive Runs Saved, his 10 are tied for 2nd.
2. Manny Machado is on pace for the worst defensive season by a SS in the advanced metrics age. His -20 DRS and -7.8 UZR aren’t merely the worst in baseball at the position, and worst by a lot. It’s already one of the worst ever, and we’re only at the break. He is only the 11th player this millennium to cross the -20 DRS threshold at shortstop. The record of -32, set by Michael Young in 2005, is well within reach. His defense this season has done more to hurt his team than Andrelton Simmons‘ defense has done to help. That’s astounding.
3. Manny Machado is actually an excellent defender at the hot corner. Despite what he thinks his position is, this is his position.
4. Johan Camargo is a solid defender at 3rd and mediocre at SS.
5. As hitters, Machado is a superstar, Camargo is a slightly above average hitter projected to hit like Dansby Swanson, and Dansby Swanson is a slightly below average hitter that is meeting his projections. Needless to say, Machado would be a major boon to the lineup.
6. So, if the team adds Machado, the most sense it makes is as a 3rd baseman. You put your stars in the best places possible and make everyone else work around them. Swanson, with more longterm upside and a better middle infield rapport with Ozzie Albies, stays at SS. Johan Camargo becomes Brian Snitker‘s most valuable chess piece, available to start at 3rd, SS, or even LF if the team wants Ronald Acuna to give Ender Inciarte an off-day. The goal here isn’t necessarily to see less of Johan Camargo, who isn’t a problematic player. The goal is to add serious talent in a way that lets the team deploy Camargo more effectively.

So, that’s why Machado is playing 3rd. If Machado doesn’t agree to man the hot corner, then this trade is off the table. Despite his protestations, I think he’d ultimately agree to play 3rd for a contender, but that’s just personal guesswork. The team would need to do its research in this event.

The Offer

The first step to figuring out what to offer is to figure out the price & value of the thing you’re acquiring. The monetary cost is somewhere around $7M or so, which is what remains on Machado’s 1 year, $16M deal. So, for this to be worth Atlanta’s while, we would need Machado to be worth at least $7M on the field. That shouldn’t be a problem. He’s projected for around 2.5 WAR over the remainder of the season. One frequent valuation standard is that teams pay around $8M for a win, but that’s more of an offseason, free agency standard. The Braves, because they have the luxury of getting a player they know will be placed onto a team that, over halfway through the year, is in contention, can and should pay more for each win, valuing each around $10M. Wins are substantially more valuable for the Braves, a team a half game out of first, than they would be for the Indians (leading by 7.5) or Mets (13.5 out). The final win count is going to be most important for teams that only make or miss the postseason by a hair, and the Braves certainly qualify. I estimate Manny Machado would have around $30M in value for the Braves. Subtracting the $7M the team would have to pay him, that gives him a surplus value of +$23M.

While Machado would certainly make the Braves better, it’s also necessary to point out that the team doesn’t outright need him. Machado would make both the starting lineup and bench better, but Camargo isn’t a bad third baseman to stick with. Atlanta could use its resources to shore up a mediocre (not bad) bullpen, or add a starting pitcher. This isn’t an advocacy of getting Machado over helping either of those other areas of need. This is simply trying to envision Atlanta’s approach to valuing Machado, not an attempt to paint him as a panacea.

So, what would be a fair offer for Machado?

Using the work of two sites, Fangraphs and The Point of Pittsburgh, the latter of which has been doing excellent work on prospect valuation for years, let’s have a look at OFR’s Andy Harris’ top Braves prospects. Using those numbers, I have placed some surplus values on Andy’s top 15 prospects that also are top-100 ranked by MLB.com and/or have a 45 FV from Fangraphs:

1. Mike Soroka – $33.95M
2. Kyle Wright – $33.95M
3. Austin Riley – $28.8M
4. Cristian Pache – $29.1M
5. Touki Toussaint – $14.0M
6. Ian Anderson – $23.1M
7. Kolby Allard – $23.1M
8. Bryse Wilson – $13.0M
9. Joey Wentz – $14.0M
10. Drew Waters – $11.0M
11. Greyson Jenista – (untradeable due to draft recency)
12. William Contreras – $11.0M
13. Brett Cumberland – $11.0M
14. Patrick Weigel – did not meet threshold
15. Alex Jackson – $11.0M

After sitting with that list for a bit, I think Atlanta should offer Kolby Allard, and nothing else, for Manny Machado.

Would Baltimore accept? Probably not, but this isn’t about what Baltimore would accept. This is about Machado’s value to Atlanta, and Atlanta has a unique situation. Atlanta, in its offer, should sacrifice a smidge of quality in order to preserve quantity, and offering a near-ready starter like Allard would do that (and give Baltimore an almost immediately useful prospect). Like we pointed out earlier, this isn’t a situation where Atlanta is forced to go get Machado. They can set their own, fair price, and that price should be roughly that of the team’s #7 prospect.

Atlanta should be hesitant to agree to a bulk, 3-for-1 type trade, because Atlanta, due to the actions of John Coppolella, may be limited with its farm growth over the next few years. The system is indeed fully stocked, but the pipeline to that system has been cut off relative to how it was built. Atlanta can’t act like a normal team that built a top farm system, because replacing traded prospects will be harder for the Braves than most teams. Atlanta could, on the other hand, afford to deal a single helpful prospect and get a superstar in return. If you want to imagine what Atlanta’s farm would look like without Allard, let me help you – it’d still be really, really, really good.

So, that’s either the offer I hope GM Alex Anthopoulos made to the Orioles, or at least an approximation of it. If another team outbids the Braves for Machado, the team should feel pleased another squad overpaid for him. And if this trade happened, you could enjoy having another of baseball’s most exciting young players on the roster for a couple of months. And while, as baseball fans, you know there’s zero chance of Machado signing an extension immediately after the trade (which is why future value isn’t factored into the trade balance), there’s the off-chance that forming the league’s most fearsome infield matters a bit to him and he decides to take  harder look at Atlanta in the offseason. Better yet, the team would get to spend 2 months with a prospective free agent (if he’s even a prospective free agent, which may not be the case).

Machado would bring excitement and confidence to a team that has been embraced by Braves fans. For a team that has already grown its home audience by more than a thousand fans from 2017 to 2018, such a trade would serve as the defining moment the Braves walked out of the rebuild and onto the scary terrain of contention, which usually requires risks and traded commodities. But it’s also why we did this whole rebuild to begin with.