The March 2018 Atlanta Braves?

Time to do a little crystal-balling: we cranked up the DeLorean to go forward in time and pulled a story that we will write a year from now. Let’s see now what our Atlanta Braves will look like then.

MARCH 19, 2018. As the Atlanta Braves wrap up another week of Spring action – nearly their last at the happy confines of Walt Disney World – let’s go through the position players and the rotation to see how everyone is doing at this point.

1B – FREDDIE FREEMAN

Without the distraction of the World Baseball Classic to deal with this year, Freeman looks to be on a mission. He was robbed of the MVP trophy (seriously: do you HAVE to win the division to get the nod??) and looks to be hungry to make sure that doesn’t happen again.

He’s off to a hot start – .555/.600/1.220 – and it may only be a matter of time before pitchers trying to make a roster start giving him intentional passes in Spring.

2B – OZZIE ALBIES

Finally! Albies has entered this Spring as the de facto second baseman after a seemingly long journey… even though he’s still only 21 years old! There seem to be no lingering effects from his elbow injury of 19 months ago, and he’s holding up well (so far) to the rigors of full-season play.

If anything, he seems a bit ‘eager’ at the plate, but we’ll see if that calms down over time, since the Braves’ lead-off hitter needs to be on base much more than the current 31% of the time.

SS – DANSBY SWANSON

The reigning Rookie of the Year came into camp with the look of a grizzled veteran. And why not? Having inked a 10-year pact last month, the 24-year-old is anchored to this position for the foreseeable future. But he’s not showing any differences on the field – hitting .500 so far and working on crazy-scenario double play combinations with Albies in practice. Good luck getting hits through this infield.

3B – ????

The competition for this job is wide open. Neither Adonis Garcia nor Rio Ruiz were able to really seize the role late in 2017, and Austin Riley has now entered the fray as a viable, though still dark horse candidate.

After his breakout year that saw him hit bombs at three different minor league levels, Riley is the surprise contender, though his candidacy is more about offense than defense.

We pretty much know what we’re getting with Ruiz and Garcia, but will the Braves have enough room on their bench to continue the platoon that finished 2017? Moreover: what do we do with those who don’t win this job?

CATCHER – LUCROY/FLOWERS

Tyler Flowers is back again, but he’s now the backup guy after Atlanta won the bidding war for Jonathan Lucroy. At least the Braves have somebody they can rely on in that secondary role so that maybe – maybe – they can coax Lucroy through all 5 years of this monster contract (after which he’ll be 36).

Since 2010, the Braves have worked through a sequence of catchers of the ilk of Gerald Laird, David Ross, Ryan Lavarnway, Anthony Recker, and A.J. Pierzynski. Some better than others.

Most had few expectations.

That changes this year.

LEFT FIELD – MATT KEMP

Maybe he’s just a notoriously slow starter, but after that 3 WAR season last year, it’s hard to know how much Kemp still has in him. Then again, he seems to be the kind of hitter that starts at 20 homers per year as a ‘given’.

I think Braves’ fans would be very happy to see 2.5-3 WAR out of his penultimate contract season… but don’t rule out a trade if things don’t work out – here or elsewhere.

CENTER FIELD – ENDER INCIARTE

Another year, another Gold Glove… but really, who else would have taken that from him in 2017? The big question, then, is now that he’s hitting down in the order, will Ender be a run-producer or… what exactly?

That will be one of the more interesting questions (along with 3rd base and the rotation) about how this season shakes out for the Braves.

RIGHT FIELD – NICK MARKAKIS

Yes, he’s still here. The rumors did not pan out (at least not thus far) and Markakis is still a Brave for the last year of his deal.

But what better options were there for Atlanta? Sure, there were a couple of more expensive ones, but after the Lucroy deal (and a couple of others), those weren’t going to happen.

There’s still a lot to be said for a .285 hitting that raps doubles with consistency from the seven-hole. But if I’m Nick, I’m renting on a month-to-month basis during the season.

THE ROTATION

More from Tomahawk Take

Well, this is going to be interesting. The biggest questions are clearly going to be these:

Is Teheran going continue being Mr. Consistency?
How will Chris Archer fare in his first National League foray?
Will Folty build on his excellent 2017 campaign?
Will Jaime Garcia hold up for a second straight year?
How will Max Fried handle major leaguers for the first time?

It still comes as a surprise that Coppy even offered Garcia that 3-year/$48m extension last season – much more that he took it. But after showing that he was healthy, this gave the Braves the additional depth needed to go after Archer during the off-season… though at the cost of Sean Newcomb, Lucas Sims and Travis Demeritte (plus).

The result is a group that looks solid on paper, but time will tell us more. So far this Spring it’s looking good for all of them: having their roles defined early on may be helping in the process… but none of them have an ERA over 3.60 – which while excellent, still comes with the usual caveat: “It’s just Spring.”

The Sum of the Parts

So is this our first truly competitive club? It is hard to say. There is a lot of speed, defense and jacked-up pitching. But will that be enough to maintain pace with a waning Washington and a Mets club that relies on pitching alone?

The major “competitive questions”, then, are these:

Albies: will he match the numbers BP put up in 2017?
Third base: your guess is as good as mine.
Right Field: suppose Atlanta manages a trade. Then what?
Will everyone else at least match their lofty expectations?

Next: Back to Present Day

We’ll find out starting April 2018.

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