Late yesterday the Atlanta Braves sent Ronald Acuna to the minors. This despite the fact that he destroyed three levels of minor league pitching last year, despite the fact he was arguably the most dominant player in all of big league spring training year and despite the fact that he is quite clearly the best player the Braves have under contract to fill the left field position to start the season.
As Bill noted last night this was, transparently, a service time manipulation situation. By keeping Acuna down a couple of weeks the Braves can delay his free agency by a whole year.