The Braves announced that they have claimed infielder/outfielder Nick Solak off waivers from the White Sox and optioned him to Triple-A. The latter club had designated him for assignment on the weekend. Atlanta had an open roster spot due to losing left-hander Richard Lovelady off waivers to the Athletics last week.
Solak, 28, has spent the past four seasons in the Rangers organization. Once regarded as a polished bat with a questionable defensive outlook, the former second-round pick hit .293/.393/.491 in 135 plate appearances as a rookie in 2019 but hasn’t found much success at the plate since.
Dating back to 2020, Solak is a .246/.317/.354 hitter in 839 trips to the plate. He’s spent the bulk of his time in the Majors at second base but also has experience in left field (324 innings), in center field (108 innings) and at third base (97 innings). Defensive metrics have panned his glovework at all four spots, however.
Solak may not have much big league success, but he has a sharp .289/.369/.503 batting line in parts of four Triple-A seasons, has played multiple infield and outfield positions, and has a minor league option remaining. That’s caused him to bounce around the league this year, as several clubs have picked him up since his original DFA with the Rangers in hopes of being able to pass him through waivers themselves, thus retaining Solak as a non-roster depth option in Triple-A.
Texas initially traded Solak to Cincinnati in exchange for cash back in November. When the Reds designated him for assignment in late March, the Mariners sent cash to the Reds to acquire Solak. Current outright waiver priority is still dependent on last year’s regular-season standings and, contrary to popular belief, is not league-specific. (That only applied to now-defunct August trade waivers.) As such, Solak falling to Atlanta means that the vast majority of the league passed on him, with only the Astros and Dodgers having lower priority than the Braves at present. Atlanta could well try to pass Solak through waivers in the coming days, but for now he’ll head to Gwinnett and hope to play his way into an opportunity on the big league roster.
Solak is too talented to not be rostered, but not talented enough to play.
I kind of feel bad for these kind of guys.
Absolutely nothing to do with talent. Baseball is skill based. Solak needs to improve his game if he wants more time in the majors.
And what is your job?
You’re a tough guy when it comes to telling Solak that he needs to work to get better, so what is it exactly that you do?
Many players don’t have enough physical strength or athleticism to succeed in the majors no matter how much they work on their skills
Take Travis Jankowski for example. He had all the physical tools and athletic gifts and had perfected the art of hitting to a great degree, but just wasn’t fancy and pretty looking enough for major league front offices, and he didn’t have power
You’re a real tough guy telling solak he isn’t talented enough. Go to your hole bud.
You think bartolo colon was a successful major league player because of his athletic ability or strength? What about nick punto?
His career performance to this point shows he needs more work to get better. There was nothing “tough guy” about what he said. It’s simply the truth. You seem to be perpetually offended.
Yes, Bartolo Colon was successful because of his athletic ability and strength
It isn’t all how hard you work. You need the physical ability too
Dtd, and what is your job? You talk hard when you tell someone else they need to work harder, but what is it you do exactly?
Do you even have a job? These guys work their asses off as it is, so you better be doing the same in your life if you’re gonna tell somebody they need to put more work in
Obviously common sense. Not everyone has the ridiculous talent guys like trout, ohtani, Nootbaar, Degrom have. It’s a mixture of skill and talent that takes to get to the top. But you can become a very good player in the majors without having ridiculous tools. Again, hard work. Plenty of players just like solak that have had really good careers, same for jankowski.
Bartolo could eat with the best of them,
I don’t know how his colon survived…
Half of it survived but he’s properly punctuated now with a semi colon.
Let’s hope he doesn’t have a perio…..oh wait, that may be inappropriate. Shame on me
Oh go ahead Curls, men sees that as bloody funny!
Did you seriously just put Lars Nootbaar in the same group as Trout Ohtani, and deGrom?
Yes, his tools are off the charts. He’s one of the best athletes in baseball.
Ok bud. Make sure you don’t drive tonight.
I have no choice man I have to drop your wife off somewhere.
Try a cliff. Save me some alimony.
Useful against lefties.
Lewin Diaz 2.0
White Sox Legend.
One of the few Frederic “Rick” Hahn acquisitions that didn’t regress.
I hope that Solak isn’t driving his own car from city to city. Although Charlotte to Gwinnett isn’t a bad drive.
I mean he can’t be worse than Ozuna lol! So it’s an upgrade!
Ozuna can’t not only hit his weight but he can’t even hit his IQ!
I think you hit your own IQ writing that sentence.
“Not only can’t Ozuna hit his weight, he can’t hit his IQ either”
Average person IQ is 100 – Ozuna is hitting .091
I don’t get your point.
I heard Gwinnett’s offense has been a bit constipated of late.
A dose o’ Solak is just what the doctor ordered!
They’ll get the runs now!
If that’s the case, trade him to the Mets & send him to Flushing, New York.
Nyuck nyuck nyuck
Keepem’ coming DC, we’re behind you (well, not too close behind)
It well may be the greatest trade in the anals of Baseball history.
If it is, that trade really stinks…
Seems like there’s been alota activity on waiver wires lately, more than usual n same names keep getn bounced from team2 team getn claimed n shortly there after DFA’d again, passed back n forth like joint@ reggae concert
With 13 man pitching staffs, the hitting side of the 40 man gets crunched. When most pitching staffs were 10-11 men, it was still a 40-man. In the last CBA they really should have gone to a 42-man setup, with 21 position players and 21 pitchers.
I’m actually for this pickup. Interested to see what happens .
Yeah can’t be worse than Eli white offensively (although his defense is great.) It would be nice if an Ozuna dfa came sometime in the near future. I would be thrilled!
.249/306/509 over 2 years, in this modern baseball world, that is better than 55% of the players at the major league level. Down play him why don’t we
I couldn’t agree more. We pan guys like Solak because he can only muster a .246 BA over two years, yet we tolerate (or just flat out ignore) MANY rostered/contracted players who flirt with .100 (Kike Hernandez) with the assumption they’ll bring up the average eventually. This is just the latest example of a long line of contradictions.
Why can’t MLBTR writers learn how to use commas with the word “and?”
“Current outright waiver priority is still dependent on last year’s regular-season standings and, contrary to popular belief, is not league-specific.”
This is straight-up wrong. There is not one, but TWO correct ways to write this:
“Current outright waiver priority is still dependent on last year’s regular-season standings and contrary to popular belief, is not league-specific.”
Or…
“Current outright waiver priority is still dependent on last year’s regular-season standings, and contrary to popular belief, is not league-specific.”
The comma should never be after “and.” Steve needs to figure it out or MLBTR needs to hire an actual editor.