Braves trade Cody Martin to Oakland A's

The Braves have traded RHP Cody Martin to the Oakland Athletics for the #53 international bonus pool slot. Before being sent back down to Gwinnett, Martin had a 5.40 ERA during a couple of stretches in the bullpen for the Braves. He started the season off well, but had struggled along with the rest of the bullpen in May and early June.

In the wake of signing Derian Cruz and Christian Pache (among others), it became apparent that if the Braves wanted to continued to be active in the international signing market in the coming years, they were going to have to acquire more international bonus pool money via trade.

The first of the moves the Braves will make to gain the $1M needed to add to their bonus pool to avoid penalty https://t.co/yrgZ3yqPhT

— Mark Bowman (@mlbbowman) July 2, 2015

This does not mean that Braves are out of the woods yet, though. They still have to acquire more bonus pool money in order to avoid restrictions on international signings in the future.

Still around $520,000 more international bonus money needed, and that's assuming they don't sign anyone else, which they probably will.

— gondeee (@gondeee) July 2, 2015

It had become apparent that Cody did not have much of a future with Atlanta in their rotation given all of the talent the Braves had stockpiled in the system. He looked promising in the bullpen to start the year off, but with his severe struggles for most of the year with the big club, the Braves probably saw him as very expendable and in need of a fresh start.  The Braves are probably thrilled to get any return for Martin, as when he was left unprotected in the Rule 5 draft...he went unpicked.

Cody Martin was available in the Rule 5 draft and went unpicked. Now he's landed international slot money, not bad.

— JJ Cooper (@jjcoop36) July 2, 2015