The Countdown to the final 10 starts as we enter numbers 15-11. If you’re behind on our Braves top prospects list, you can catch up here:
Braves Top Prospects, #15 Luis Guanipa, CF, 19, A-, 2028
A true 5 tool player when signed, Guanipa has steadily lost his power stroke with each passing
season. He remains decent in centerfield (he gets terrible jumps) because of his speed, while
his plus arm is a bit erratic. He was overmatched physically with the jump from the complex to full season ball and should be better prepared this season. He is the one guy from this part the list who could still be an impact player.
Braves Top Prospects, #14 Garrett Baumann, RHP, 20, A+, 2027
Spent the year at Rome as the ace of their staff. Baumann is another large human (6’8”) who
doesn’t throw as hard as one would expect with the best pitch being a change. He has never put
up huge strikeout numbers but has also run miniscule walk rates (and virtually no home runs!)
so he has potential as a back of the rotation groundball guy. AA is usually the test of these types
so 2025 is key for him.
Braves Top Prospects, #13 Jhancarlos Lara, RHP, 22, A+, 2026
A Dominican stringbean that I was a bit exuberant about in last year’s writeup. He had serious
control issues to begin the season and looked lost there for a while but came back to
dominance in his final 6 starts of the year. I am more worried about a move to the pen than any
performance issues with him as he will need to go on the 40 man roster after next season.
Braves Top Prospects, #12 Carter Holten, LHP, 22, A-, 2027
Our 2024 second round pick from Vandy. Holten has suffered mystery injuries during the last 2
college seasons that had him shut down late in the schedule. Many suspect his small frame
(only 5’11” and wiry thin) leads to a loss of stamina late. He tries to compensate for his lack of
height by coming directly over the top but that arm motion makes his change and curve less
effective. The Braves want to move his arm slot lower which will allow all his pitches to tunnel
and give him more extension. The player development team is very good at teaching this kind of
adjustment (Kyle Wright for instance) and I suspect we got a first round talent here.
Braves Top Prospects, #11 Owen Murphy, RHP, 21, A-, 2027
2022 first rounder who has never showed the velocity of his HS senior year again. He still has a
plus fastball he locates well, has great spin, and has excellent extension, but only throws it 92.
Has performed well at every stop but will miss most of 2025 due to TJ surgery. Interesting if the
oompf comes back on his fastball after the surgery.
Man, i expected more out of this range of prospects.
Agreed. Three blog posts in, not much to hang your hat on.
We are actually just a bit below average as a system overall although in terms of prospect value we are very top heavy. The top 8 guys are pretty good but the rest of the system is youngsters and lotto ticket types. It would not surprise me to see Lara in the bullpen come August while the other 4 listed here are some variety of longshot
Looks like Lara’s biggest issue is throwing strikes judging by his walk rate.
https://x.com/baldheaded1der/status/1881368876472217620
His starts were not the most aesthetically pleasing the last few years but his aggregate numbers were pretty much what you would hope for. I think casual fans would watch some of his starts, and coupled with his age, assume worse overall performance.
I think last year’s numbers are his new ceiling and the Braves were right to move on.
Godspeed, Charlie. Thank you for 2021.
If Guanipa can take a leap, and if Richie’s velocity can return, our farm system will get a big boost.
Anthony Santander signs with Blue Jays.
https://nypost.com/2025/01/20/sports/anthony-santander-signing-with-blue-jays-for-90m-in-mlb-free-agency/?utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=nypost&utm_medium=social
That contract will look pretty good for 2 years. Not sure after that for a hitter that is a left handed Dan Uggla. Good for him in maxing out his earning potential.
*EDIT: switch-hitting Dan Uggla
I’m holding out for our new left fielder, Pete Alonso. Get it done, AA.
Wow – $90 million is a LOT for a 30-year-old slugger with a career .307 OBP. That’s clearly their direct attempt to make up for losing out on premium free agents by overpaying for a midtier guy – precisely what AA pathologically refuses to do. Santander is two years younger than Teoscar Hernandez, but I’d much rather have Teoscar than Santander, given their respective contracts.
But I’m obviously frustrated by the offseason thus far. I’d feel much better if we wound up with Ha-Seong Kim and it actually feels like the team has addressed our hole at shortstop.
Yeah, they way overpaid.
Actually, looks like a ton of the money is deferred and this is being treated as a $70 million deal for the luxury tax, so that makes it a lot more reasonable.
Still would rather overpay for an A-lister than settle for a B-lister, but looks like they basically paid market price for him rather than way over market price.
Chasen Shreve signed to a minor league deal. He’ll make $1.3M if he makes the major league roster. He pitched 1 inning last year, 44 bad innings in 2023 (4.63 ERA), was terrible in 2022 (6.49 ERA in 26 IP). He was ok in 2021 (3.20 ERA but with a 4.73 FIP). He’s been either injured or ineffective for most his entire career. Googling tells me that he’s had 3 different injuries in the last 4 years, and it would seem that he’s pretty healthy now. He’s a familiar name for us, it softens the blow a little bit from losing Minter (but not really), and he might be healthy and good again for the first time in a while. We’ll see. No real downside so I’d rather have him than not have him.
Just read this good article advocating for Andruw’s HOF case. I did not realise he put up essentially the same bWAR numbers as Ichiro. He deserves to get in. Hopefully the Hall voters wake-up and realise that.
https://www.espn.com.au/mlb/insider/story/_/id/43455573/2025-hall-fame-voting-election-ballot-cooperstown-andruw-jones-ichiro-suzuki
I think Ozzie Smith is a good comp too. An all-time defender at an elite position with an above average but not elite offensive game. Ozzie just played longer and accumulate a little more WAR.
I wish Andruw had kept his weight down a little and not tried to hit so many dingers. I think he could’ve extended his career.
I think both should get in, but wouldn’t be shocked if Andruw (rightly or wrongly) was again snubbed.
In 19 seasons, Ichiro had an OPS+ of 107. He didn’t walk or hit many HRs — he had 2,500+ singles.
Offensively, he’s Pete Rose who stole more bases & walked a lot less. (Defensively, he was miles ahead — he had a hell of a RF arm.)
That said, Ichiro was my favorite player to watch whenever the M’s came to The Bronx. In our season-ticket plan, I always made sure I got the Seattle game.
Andruw’s career really was a weird one. I’ll always have trouble flushing that one Dodgers season from my mind (.505 OPS in 75 games). He looked so indifferent & out-of-shape. I saw him at the end when he played for the Yanks as a designated lefty masher, but I sure missed him in CF.
A Fave Andruw Moment: In 1999, he hit a 9th-inning go-ahead HR off Mariano Rivera in Yankee Stadium. In the film “Fargo,” Steve Buscemi described the scene perfectly: “Total silence…”
Andruw (and Beltran) will likely get in next year.
Yeah, I think that’s right. None of the 2026 newcomers seem likely to get in on the first ballot, which will probably also make it easier for Jones and Beltran. Next year’s best newcomer will be Cole Hamels, and he had a significantly worse career than, say, Andy Pettitte, who will still be on the ballot and who got just under 30% this year – more than doubling his vote total from last year. He’ll probably make another leap next year.
Hamels may at least clear 5%; I’m not sure how many of the others will even clear that bar.
Surely not Ryan Braun, with his PED conviction. But the rest of the ballot is highlighted by guys like Alex Gordon and Nick Markakis; they had wonderful careers but I can’t see them getting more than a handful of downballot votes from homers who remember their halcyon days with the teams who drafted them.
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6079263/2025/01/21/hamels-braun-2026-hall-of-fame-ballot/
As a result of the unimpressive group of newbies, next year will be the year that Utley makes the jump and clears 50%, I think. I’d prefer him in the Hall to Pettitte, all things considered. But I’d prefer both of them to neither, and I think it’s pretty good odds that’s what we get.
https://x.com/reach_baseball/status/1882443179720675502
I don’t buy it either and Bowman says we have around $33 million to spend.
Here are some sanguine predictions to lighten the mood:
https://www.si.com/mlb/braves/analysis/five-bold-atlanta-braves-predictions-2025-01jja9apcfv0
Let’s do all these things, yes
Braves just signed Profar
Hey, alright!!
Can Profar still play SS????
100000000% no. That was about a billion leg injuries ago. He hasn’t really played infield in six years, when he played 2B in Oakland. (And his defensive stats were pretty bad back then.)
His sprint speed and defensive range on Baseball Savant are ice-blue. My take is that he’s basically replacing Kelenic.
I’m also so old I thought Profar was still at least some sort of utility player that still played a little middle infield, but he hasn’t logged consistent innings at 2B since 2020. He’s almost strictly a LF now, though I would assume he’ll play RF to start the season. He played 1 inning of 2B in 2023, and he’s started a few games at 1B the last couple seasons. So he can also act as Olson’s backup, but I’m sure Riley is also considered Olson’s backup.
Whoops, I missed that Alex broke down his 2B history. Sorry, Alex.
THIS OFFSEASON SUCKS
EDIT: I’m still on dial up and I sent that 2 hours ago.
Me so funny.
3 yrs/ 42m
Dodgers have Japan, we have Curacao
meh, not a fan, but hopefully not an albatross of a contract
“Sign Profar and trade for Montgomery and suddenly we are feeling a lot better.”
I said that Sunday. 1 down, 1 to go!
You’re not getting Profar for $14M per and only for 3 years if the marketplace thought he was the 3.6 WAR player he was last year. If he can be a 1.5-2 WAR player, then he’s worth his contract. More importantly, he can play RF before Acuna gets back, and that gives Kelenic some time to show he belongs. If Kelenic hits and Acuna returns, then things get interesting. Now you have 4 good OFs. But there’s plenty of risk with Kelenic and Acuna, so we definitely could have used another OF. I thought Profar wouldn’t have wanted to come join a crowded OF, but clearly I was wrong.
Kelenic is a classic 4th OF unless he can somehow figure out how to cut his strikeouts. Can’t really field well enough to be considered an everyday CF, and doesn’t hit well enough to be an everyday corner OF.
He will be the primary RF (I’d guess Eli White will get some starts against tough LHP) until Acuña is ready with Profar in LF.
17 MLB players have come from Curacao. We now have had 7 of them: Andruw, Ozzie, Jurickson, Kenley, Jair, Andrelton and Randall. Only one assaulted a sausage.
Lol
Profar is a steal at this price. I like his chances to maintain his gains from the last year-plus because it wasn’t fluky. He could go south but it’s a pretty cheap AAV. If he maintains a 3+ WAR level of production it is a huge value
If Profar can approximate last season this will be really good. On the other hand, he’s a 32-year-old with a long history of not approximating last season.
Most likely he’ll be better in ’25 than anyone else we could run out there, so there’s that.
I like it for a variety of reasons. The money isn’t bad, and if he regresses to his 2022 performance, it’s still good value. Putting him second in the order really lengthens the lineup. A great intangible is he has an attitude, something I think we’ve missed since Joc left.
He basically performed as expected based on his batted ball data:
https://www.mlb.com/news/jurickson-profar-free-agent-analysis
The real question is whether he can continue to hit the ball this hard. There’s a long list of players who had a career season in a walk year and were never the same, but we really just need him to be above average in this lineup.
I really like this deal. I still hope we sign Ha-Seong Kim, but this is a good player at a good price, and just as with Josh Donaldson, Marcell Ozuna (and, of course, the Joey Bautista and Edwin Encarnacion extensions that made his name as a GM), Alex Anthopoulos pounced on a player with blood-red batted ball data who was nevertheless undervalued by the market. Alex really likes betting on helium guys, figuring that the market has overcorrected and now undervalues recency.
Especially given our offensive struggles last year, Profar feels like he could really help us.
Keith Law is bearish on it, suggesting that the Braves will feel much happier with Profar on these terms than the Blue Jays will feel with Anthony Santander on the terms they got him: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6084902/2025/01/23/jurickson-profar-atlanta-signing-analysis/
He notes that Profar really can’t field. He’s a better fielder than Jorge Soler, but much worse than Kelenic, who is now essentially fourth on the outfield depth chart behind Harris, Profar, and Acuña as soon as Ronald returns. That’s a much better situation to be in than we were last year with the Luke Williamses and Forrest Walls of the world.
It’s been a long winter but this is a very good day.
Alex, I didn’t know much about Kim, so I looked him up and saw he tore his labrum in August and had surgery in October. He’s not going to be throwing full strength from SS until May or June. I’m not sure Atlanta wants to sign him, run Arcia out there until May or June and then bench him if he’s any better than he was last year.
Also, as someone who’s had 2 labral repair surgeries, one in each shoulder, it wouldn’t surprise me if Kim didn’t have his full throwing strength until closer to a year after surgery, but I’m not a pro athlete.
I also have been wanting to sign Kim. I think you can get him for even less than what we paid Profar, and it would be another case of potential huge returns for a modest contract. He is probably a 2 WAR SS at worst and could give you a 4-5 WAR season with good OBP and defense. Probably similar projection to Dansby over the next 3 years. A 3 year deal for $36 million or a 1-year pillow deal for $15 million sounds like it could get done. As much as I wanted a pitcher, I think we get greater returns out of upgrading at SS and it can be done more cheaply.
What may be an even better option though is signing Jose Iglesias to a 1-year deal. If you think Nacho can be your future SS or you want to be in the market for a big upgrade like Bichette, a stop-gap makes sense
Stampton, how is he going to be a 2 WAR guy if he only plays half the year? He had shoulder surgery 3 months ago.
https://x.com/notgaetti/status/1882623343880536093?s=46&t=WSNPrB2JyUoeKSn2PZsXZg
Sorry, Kenny, but no one called you exclusively by your first name.
Despite what he did to us, I think it is criminal Kenny Lofton is not in the HOF. He was an amazing player and one of the few great leadoff men of his era. It’s not his fault we made a dumb trade for him when he never wanted to be here.
I think the Veterans will get him in.
I’m excited about the Profar signing largely because of his on base skills. That’s something the lineup could use more of. I love both Ozzie and Harris but neither has the OBP to hit near the top of the order. Hopefully Snit will bat Profar one or two as opposed to MHII or Ozzie.