Thumbs up or down for Boras ?

The baseball trading deadline has passed and players have moved to their new teams.  It is now time to look at the players who will be hitting free agency. Most notable of the bunch is Andrew Jones. With the recent trade of Mark Teixeira, it all but closes the door on Jones returning to the Braves. It doesn’t help that Jones is having one of his worst seasons of his career, and Texeria is a young power batter who will sign a big money contract. There is talk that Boras will ask for 20-30 mil per season.

An interesting situation I would like to point out is that both of these all-stars are clients of Scott Boras, and both of these players will demand big money. I believe Boras is in somewhat of an odd position because one client (Teixeira) will be the Braves new star player and will likely get a contract extension somewhere in the 100 million range, while Jones may be shown the door. The Braves are one of the teams that have the money to spend big this summer, and this trade essentially eliminates one of Boras’ bargaining chips.

I would like to know whether Boras helped broker this trade or if he tried to get Teixeira to another team. I know as an agent you can not control what teams do, but this trade certainly did not help Boras’ relationship with Andrew Jones. An agent never wants to put one of his clients in a disadvantaged situation, and the Jones camp is certainly in one. His lackluster season has probably cost him around 20 million dollars and his bargaining power just decreased with the Braves new acquisition.

I know this is not Scott Boras’ fault but it certainly is an interesting situation.

-Paul Schackman