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The Atlanta Braves steal Toussaint, continuing the New Braves Way

By Wayne Cavadi

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Apparently there was a crime committed in the baseball world last night. No, I am not referring to Jose Tabata stealing a perfect game from Max Scherzer. It seems that the trade happy Atlanta Braves may have committed grand larceny in acquiring yet another young arm as GM John Hart continues to restock the farm system.

The move has created quite the stir amongst pretty much every Minor League expert.

There is no doubt that the Atlanta Braves came out winners in this deal that they send infielder Phil Gosselin to Arizona in return for Bronson Arroyo’s contract and 19-year old Touki Toussaint. The Arizona Diamondbacks GM Dave Stewart may want to take a few lessons in how to rebuild from his partner in the “trade” last night. Getting a large contract off the books in a deal is not uncommon, nor unthinkable. Getting a return that is better than a backup middle infielder certainly is.

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The Atlanta Braves did much of the same this offseason. John Hart dumped a lot of Atlanta Braves fan favorites who either made too much money or were about to in the upcoming free agent market. He shipped off Justin Upton, Craig Kimbrel, Evan Gattis and Melvin Upton, but in return received some of the most promising arms in the game like Matt Wisler, Manny Banuelos, Max Fried and Mike Foltynewicz, not to mention key contributors like Jace Peterson.

Salary dumping is not unheard of by any means, but when you are a team in dire need of a new direction, it seems like the Diamondbacks should have, and could have asked for much more. Touki Toussaint, the former No. 4 prospect in the Diamondbacks system, is now one of the Braves best young pitching prospects in a system stacked with pitching.

Still just 19-years old, Toussaint was the 16th overall pick in last year’s MLB Draft. He has three plus pitches — a 65-graded fastball and curveball and a 55-graded changeup — but his command has always been and is still lacking. That is not uncommon with a pitcher so young, and the Braves did not acquire Toussaint to start tomorrow. He adds depth to an already deep pitching department.

The question is what the Atlanta Braves do with all of the pitching they have. They are young from the top of their rotation in the big leagues to the bottom of their Minor Leagues in Rome. This isn’t a new concept for the Atlanta Braves, as they always have had a bevy of the brightest pitching prospects. It’s how they will handle them that John Hart can change things.

The Braves have an arsenal of young arms starting with Julio Teheran, Alex Wood, Matt Wisler, and Williams Perez in Atlanta, Banuelos in Gwinnett, Tyrell Jenkins in Mississippi, Lucas Sims in Carolina, Max Fried on the recovery trail and now Toussaint. The past Atlanta Braves regime would deem several of those arms “untouchable”, but I don’t think that is the way of the new leadership.

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Not too long ago, teams were knocking down the doors of the Atlanta Braves when they had four of the higher rated pitching prospects in their system. But the price was too high, or they wouldn’t even listen to offers, for Teheran and names like Kris Medlen, Brandon Beachy and Mike Minor. We have seen how that turned out, as three of those names can’t even stay healthy enough to have a big league career.

John Hart now not only has an arsenal to restructure his future rotation, he also has an arsenal of trade bait. Not all of these pitchers can stick in Atlanta, and Hart should be open minded enough to listen to offers, or as he has done so well already, make some.

The Atlanta Braves, although not running away with their division, are certainly performing much better than most people expected. Hart seemingly doesn’t rest and is not content with the pieces in place. With the trade deadline looming, it will be both interesting and exciting to see how much more the Atlanta Braves transform.

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