The Braves have traded shortstop Yunel Escobar and minor leaguer Jo-Jo Reyes to the Toronto Blue Jays for shortstop Alex Gonzalez, and prospects Tim Collins and Alex Pastornicky, reports David O'Brien of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Baseball America has their scouting reports on the players involved.
Collins is a 5'7" LHP with remarkable minor league numbers who gets overlooked because of his diminutive size. Exclusively a reliever, Collins has posted a career 2.40 ERA in 130 appearances spread over 4 seasons and 4 different levels, and an FIP that has never been higher than been higher than 2.62 at any level in which he has thrown more than 15 innings. While his astonishing strikeout numbers - 13.6 K/9 in his professional career - are the first thing you will notice about Collins, the most impressive has to be that he has actually been equally dominant against right-handed hitters as he is against lefties. Collins has struck out 36.8% of the left-handed batters he has faced in his career and 37.9% of the righties. His FIP against RHH is 2.25 while against LHH it is 2.75. Collins has been successful in Double-A this season and could make the jump to Triple-A if the Braves want to test him as a possible bullpen addition for the stretch run.
Pastornicky was a 5th round draft pick in 2008 and is an above-average defensive player who could develop into a good enough hitter to play every day. At the moment, Pastornicky is a line drive hitter who doesn't hit quite enough line drives to make up for his lack of power, although his LD rates have risen as he has progressed.
