Rotation central to Braves’ Winter Meetings

ATLANTA — The flurry of activity the Braves have generated over the Hot Stove season’s first month has shown they are ready to take the next step in their rebuilding process. They’ll enter 2017 with a team that should be much more competitive than the ones they have fielded over the past two seasons.

Motivated by the successful finish to their 2016 season and the desire to field a consistently competitive team during SunTrust Park’s inaugural year, Atlanta has already strengthened its bench with the addition of Sean Rodriguez and fortified its rotation with the signings of veterans R.A. Dickey and Bartolo Colon.

Now as the Braves prepare for next week’s Winter Meetings in suburban Washington, they are still aggressively evaluating ways to improve their current roster without comprising the collection of highly-regarded prospects they compiled during their massive rebuilding process.

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The Braves might be hesitant to move many of their prospects, but they haven’t removed themselves from the mix of teams willing to pay the steep price to trade for Chris Sale, Chris Archer or Sonny Gray.

Along with the possibility of adding a controllable front-line starter, Atlanta will spend a portion of this year’s Meetings looking for ways to upgrade at catcher or possibly strengthen a talented but inexperienced bullpen.

MLB.com and MLB Network will have wall-to-wall coverage of the 2016 Winter Meetings from the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center outside Washington, D.C. Fans can watch live streaming of all news conferences and manager availability on MLB.com, including the Rule 5 Draft on Dec. 8 at 9 a.m. ET.

Club needs

Starting pitching: With the additions of Dickey and Colon, the Braves now have the option to use Aaron Blair, Matt Wisler or Josh Collmenter as their fifth starter. Still, they haven’t ruled out the possibility of adding another starter, primarily because they have the prospects required to land an impact arm like Sale, Archer or Gray. The teams (White Sox, Rays and A’s) controlling these three starters don’t have a definite need to trade, but they could certainly benefit from the enhanced value these hurlers have amid a thin free-agent market for starting pitching.

Each of these three teams will be looking to get a Shelby Miller-like return (Atlanta received Ender Inciarte, Dansby Swanson and Blair from Arizona for the right-hander last December), so there’s …

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