It has been as rough a stretch for the Atlanta Braves, the likes that we haven’t seen since 2017. While the team has struggled to put together wins, the good news is, there is still plenty of baseball left to be played and time to get things headed back in the right direction. Unsurprisingly, we received a ton of questions for this week’s mailbag, enough that I am going to split this into two parts. If I didn’t get to your question, we will do it again soon. Let’s get to it!
Have we hit rock bottom yet?
This is probably the best question that I received this week. I have thought that the Braves simply couldn’t play any worse offensively about three different times over the past six weeks and they have proven me wrong each time. I continue to believe that this team is too talented to continue to struggle like this and many of the metrics point to a turnaround. Still, it hasn’t happened on the field since early in the season, so please accept my tepid response.
With the farm system lacking overall deep talent and the offense struggling as much as it has to this point, do you see the Braves possibly being sellers at the trade deadline? Sure, they are currently in the first wildcard spot but up to this point there is not a lot they’ve done to make anyone think this team is making a long post season run like the 2021 team. Lightning doesn’t strike that many times.
Naturally, we received a bunch of questions about the possibility of the Braves selling at the Trade Deadline. There is a lot to unpack here. First, for about a three week stretch in April, people thought this team was on its way to another monster offensive season. Granted, it hasn’t worked out that way but there is a little bit of a “what have you done for me lately” element to the consternation.
There are many examples of teams over the past few seasons that entered the postseason looking like they had no shot before going on extended runs. In fact, many have suggested recently that dominant regular seasons have actually worked against teams, though this remains a suggestion and goes against the research. We will get to the 2021 Braves in a minute, but 2023 Phillies won 90 games, beat Atlanta in the Division Series and then flopped against an 84 win Arizona Diamondbacks team that advanced to the World Series. The 90-win Texas Rangers, who choked away their own division late, won the World Series.
In 2022, the 87-win Phillies stormed all the way to the World Series while the 100-plus win Braves, Mets and Dodgers lost in the first round. The 2021 postseason was even worse...
...which brings us to the 2021 Braves. That team will forever be remembered fondly for how it ended, but they were arguably the most frustrating to watch of any team during the run of consecutive division titles before 2024. They didn’t get over .500 until August 8. Most of the season was a long scuffle, and that was before the team lost their MVP candidate on July 10. A few days later, Ian Anderson followed Acuña to the Injured List with a shoulder issue. The only reason that team still had a shot at anything was because the NL East was so bad and no one in the division had really shown signs of being a successful playoff club. Even after the Braves righted the ship, they were still not given much of a chance to do anything in the postseason by the national media largely because of how bad the division was. There was a much better case for selling in 2021 than there is currently in 2024, and it remains pretty crazy that the Braves not only opted to buy with five percent playoff odds, but actually had that pay off to an extreme degree.
I’m going to talk about Max Fried below, but I think there is close to a zero percent chance that the Braves are sellers at the Trade Deadline, unless something even crazier than the past seven weeks happens and/or the Front Office gets a case of collective psychosis. Alex Anthopoulos said Wednesday that you just need to get into the postseason to give yourself a chance. In the expanded playoff era, that has been proven time and time again, because anyone can win in a short series. Beyond the Phillies, Dodgers and Brewers, the entire National League is a mess and that goes into the decision-making process as well.
Obviously, the club needs to start playing better. Lightning might not strike that often, but there is still a chance that they enter the playoffs as a wild card, roll the dice well, and this rough stretch is a distant memory. There’s an even bigger chance that they rebound to some extent, and look like a much better team than they have lately.
How likely are the Braves to explore trade packages for Max Fried at the trade deadline? If not likely, what are the chances we re-sign him in the offseason?
It probably isn’t wise to say there is no chance, but I think it is probably about a one percent that the Braves would consider trading Max Fried. I laid out in the previous question why I don’t think Atlanta will be sellers. Honestly, we have been getting this question since the offseason and it really didn’t make sense then. If there is a postseason run to be made, then Atlanta has to have Max Fried. I don’t think any of that has changed. It would also be a really crappy message for the Front Office to send to its players, one they again didn’t bother sending in 2021. The Braves are clearly aiming to be a good place to play, and good places to play don’t cut off their own teams at the knees when there’s something to play for.
With that said, I still think the chances of re-signing Fried are slim as well. After a rough start, he is again showing that he is one of the best pitchers in the game. I think he will command a contract on the open market that will be much more than the Braves are willing to take on for a 30+ year old pitcher. In some ways, it is the same as Dansby Swanson’s final season in Atlanta: the numbers he put up priced him out of the picture.
The point I’d like to make here is, the Braves are not a rebuilding team. Most of their core is locked up, so even if this season flops completely, I believe there would be limited changes made. The Braves value what Fried can give them this season along with the draft pick that they will receive if he signs elsewhere more than what they might get for dealing him as a two-month rental.
My question is pretty simple. Do you think the FO can afford to wait until the All-Star break to do something to improve this team?
They certainly look like they could use a spark sooner rather than later. Alex Anthopoulos sent the team a message back in 2021 by acquiring Joc Pederson shortly after Acuña’s injury. That said, it takes two to make a deal happen, and the Braves may need multiple pieces at the Trade Deadline so you don’t really want to overpay now.
Alex Anthopoulos said Wednesday that he had been more active than normal for this time of the year. He also said nothing was imminent because he was never going to say anything else. As I write this, they are still three games up for the first wild card. If this slide continues though, it may actually force his hand.
With the deadline coming up and our need for outfielders, and starting pitching. Could we see Bryce Elder be involved in a trade package that will be used to go get Luis Robert and Garret Crochet from the White Sox. Or might they make a play for Jazz Chisholm and use him as shortstop?
I hate doing trade speculation articles because the truth is we don’t know who is really available and who they might be willing to part with. I’d say that any of the Triple-A depth pitchers would be in play (e.g., Bryce Elder) but I don’t think there is much value there either. A trade for Luis Robert probably includes the names AJ Smith-Shawver, Hurston Waldrep or Spencer Schwellenbach in some combination. If Jazz Chisholm Jr. was acquired, then he would probably be used in the outfield.
Robert has always been a favorite of mine. He has star potential and is locked up on a good contract with team control through 2027. However, that good contract isn’t nothing and might require the Braves to scramble with regard to luxury tax implications. Perhaps more importantly, Robert has topped 100 games played in a season one time in his career. He’s played 15 games in 2024 so there is tons of risk there too; he can’t be a difference-maker if all he does is come over and get hurt.
It probably isn’t smart to completely rule anything out. It wouldn’t be shocking at all to see Alex Anthopoulos swing big, but at the same time, I just don’t know how realistic it really is.
Why has Atlanta struggled so much the past four years developing position players in farm system? Take away Michael Harris and maybe Shea Langeliers and there’s hardly anything left. Vaughn Grissom was a solid prospect but has really struggled since ‘23. Obviously they have most positions locked up at MLB level and they’ve focused heavily on pitchers in recent drafts, but they aren’t able to use prospect capital in upcoming deadline trades like the LAD can or fill a hole in left field or at shortstop. Sure they can trade pitching prospects, but they also have 2-3 + depth rotation holes to fill in 2025 and beyond.
I think you kind of answered the question yourself. The Braves haven’t spent much high draft capital on position players since taking Shea Langeliers and Braden Shewmake. Michael Harris II was a steal in the third round, even with his struggles this season.
Harris is their starting center fielder and is locked up long term. They turned Langeliers into Matt Olson who is also locked up long term. Vaughn Grissom turned into Chris Sale. Everyone loved Grissom’s bat, but his glove was always going to be the question mark. I don’t think you can ding the Braves for him struggling in Boston either. He’s been hurt most of the season and I still think he will be fine from an offensive standpoint. You also didn’t mention William Contreras, who is doing pretty well for himself, albeit in another organization.
Now I’m no prospect expert and I probably should have handed this question off to Garrett Spain, but I think the hit and miss rate on a lot of minor league guys is misconstrued by a lot of fans. As fans we might say “well only these three guys made it and are productive in the majors” but that is actually a pretty good success rate. The Braves haven’t needed position players at the major league level because their core is locked up. I certainly don’t feel that there was a trade out there that was available that they couldn’t make because they didn’t have the assets.
While it’s only one methodology, Fangraphs’ Kiri Oler had the Braves as good at developing prospects on both sides of the ball earlier this month. The only way to judge this sort of thing is relatively, and there just isn’t much evidence they’re doing relatively worse than their peers.
The Dodgers are the gold standard when it comes to being able to spend money while having a great farm system. In my opinion, they are the model that every team is chasing. Even then, they ranked above the Braves for pitching but not position players in Oler’s analysis.
People have been saying for years that the Braves’ system is weak, but it hasn’t held them back at any of the most recent Trade Deadlines. I think if there is one criticism of going pitcher-heavy in the draft it is that pitchers tend to break more than position players. Owen Murphy and JR Ritchie are good examples. If those two guys were healthy then maybe that is five good pitching prospects that are bubbling up as top 100 guys along with AJ Smith-Shawver, Hurston Waldrep and Spencer Schwellenbach. Murphy seemed to be well on his way at the time of his injury. I feel better about this minor league system now than I have in recent seasons. Nacho Alvarez looks like he might actually be able to stick at shortstop. Isaiah Drake has been intriguing. Ambioris Tavarez looked like he was figuring things out before he got hurt.
It is a delicate thing to try and balance for sure, especially for a team like the Braves that was barred from participating in international free agency for several seasons. None of the prospects they lost panned out, but not being able to sign anyone in the years after that scandal did no favors for the system’s depth.
As far as the rotation goes, they are going to need several of those young guys to step up. There is also a lot of money potentially coming off the books. This is another topic entirely but they may elect to stay below the tax next season, but there still should be enough money to add a starter.
Thanks again everyone! The second part will be up over the weekend.
