Update - The Braves actually acquired Matt Joyce from the San Francisco Giants in exchange for cash considerations. Joyce is currently on a minor league deal and is reportedly willing to open the season in Gwinnett if need be.

The Atlanta #Braves today acquired outfielder Matt Joyce from the San Francisco Giants in exchange for cash considerations, and extended him an invitation to major league spring training. — Atlanta Braves (@Braves) March 23, 2019

The Braves announced they acquired Matt Joyce from the Giants for cash. Joyce is on a Minor League deal and he's willing to start the season with Gwinnett. But as he preps to join his third team this spring, he's a cheaper gamble than Duvall. — Mark Bowman (@mlbbowman) March 23, 2019

Over the past few offseasons (but before this one), I really wanted the Braves to sign Matt Joyce. He had a hilariously dreadful 2015 with the Angels and represented an obvious bounceback candidate that offseason — the Pirates snatched him up, and he rewarded them with a 136 wRC+ and 1.9 fWAR in just 293 PAs. He parlayed that into a full-time role with the Athletics in 2017 and a two-year deal with $11 million, putting up a 116 wRC+ and 2.7 fWAR in 544 trips to the plate. But, in the second year of said deal, he didn’t fare nearly as well: an 89 wRC+ and just 0.2 fWAR in 246 PAs.

So, it’s bounceback time for the 34-year-old Joyce again. Will he do it? Or is this his decline phase, now proceeding in uninterrupted fashion? Looks like the Braves might be finding out:

Confirmed @extrabaggs' report that OF Matt Joyce will be joining the Braves. Joyce, who was just released by the Giants, will sign a Minor League deal with Atlanta — Mark Bowman (@mlbbowman) March 23, 2019

This is actually Joyce’s third team this week: Joyce was released by the Indians, with whom he signed a minor league deal, on March 19. He was scooped up by the Giants on March 20, only to be released from their team earlier today, at which point the Braves got their talons into him. Joyce wasn’t really having a banner Spring Training (.185/.267/.185 with the Indians; .250/.333/.250 with the Giants), but the Braves probably aren’t worried about that too much.

On the plus side, Joyce has struck the ball at an above-average rate in each of the past three years. Even his 89 wRC+ from last year was the result of underperforming a perfectly solid .328 xwOBA by a substantial amount (.299 wOBA). He also underperformed his xwOBA, albeit to a lesser extent, during his highly solid 2017.

On the minus side, he represents kind of a strange option for a team with Nick Markakis already in the fold and presumably getting the lion’s share of the playing time in an outfield corner. Joyce has a dramatic career platoon split (61 wRC+ against lefties, 121 against righties), meaning that he’s basically a full-platoon bat who plays okay-but-that’s-pretty-bad-since-it’s-in-an-outfield-corner defense. This, makes him more like an exaggerated Nick Markakis coming off a worse season, rather than someone to be paired with Nick Markakis. (Over the last three seasons, Joyce has -3 OAA/-3 CPA; Markakis has -6 OAA / -2 CPA, and neither UZR nor DRS really see much of a difference between them defensively.)

But, he’s here now, so that’s a thing. It may be a couple years too late, but it is what it is. What’s not clear is what message this sends regarding the status of Adam Duvall: while Joyce does seem like an upgrade over Duvall in some respects (though not necessarily defensively), he’s more redundant from a handedness perspective.

In terms of a brief projections outlook, Steamer sees Joyce as interchangeable with Markakis, and really dislikes the prognosis for Duvall. ZiPS, meanwhile, sees Joyce as replacement level while having Duvall only somewhat worse than Markakis. So, it’s kind of a pick-your-projected-below-average-outfielder situation going forward. Cutting Duvall at this point would indeed save the Braves money, but would essentially yoink any chance of reaping platoon advantage with Nick Markakis’ spot away from the team (unless they find a different replacement); while the Braves could definitely play Johan Camargo in the outfield against southpaws, one wonders whether it makes sense to have him replace Dansby Swanson on those occasions instead. In any case, this is all stuff to sort out as the season gets going.

Stay tuned to see how this affects the Opening Day roster, if at all.