I suppose the big news is that the Braves seem to have settled on a center fielder, but the related trade is interesting in its own right …

KISSIMMEE, Fla. -- Atlanta traded Josh Anderson to the Detroit Tigers on Monday, increasing the chances that rookie Jordan Schafer will open the season as the Braves' center fielder. Schafer, who is hitting .373 this spring, appears to have the edge over Gregor Blanco, who was away from the team most of spring training while playing for Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic. "The center-field job is still open," Atlanta general manager Frank Wren said. "It will be hard to keep two. We knew we couldn't keep all three." In exchange for Anderson, who was out of options, the Braves received minor league pitcher Rudy Darrow. The side-arming reliever will be assigned to Double-A Mississippi. The 25-year-old right-hander split time between Class A West Michigan and Double-A Erie last season, going 5-3 with 10 saves and a 2.02 ERA. "He's a prospect, absolutely," Wren said. "We feel good about getting an arm like that."

They should. Darrow throws low-90s sinkers, and in 104 professional innings he's given up exactly one home run. According to this press release, last season Darrow's ground ball-to-fly ball ratio was 4.8; by way of comparison, Brandon Webb led the majors last season with a 3.2 ratio. Darrow's 25 and hasn't yet pitched in Triple-A, but it's hard to not like a guy who throws that hard and keeps the ball down that much. According to Baseball America's Prospect Handbook, "Darrow could arrive in the majors as a middle reliever sometime this year," and that sounds right to me. As for Anderson, the question of the day -- asked here and here and probably a few dozen other places -- is, "Why would the Tigers want another fourth/fifth outfielder?" They already had Marcus Thames, Clete Thomas, Jeff Larish, Ryan Raburn, and Brent Clevlen. None of those guys are any great shakes, but then neither is Josh Anderson. On the other hand, Anderson does bring some particular skills to the table. He's real fast; last year he stole 52 bases -- 42 in the minors, 10 in the majors -- and was nabbed only eight times. Statistically speaking, the jury's still out on his defense, but considering his speed there's a pretty good chance that he's significantly better than Magglio Ordonez and Carlos Guillen in the corners. In the short term, this trade may help the Tigers if Jim Leyland is aggressive about using Anderson in the right spots. In the term, I expect Darrow to be the more valuable player.