ESPN reports:
The Atlanta Braves put third baseman Chipper Jones on the 15-day disabled list Thursday night so their insurance company will pay a portion of his $13.6 million salary.
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General manager John Schuerholz insisted the 1999 NL MVP could return early next week.
“He will not be out for the rest of the year,” Schuerholz said. “He’ll be eligible to return on Tuesday. If his side heals, we’ll be ready to go.”
I don’t know the details of the Braves’ policy on Chipper, but seems to me that if he’s not that seriously hurt and the Braves are admitting to DL-ing him just to collect insurance, the carrier may have grounds to refuse to pay.
I’d bet the scenario is legit. If he’s hurt enough not to play for well over a week then he’s hurt enough to go on the DL (again, it’s been a recurring injury for quite a while).
He’s definitely hurt. I don’t know if the Braves would’ve won the wild-card if he’d played but they’ve definitely had a huge dropoff in their lineup when he’s been out with the side injuries (which has been a lot) this year and the Braves have had to replace their .318 hitting 3B w/23 homers in 387 ab’s with folks like Pete Orr and Manny Aybar after Bettemit filled in admirably. One of the reasons they took out an insurance policy is for what’s going on right now. He hasn’t had a defninitive injury like a broken bone or a ligament sprain, but it’s been the ribcage strain that no one knows when or how it’ll get better.
Where does the article have the Braves admitting that the move was for insurance purposes? That’s something the reporter wrote. We have no idea whether the Braves told him that or if the reporter was just surmising it. I assume that the reporter surmised it, which really is nothing that the insurance company couldn’t do for itself.
Actually, I had the same thought, which is what set off the alarm bells about whether this would work. I’d be surprised if they have a policy that covers the 14-day DL or that allows them to openly admit they are DLing him to collect insurance.
Chipper has played 101 games so far. I would guess that perhaps missing a third of the season is a threshold for collecting insurance. I’m pretty sure teams don’t normally collect for just a regular DL stint.
There’s no reason to put a player on the 15-day DL when you have expanded rosters in September other than to collect insurance. If they wanted a replacement, they could just call one up now.
I can see using the 60-day DL to create space on the 40 man roster, but that’s not what the Braves are doing.