Braves News: Alex Anthopoulos discusses Joe Jimenez acquisition, Dansby Swanson’s market, and more

Dec 9, 2022 - 11:00 AM

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Atlanta Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos caught up with the media to discuss the Wednesday evening acquisition of reliever Joe Jiminez. Joe Jiminez was acquired from the Detroit Tigers in exchange for Justyn-Henry Malloy and Jake Higginbotham.

“We’ve been trying to acquire him for quite some time,” Alex Anthopoulos said following the Winter Meetings. “We pursued him pretty strongly at the trade deadline last year, but we obviously couldn’t get a deal done. But he’s someone that we’ve had an eye on that we’ve been trying to acquire for quite some time.”

Jiminez suited up for the Tigers 62 times in 2022. He tossed 56.2 innings with an impressive 77/13 SO/BB ratio. He owns a career record of 19-19 and has provided some valuable bullpen depth.

“We view him as a late inning guy. Fastball, 96-98, very good slider,” Anthopoulos added. “The makeup is outstanding and we did a lot of work on him there and he’ll be a very good fit I think. Adding a guy like Jiminez really completes it [the bullpen] for us.”

“We knew that if we could, we wanted to add to the bullpen a power right hander. Again, it wasn’t just going to be doing it for the sake of doing it. It had to be the right guy. So this was the guy we were trying to get and it just took time to finally get there. But again, it’s nice to get this done.”

The 27-year-old righty will add some much needed power to the bullpen and bridge the gap as former Braves closer Kenley Jansen just agreed to a two-year deal with the Boston Red Sox. In response to Jansen’s deal, Raisel Iglesias will likely take over the role of closer, leaving Jimenez to tackle the later innings.

More Braves News:

Starting Nine takes a look at Dansby Swanson’s market after Trea Turner and Xander Bogaerts have each reached deals.

The season in review series continues with Jackson Stephens and JR Ritchie.

MLB News:

The Los Angeles Dodgers signed former Chicago Cubs outfielder Jason Heyward to a minor league deal. The club invited Heyward to Major League Spring Training.

Tampa Bay Rays reliever JP Feyereisen underwent a successful shoulder surgery. He is expected to resume throwing in four months.

The Cincinnati Reds signed RHP Silvino Bracho to a minor league deal. The 30-year-old was recently non-tendered by the Braves after just three big league appearances in 2022.

The New York Mets made some more big moves as they signed CF Brandon Nimmo and RHP David Robertson. Nimmo was signed to an eight-year, $162M deal. Robertson will make $10M in a one-year deal.

Reliever Chris Martin was earlier signed by the Boston Red Sox, with no clear breakdown of his salary. In 2023, Martin will make $6M, followed by $7.5M in 2024. There will also be a $4M signing bonus.