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JimK's avatar

So how much cash all told did the Braves invest (lose) in Kelenic? The particulars of bad contracts assumed and paid off go unmentioned in reports of Kelenic's release focused on his wretched statistics and unsympathetic personality. Good risk management requires accountable hindsight.

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Lindsay Crosby's avatar

I broke this down for a premium subscriber in an email about a month ago. Here's the copy/paste:

Short answer: Roughly $16M

Long answer:

December 3: The Braves acquire Kelenic, Marco Gonzales ($12.5M), Evan White ($8M), and cash ($2.25M for two years).

December 5: The Braves send Gonzalez and cash ($9.25M) to the Pirates.

December 8: The Braves trade White ($8M) and Tyler Thomas (MiLB) to the Angels for David Fletcher ($14M over two seasons: $6M, $6.5M, $1.5M buyout) and Max Stassi ($7M).

December 9: The Braves send Stassi and cash ($6.26M) to the White Sox.

Final numbers on Atlanta's books:

Marco Gonzalez: 3.25M

Evan White: -4.5M (they traded the entire contract to LA without sending cash, but kept what Seattle gave them, from what I can find. They couldn't use that as a CBT deduction, but it ended up being cash-flow positive)

Max Stassi: $740k

Fletcher: $14M (two seasons of salary plus expected buyout)

Kelenic himself: $3.06M salary across two years

Total = ~$15.81M, give or take some small stuff like a trade assignment bonus, the actual cash considerations amounts (which are limited to no more than $100k but can and frequently are as low as $1), etc.

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