Braves face bright future, pressure
ATLANTA – Once the final out of the series was recorded, the Los Angeles Dodgers began celebrating amid something that resembled silence. But it only lasted a few seconds. As the Dodgers spilled out onto the field and the Atlanta Braves began leaving it, nearly 40,000 people at SunTrust Park rose to their feet for a final standing ovation.
Even though the Braves lost the National League Division series, 3-1, they deserved it. Not just because they got to the playoffs this year after three straight seasons of 90-plus losses but because they gave their fans hope that there’s plenty more to come.
While the Braves were an imperfect team and showed as much against the Dodgers, they are also one of the most promising. Not only did they ride a wave of rookies into the playoffs who figure to get much better, Atlanta has only scratched the surface of its farm system, with more highly-touted prospects on the way.
“I think we’re really close,” said first baseman Freddie Freeman, who endured all the pain of Atlanta’s rebuild and savored this return to the playoffs. “The last couple years you heard about the names sprinkling into the big leagues and now they’re here and I know we’ve got a lot more coming still. Hopefully we can put it together completely next year and win the World Series.”
Indeed, fair or not, the bar has been raised – and quickly – for this organization. Though it was widely recognized in the baseball world that Atlanta was well positioned for eventual success, few figured it would come this quickly.
And yet it did, partly because players like 20-year-old left fielder Ronald Acuña Jr. blossomed ahead of schedule and partly because the NL East was woeful, providing no real challenger aside from the Philadelphia Phillies, who are also just emerging from a rebuilding phase.
Regardless, the Braves are both a team on the rise and a team that, in a sense, has arrived, meaning the expectation of a deeper playoff run will be massive.
“We’ve got a lot of young talent and this organization is going to be very good in the next few years,” outfielder Ender Inciarte said. “And I’m looking forward to see what we can do.”
Of course, even a team on a trajectory like Atlanta’s will have questions to answer.
Though every key contributor this season aside from Nick Markakis is under contract for next year, the Braves will be under some pressure to get better in key areas both internally and perhaps through free agency.
Though Atlanta’s lineup performed well most of the season, its hitting was exposed a bit by the Dodgers’ playoffseasoned pitching staff. Aside from a win in Game 3, which was fueled by an Acuña grand slam and Freeman’s game-winning solo homer, the Braves struggled to drive in base runners and hit just .144 as a team in the series.
Though Freeman said it was “above my pay grade” to determine whether the lineup needs some free agent help, it’s obvious Atlanta could use some more power in the cleanup spot. Though Markakis had an All-Star year (.297 batting average, 14 home runs), he struggled down the stretch and the Braves couldn’t make any obvious adjustments.
Meanwhile, as effective as Mike Foltynewicz was during the season, he’s probably not a true No. 1 starter on a championship team, meaning the Braves will need someone among their bevy of young arms to emerge in that role. But that can also be a long and fraught process, with no guarantees that anyone will pan out. Though the Braves can boast of a potential future with former firstround picks like Kyle Wright, Ian Anderson and Mike Soroka in their rotation, those guys aren’t yet full-time big leaguers.
Overall, though, the Braves organization is a picture of health, having moved into a sparkling new park last year and emerging from both a painful rebuild and an embarrassing scandal in which former general manager John Coppolella was banned for life by MLB for breaking signing rules involving international players.
Now, the Braves have a young, winning, inexpensive roster, which gives general manager Alex Anthopoulos a lot of options to get them closer to a team like the Dodgers.
“I have a great sense of the future. I think it’s very bright,” manager Brian Snitker said. “We took a huge step forward this year. We had some very young players get a lot of great experience, both during the regular season and the postseason. And we have some really good players coming. And I really am excited about the future of the Atlanta Braves right now, with the young nucleus that we have here.”