Talking Chop

The Atlanta Braves third baseman Chipper Jones talked with The Sporting News about several hot-button off-season topics.

Chipper on the Mets and Phillies:

We won for 14 consecutive years, and you never, ever saw any bulletin board material. And now that these two teams are on top of the division, they can't keep their mouths shut. Just go play baseball. It's Cole Hamels now. It was Jimmy Rollins and Carlos Beltran the past couple of springs. These two teams are constantly going at each other verbally. You know, win with class, lose with class. Just keep your mouth shut and go play your game.

Chipper on the Braves failuire to acquire Jake Peavy:

If Jake wanted to play in Atlanta, Jake would be in Atlanta. Jake is in control of this whole thing. There was a deal in place, and Jake didn't want to play here. So Jake's not playing here. [...]

Certainly, a month ago when Padres G.M. Kevin Towers was fielding offers from four, five, six teams, the best offer on the table was ours. [...]

I don't know why we were on his wish list, but that's baseball. That's one of the rights that he has with his no-trade clause. I would be hard-pressed to think San Diego is ever going to give out another no-trade clause. This is a prime example why the Atlanta Braves have a strict no-trade-clause policy. They're not going to give any player who comes through here a no-trade clause. I don't care if it's Hank Aaron. I don't care if it's Mickey Mantle.

You've got to wonder how accurate his statements about a "deal in place" and Peavy being the one to turn it down are, but if they're anywhere close to accurate, that's a very interesting development to basically see a player controlling negotiations so closely.

And finally, he has some interesting words about the Braves and money:

Ten or 15 years ago, we could lure people to Atlanta strictly on reputation. You knew we were going to win, and we had a bunch of good players. Players would shun money from New York and take less to come here. For the past three seasons, we've kind of been on the downslide and not making the playoffs, so you can't do that anymore. We can't compete monetarily, so the only way we're going to get players in here to play and win is to force them--and that's done by trading.

The downside to trading is that it weakens your minor league system. But the only way that we are going to win now is through trades. We just don't have enough money to compete with the New York, Los Angeles and Chicago teams.

Always good stuff from Chipper, and he seemed to be in one of his really candid moods when answering those questions. I would have liked to have seen them ask him a question about his impending free agency next year.