LAS VEGAS — The story is all too common. People fly into Las Vegas, full of hope and energy, and all too ready to throw caution to the wind. They leave a little poorer, a little sicker and with a nagging question over what just happened.
Or, in the case of baseball’s winter meetings, what didn’t happen. This may be a bit of a head twister for the syllogists of the world, but there were a lot of things that didn’t happen at the winter meetings.
With that in mind, let’s take a tour of the manager interviews conducted in the media room at Mandalay Bay over three days earlier this week. In each instance, the manager was asked about some need his club still has when looking ahead at the 2019 season. Since few of those needs were addressed in Las Vegas, I will offer a friendly suggestion for each club.
NL EAST
Brian Snitker says: “I would like [free agents Evan Gattis and Matt Adams]. All that kind of stuff is going to be up to [GM] Alex [Anthopoulos] as he rounds out this team and things like that. I think the world of both of those guys.”
The move: Gattis and Adams are former Braves mashers and either or both would give Atlanta a much-needed bench component. Neither is really a National League player at this point, especially for a team with an everyday first baseman like Freddie Freeman. So perhaps a better focus for now would be to fill the opening of a corner outfielder, perhaps by bringing back free agent Nick Markakis.