Losing Spencer Strider last month was already lame enough. Now Ronald Acuña Jr. is gone for the rest of the season. The hits just keep on coming.
Well, this sucks! Again!
For the second time in as many months, the Atlanta Braves have lost a key member of their team for the remainder of the season. This time, it’s a bit of nasty déjà vu as Ronald Acuña Jr. has completely torn the ACL in his left knee this time. Just like Spencer Strider, we’re not going to see Acuña again until next season and there’s no guarantees that he’ll be fully right again until 2026. Needless to say, it’s an extremely frustrating development in what has already been a very unlucky season for the Braves as far as injury luck goes.
If we’re counting a game where Strider would be the starting pitcher, the Braves have now lost five of their starters to IL stints (and I’m counting Austin Riley’s injury in this since while he was never placed on the IL, he was out for longer than 10 days). This is in stark comparison to the “good ol’ days” of last season when one of the reasons why they were able to play as well as they did was because the injury bug stayed far away from the team. Here in 2024, the Braves have had no such luck in that regard and are clearly hoping that this is the worst of it instead of only being the start of it.
The only good news I have to share is that the Braves are still a virtual lock to make the Postseason. Heading into Memorial Day, FanGraphs is giving the Braves a 97 percent chance to make the Postseason and they still have pretty strong odds of winning the World Series as they’re being given an 11.6 percent chance of doing so — which is only behind the Yankees (14 percent) and the Dodgers (19 percent) when it comes to those odds. The Braves are still a team comically loaded with talent and they could afford to lose players of Strider and Acuña’s ability and still be right in the mix of things.
With that being said, the division is officially up for grabs at this point and if I’m being completely honest, I’d rate the Braves as underdogs to retain the divisional crown. The Phillies have gotten off to an incredible start and as long as the injury bug doesn’t start stalking them then they’re going to be in the fight to take the division all season long. Yeah, their schedule has been comically weak but hey, you can’t control who you play and those wins count just as much as if they had had to deal with the 1927 Yankees or the 2023 Japanese National Team. You still have to take care of business and so far, the Phillies are doing just that.
Still, the Braves under Brian Snitker are the type of team that relishes being in the underdog role — all you have to do is look at the red flag with ‘2021’ on it outside of center-right field at Truist Park as evidence of that. Additionally, they have a magician for a General Manager in Alex Anthopoulos so if anybody can find a way to make this team better while Strider and Acuña are down, he can. So if the Braves have to enter the Postseason as the Wild Card, so be it. If they have to make another incredible come back in order to pull off an upset and remain divisional champions, so be it. This group has dealt with plenty of adversity in their time together and this is just another challenge to add to the list.
With all of this being discussed, I do feel absolutely horrible for Ronald Acuña Jr. His road through recovery from tearing his right ACL and eventually returning back to good form was long and arduous. Acuña’s passion for the sport is hard to match — he was announced as 2023 National League MVP while getting ready to play in a Venezuelan league game that he didn’t really need to be playing in. Instead, he was there playing because he loved baseball and wanted to give the fans back home a show and he pulled that off.
The game of baseball has been equally loving and cruel to this guy. When Acuña has been on the field, he’s been one of the most dynamic talents to step on a field and his impact on the Braves has been nearly immeasurable. Unfortunately, injuries are starting to become a major part of Acuña’s career and it’s honestly fair to wonder if he’ll be the same now that he’s had to have both of his knees surgically reconstructed. Medical science has come a long way and he was absolutely brilliant once he fully recovered from tearing his right ACL but this is going to be one hell of a challenge for him to get back to the level that we saw him at in the first half of 2021 and throughout all of 2023.
It also has to be draining from a mental standpoint. We’ve all heard the stories about how while Acuña was thrilled for his teammates and was probably their loudest cheerleader on their way to winning the World Series title three seasons ago, it also killed him inside that he was unable to contribute to the title run. The Braves are still good enough to make a run at another World Series title but it’s going to be a huge bummer knowing that Acuña’s going to be on the sidelines once again if they do go on and have another special season.
So yeah, other than the fact that the Braves should be able to withstand this injury just like Strider’s injury, it’s a huge bummer that both of them are out. In addition to Acuña and Strider being a massive part of Atlanta’s plans not just for now but for the future as well, it’s a bummer for the sport. Ronald Acuña Jr. was absolutely electric last season and is one of those players that fans pay full price just to see what he can do. It really, really sucks that we’re not going to be seeing him play anymore this season and it’s worse knowing that he’s got to go through the process of recovery all over again.
Acuña will be back on the field eventually and while it’s okay to wonder if he’ll be the same, I’d bet the house on him giving it one hell of a try to get back to his normal form. If he returns from this injury and also returns to what we’re used to seeing from him — meaning the domination on the basepaths, the moonshot home runs and the acrobatic play in the outfield — then it’ll be one of the great stories in Braves history and in recent baseball history as well.
All we can do as fans is be patient and hope that Acuña will be up for the challenge of overcoming this latest hurdle. Until then, the Braves will just have to keep on moving forward. It’s all they do, so why stop now?