The Braves Are Already Playing Catch-up AgainWith the other NL East contenders making moves, defending champion Atlanta needs help keeping up. Offseason acquisition Josh Donaldson and phenoms Ronald Acuña Jr. and Ozzie Albies will get the headlines, but the Braves will go only as far as their young pitching staff can take them in 2019:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/63180047/BravesFallingBehind_Getty_Ringer.0.jpg)
The Atlanta Braves won the NL East by eight games last year. And even though they went 72-90 the year before, Atlanta’s success in 2018 wasn’t some one-off fluke...Last year’s Braves were the turning point of a multiyear rebuilding project, a club that had spent the past five years stockpiling talent and finally unleashed it in force on the National League.
It’s important to say all that off the bat, because five months later it’s easy to forget. PECOTA, the Baseball Prospectus projection system, has the Braves pegged to finish fourth in the NL East this year. It’s not a distant fourth; the Phillies, Nationals, Mets, and Braves are all within five games of each other in PECOTA, and depending on whose odds you’re looking at, Any Specific Team But The Marlins is about 3-to-1 to win the NL East.
Atlanta will be counting on continued development from 2018 National League Rookie of the Year Ronald Acuña Jr. and 2018 All-Star second baseman Ozzie Albies (both born in 1997), among other youngsters. To supplement their homegrown stars, the Braves signed 2015 AL MVP Josh Donaldson to a one-year, $23 million contract. Albies and Acuña are the best-known products of Atlanta’s rebuild, and among the first to make an impact in the majors, but the Braves have poured substantial resources into pitching prospects who are still developing.
Atlanta’s stable of young pitchers is impressive, and exciting, and gives the Braves immense upside, not just this year but beyond. But the kids must perform this year if the Braves are going to contend for the division. The Mets, Phillies, and Nationals brought in so much outside help that Atlanta has to improve from within in order to keep pace.
I kid I kid
