Whit Merrifield came through for the Braves during a rough stretch of injuries.
It is safe to say that the Atlanta Braves had some terrible luck with injuries this past season. Ozzie Albies was one of the players that suffered, missing extensive time and finishing the season with just 99 appearances. Austin Riley suffered a season-ending injury to his wrist in mid-August. So, in came Whit Merrifield, fresh off his release from the division rival Phillies, to try and mitigate some of the drop-off… which he actually did.
How acquired
On July 12, the Phillies released Whit Merrifield after he struggled to a slash line of .199/.277/.295 and -0.3 fWAR through 174 PAs across 53 games. He was on a one-year contract with a team option for 2025, so the Phillies basically accelerated their parting. The Braves apparently saw something beyond his name and took a chance, signing Merrifield to a major league deal ten days later. In so doing, they filled a hole with little cost. By picking him up for the pro-rated amount of league minimum, it was a low risk move. Merrifield was obviously struggling, but the Braves needed all the help they could get, even if that help came in the form of a guy coming off a horrible half-season who honestly hadn’t hit much since all the way back in 2020.
What were the expectations?
With the slash line that he produced up to the point he was signed by the Braves, the expectations for Whit Merrifield were not high. He was a low-risk pickup to fill the gap until Ozzie Albies could get healthy. Albies was projected to be out eight weeks, and so any help at second was appreciated. In the offseason, the Braves did not prioritize infield bench depth, so there was a gaping hole — one made arguably worse by the fact that the Braves seemed to shuffle their initial options (Luis Guillorme and David Fletcher) for a potentially worse one (Zack Short) after about a month of play.
Merrifield showed as recently as 2023 that he had the capability of being at least serviceable, with a 93 wRC+ and 1.3 fWAR, driven in part by his baserunning. That said, his 93 wRC+ that year was driven by a very large (nearly .030) xwOBA overperformance; Merrifield hadn’t posted an above-average xwOBA since 2020, and his defense seriously backslid in 2023 as well as his half-season with the Phillies to begin 2024.
Given all this, it was hard to pinpoint a useful expectation for Merrifield when the Braves picked him up: before the season, he was projected as a below-average regular or elite bench option (below-average bat, fine defense, good baserunning); he looked pretty cooked in Philadelphia, though, with another sub-.280 xwOBA and some pretty poor defense. Basically, it was going to be somewhere between a continued disaster and exactly what the Braves needed; fortunately for them, they mostly got the latter.
2024 Results
Here’s the thing: for whatever reason, Merrifield’s move to Atlanta righted his offensive ship, even if it happened in a bit too few PAs to take very seriously. With the Phillies, he managed a .259 wOBA (63 wRC+) on a .279 xwOBA. With the Braves, in more or less the same number of PAs, he managed a .310 wOBA (97 wRC+) on a .313 xwOBA. Thanks, buddy.
Merrifield’s defense also rebounded, though in such a small sample it’s hard to really draw any conclusions. Still, he posted -2 OAA-based runs at second base for the Phillies in just 102 innings, which is really bad. In nearly 400 innings for the Braves, he finished at +1.
The net result was that he gave the Braves 0.8 fWAR in 161 PAs, which is nearly a 3 fWAR-per-600 PAs rate. That’s actually better than the rate Ozzie Albies put up over the course of the entire season — while hardly a fair comparison given the PA disparity, Merrifield had better wOBA, xwOBA, baserunning metrics, and defensive metrics than Albies. That was nice for the Braves, but also not nice for the Braves, given that, well, they kinda need Albies to be better than he was in 2024.
What went right?
Most things went right — with Merrifield’s huge spike in OBP (from .277 to .348) driving the bus. Merrifield’s contact rates didn’t really change, and while his contact quality went up, it was still pretty sad. But, he simply swung way less as a Brave, which ballooned his walk rate. Combine that with somewhat more effective slapping at the ball, and there you go — from an abysmal performance in Philadelphia to a fine one in Atlanta.
Merrifield had a nice measure of revenge after hopping across the rivalry line, too. On August 20, his first game against the Phillies after they canned him, he hit a triple off Zack Wheeler and then scored the game’s first run, doubled off Wheeler in his next PA (but was stranded), and drew a walk in his next plate appearance. The Braves won the game, 3-1; Merrifield’s strikeout with the bases loaded to end the eighth ended up not mattering.
Weirdly enough, this was similar to a different leadoff triple he had earlier in the season — this one was a big part of a big comeback Braves win:
And then, there was his game on August 26, a 10-6 win over the Twins, where he went 5-for-5 with four singles and a double from the leadoff spot, including collecting three hits in the first three innings. It was a banner day for flicking the ball over the infield, though a few of his hits were hit hard as well. Given the type of hitter he is, you’d think this sort of thing would happen more often, but this was Merrifield’s first five-hit game since July 2018.
What went wrong?
Comically, Merrifield’s tenure with the Braves did not start well. Brought in to serve as an injury replacement, he… got injured in pre-game warmups before he ever played a game for the Braves. He didn’t start his first game for the Braves until nine days after signing with the team. It was another case where the Braves then played a man down, because they never put him on the Injured List despite the relatively lengthy absence.
Nor was that the last of Merrifield’s injury-related woes. He fractured his foot in early September, but again was not placed on the Injured List, and actually came back and played on said fractured foot for about a week after missing a week of time. It’s not clear whether that was actually a good idea, though the small sample makes it hard to conclude anything one way or another. Before said fractured foot, Merrifield had a .318 wOBA / .325 xwOBA with the Braves; when playing on the fractured foot, his performance dipped to .268 / .250.
Beyond that, the only thing that jumps out is that while the Braves were certainly more beggars than choosers given their injury woes, boy, Whit Merrifield’s offensive profile just didn’t blend in at all. While Merrifield hasn’t even shown an average-y ability to generate oomph for about half a decade now, and had one of the saddest contact quality profiles in baseball in 2023. His barrel rate was three percent with the Phillies and actually fell (to two percent) with the Braves.
After his big game on August 20 that helped the Braves top the Phillies… Merrifield gave it right back on August 21, which saw the Braves lose in one-run fashion. He actually reached base both of his first two times up against Aaron Nola, but then grounded out with the go-ahead run on second and two outs in the fourth, grounded out in the seventh, and as the coup de grace, with a chance to win the game in walkoff fashion if he could just bloop a ball over the infield again… made this pathetic bit of contact on an inner-third pitch to end the game instead:
Again, it seems kind of weird given that he’s had a sizable career, but he’s never had a worse WPA outcome in a single plate appearance than that out.
2025 Outlook
Whit Merrifield is currently a free agent and is able to sign with any team. Odds are that his second half with the Braves, and his name recognition will land him an MLB contract, although it would likely be a cheap one-year deal. If not, it is virtually guaranteed he will at least get one minor league offer.
He came through when the Braves really needed him, so here is to hoping he can find a home that is fitting for him and his family.
Overall, Merrifield finished at 0.4 fWAR in 335 PAs, with a sub-.300 xwOBA, when combining his Phillies and Braves tenure. He’s projected for 0.6 WAR in about a half-season’s worth of PAs by Steamer; ZiPS is a little more generous with around 1.0 WAR in about 400 PAs. His days of being a penciled-in starter are probably over, but he should provide some okay defensive and baserunning value for someone as a reliable bench guy. Just don’t expect him to do anything other than slap the ball.