Lee is another short term pick up along the lines of Alex Gonzalez.  Neither one is meant to be a long term prospect.  Neither one is meant to be a team building block.  The Braves have depth.  They have a farm system second to none.  They aren’t picking these guys up to carry them into the next 5 years or even the next 1 year.  These pickups are all about the short term, the right now, the next week.

DLee has always been a favorite player of mine.  He works hard.  He does his job well.  He’s a team player.  He’s a professional.  This is just what the Braves need.  Sure his production has dropped a bit, but not all that much considering he is almost 35  But  he can still hit the ball and he plays a great first base.  

Here are DLee’s stats from this year so far:  109 Games, 63 Runs, 105 Hits, 21 Doubles, 16 Homers, 56 RBI’s,  52 Walks, 101 Strikeouts,  .251 Batting Average, .335 On Base Percentage, and only 16 Grounding Into Double Plays.  These are not bad stats at all.  Especially for a guy who you are bringing in to get on base, generate base runners, generate runs.  He has made only 6 errors at first base in 105 games this year.

His stats are very similar to Troy Glaus’, in fact there are only the tiniest difference in most of the numbers except batting average.  DLee is .251 and Glaus is .239, even still not that big of a difference.  But Glaus’ contributions are unpredictable.  The other night I saw him whiff on a 92 mph fastball and whiff badly.  Glaus is now on the DL for the Braves.

While most people think that DLee was brought in so Glaus could move to 3rd base and that that would somehow help his hitting, I don’t see that at all.  Moving Glaus around isn’t going to help his bat.  The Braves have been platooning 3rd for the better part of this year due to Chipper’s injury battles.  And the players who have come in have been great.  They can play the position AND they can hit.  In all honesty, with DLee coming in I can’t see much need for Glaus at all except on an every now and then basis.  

What this move gives the Brave is options.  Options to make the very most of the talent they have in this run to the World Series.  It gives them options of playing guys here and there and moving things around to get the very best producing lineup they can field on an every night basis.  This is what it takes to get to the World Series and win and the Braves are all about that goal and all about the short term.  DLee just helps that goal along.