There’s a non-zero chance that the way the Braves look right now is the way they’re going to look once this thing gets rockin’-and-rollin’ again in late-March.
So here we are, folks: It’s January and the biggest move of the offseason for the Atlanta Braves has been the one where they stick their hand up and wave “bye-bye” to to a bunch of familiar faces. Jorge Soler and Travis d’Arnaud are in Anaheim with the Angels. Max Fried got a fat bag in order to join the Yankees. Charlie Morton will continue his quest to defy father time in Baltimore. Fill-ins like Ramón Laureano, Whit Merrifield and Gio Urshela are out the door.
Despite all these changes and departures, the Braves still currently have a full 40-man roster. Atlanta’s been busy this offseason but they haven’t exactly been swinging for the fences so far. Instead, they’ve filled up the 40-man roster with a handful of fringe options who each figure to have an outside shot at making the Opening Day roster. With all due respect to those guys, I don’t think that many Braves fans had Davis Daniel or Carlos D. Rodriguez at the top of their offseason shopping list once the season ended.
With that being said, there’s still a little more time to for the Braves to accomplish their publicly-stated goals of acquiring some pitching help (starter and/or reliever) and an outfielder. I say “publicly-stated” because I think if we’ve been paying attention to how the Atlanta Braves operate under Alex Anthopoulos, there is a bit of a difference between what you hear from the franchise and what they actually do. It wasn’t all that long ago when the Braves spent a lot of time trying to convince everybody that Vaughn Grissom was going to be their middle infielder of the future before trading him away once they felt like they were able to get a good deal (and so far, so good as far as that trade is concerned).
So I’m saying all of that to say that if you think the Braves have been quiet so far, this may only be the beginning. As much as we’ve tried to figure out what the Braves are going to do during this offseason, I think it’s fair to ask this question: What if this is it for the Braves as far as the offseason is concerned? What if the Braves are looking at their roster right now and thinking “You know what? We’re good over here, let’s ride.”
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Obviously, it wouldn’t be the most exciting development in the world and quite frankly, it would be a bit disappointing. While the Braves certainly have every reason in the world to just chalk up 2024 as an outlier of a season due to all the injuries and the precipitous regression from a historically-good hitting season as a team in 2023, you still would like to see the team routinely taking steps to make tangible improvements with each passing season. There are some years where standing pat makes sense — I don’t think that this would be the time where standing pat would be the best decision in the world.
That especially goes for the pitching staff, which still seems to look good on paper but as of right now, they’re relying on a lot of ifs in order for this team to make the dream work. Yes, Chris Sale just pulled off a shocker and delivered one of the best seasons of his career but it’s going to be a very tall order for him to pull off a repeat performance (including staying healthy) in 2025. Is Reynaldo López going to keep up his level of production? Will Spencer Schwellenbach avoid the mythical sophomore slump? Will Spencer Strider be the same once he returns? Also, who’s going to hold down the fort until Strider returns? Will someone from the organization (like AJ Smith-Shawver, Grant Holmes, Ian Anderson or even Bryce Elder) be able to step up and make a strong claim for a long-term rotation spot? Those are all real questions for a pitching staff that could end up being really good once again just as easily as it could blow up.
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The lineup has fewer questions but there’s still a major one. I don’t think the infield is anything to worry about — Austin Riley was heating up and looking like his normal self before his season ended, Matt Olson ended the year with a flourish at the plate, Sean Murphy should be his normal self as long as he doesn’t injure his oblique straight out of the gate again and Orlando Arcia is Orlando Arcia. Marcell Ozuna has just strung together two really good seasons as the DH, so worrying about him would be a waste of time at the moment.
The outfield is where the big question mark is at. Michael Harris II is going to be looking at Jarred Kelenic in left field on most days but whoever’s going to fill-in for Ronald Acuña Jr. in right field is the really big question right now. I’d imagine that they’ll probably wait until the tail end of the offseason and pick up a clear-and-obvious fill-in outfielder but once Acuña returns, it’s also a fair question to ask if if he’ll be the same as well. I’m no doctor and doubting Ronald Acuña Jr. has usually been a fool’s errand over the years but I’d have to imagine that he’s probably not going to hit the ground running at the same pace he was before he suffered a torn ACL to his other knee. It’s still going to be great to have him back but I think this might be another case of it being a long wait before he returns to being the dynamic supernova that we’re used to seeing out there.
Photo by Kevin D. Liles/Atlanta Braves/Getty Images
Even with all of these perfectly valid questions about how this roster is looking, we’re still talking about a very good team on paper. As of right now, this is still a team that’s looking like a very serious contender to win back the NL East and as such, that makes them a serious contender in baseball as a whole. Still, it would be very nice to see this team really fortify itself in its publicly-stated positions of need. With all due respect to Bryan De La Cruz, I don’t quite see him being the answer to the outfield question for the Braves.
As much as we want to see the Braves make some big moves, there’s still the possibility that the team itself could decide to let it ride with the way they’re currently constructed. It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world and if it doesn’t work out here in the offseason then Alex Anthopoulos would surely need to get busy at or before the trade deadline in order to make sure that this team stays on a trajectory that has them playing deep into October. This team’s window to add another Commissioner’s Trophy to the cabinet facing the statue of Henry Aaron in the memorial garden at the ballpark is still pretty wide open. Hopefully Atlanta will make the most of it instead of passing up any opportunities to potentially get better.