The arms race between the Los Angeles Dodgers and Atlanta Braves continued on Saturday as Atlanta dealt promising shortstop Vaughn Grissom to Boston in exchange for LHP Chris Sale.
In order to accommodate the deal, Sale was required to waive his no trade clause, which he did on Saturday in an attempt to capture his 2nd World Series ring. Also heading to Atlanta are cash considerations to help offset the lefty’s $27.5M contract.
The 6’6″ lefty has battled a myriad of injuries in recent years, limiting him to just 31 total games since the end of the 2019 campaign. When healthy, he’s been amongst the most dominating pitchers of his era, recording a career record of 120-80, 3.10 ERA, 1.04 WHIP, and 2189 K’s across 1780.2 IP.
A 7x All-Star, Sale is entering his final guaranteed year of his contract. The 34 year old has a club option for 2025 (his age 36 season) before becoming an unrestricted free agent in 2026. Depending on how this season goes with Atlanta, and Sale’s health, will largely dictate the Braves appetite to pick up the final year of his deal.
Sale joins a rotation that will feature Spencer Strider, Max Fried, and Charlie Morton, and provides veteran experience to a roster with World Series aspirations in 2024.
Heading back the other way is 22 year old shortstop Vaughn Grissom as he becomes the 9th trade of the offseason for President of Baseball Operations Alex Anthopoulos. Uber talented, Grissom has hit .287 with 5HRs, 27 RBIs, 29 runs, and 5 SB across 216 Major League at bats.
However, with Orlando Arcia and Nicky Lopez already splitting reps at shortstop, Ozzie Albies under contract through 2027 at 2B, and an earlier trade to acquire outfielder Jarred Kelenic, Atlanta had no clear path to get Grissom regular at bats. As such, the 6’2″ infielder ultimately became expendable.
Boston will be happy to acquire a young, impact bat under pre-arbitration team control through 2026. It will also go a long way to filling their glaring hole at 2nd base. An area that became a point of contention amongst the Fenway Faithful throughout 2023.
That being said, the Sox are far from a polished product at this point, featuring question marks at multiple defensive positions, and lacking impact bats outside of Rafael Devers in their lineup. Dealing Sale for a highly touted prospect, with proven Triple-A and MLB experience, and team control helps them in the short term and the future. However it also thins out an already precarious starting pitching staff.
As reported earlier today, Boston signed RHP Lucas Giolito to a 2 year deal with an opt out after year 1. However beyond the former White Sox hurler, Boston doesn’t feature much in terms of proven front of the rotation arms.
With Craig Breslow now seeming to pivot after missing out on Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto, it will be interesting to see what Boston’s top priorities will be as free agency continues.
-Kyle Skinner
Twitter: @JKyleSkinner
Photo: Keith Allison. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.