Young duo making history for Braves
Albies, Acuna fuel winning prospects
PHILADELPHIA – The photos and GIFs are endearing, and if you’re a Braves fan, downright reminiscent.
Go to Ozzie Albies’ Twitter page — @albiesozzie97 — and you can’t help noticing how frequently left fielder Ronald Acuña Jr. appears alongside him. Their rapport is obvious, and not just online.
The rising young players roomed together in the minors, have lockers next to each other on the road, get to the ballpark and leave together and live in the same Atlanta-area apartment complex.
“We’re tight with each other like brothers,” said Albies, a switch-hitting second baseman. “I’m happy to have him on the team. We talk about everything, on the field and off the field.”
Go back less than a decade, and similar words were heard from Jason Heyward and Freddie Freeman, close friends in the minors who came up in 2010 and ushered in a stretch of three postseason appearances in four years for Atlanta, after
the club missed the playoffs the previous four seasons.
The Braves are now enduring another such fallow period, and Albies and Acuña represent their best hope for not only reaching the postseason for the first time since 2013 but perhaps even returning to the glory days when the club was winning 14 division crowns in a row.
Tuesday night’s 3-1 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies improved the Braves’ record to a National Leaguebest 29-18 and ensured them of leaving the City of Brotherly Love in first place in the East, a spot they’ve maintained for nearly all of May.
“I definitely didn’t see it coming,” general manager Alex Anthopoulos said of the early surge. “I don’t think anybody could have. I thought it was possible because there’s a lot of young, talented players, but I didn’t know.”
There are many reasons for the emergence of a team generally regarded as at least a year away from contending in a division dominated in recent seasons by the powerful Nationals.
Freeman and veteran Nick Markakis are enjoying excellent years, each boasting an OPS above .900. Starting pitchers Mike Foltynewicz and Sean Newcomb are living up to their billing as first-round picks after previous stumbles, solidifying a rotation that has shaved more than a run off last season’s 4.80 ERA. And the relief corps is much improved as well.
But the first two games of the series against the Phillies illustrated what makes the Braves go these days. A night after Albies and Acuña reached base a total of one time in a shutout loss, they combined to go 4-for-9 with one RBI each Tuesday. Albies scored all three runs, one on his 14th homer of the season — the second-leading total in the NL — another time drawing a bad throw by dashing to the plate on a bouncer with the infield in and the final one on an Acuña single.
With their speed, power and hitting ability, they’re as dynamic as a duo gets, and with plenty of room to grow.
Leadoff hitter Albies is 21, No. 2 hitter Acuña a year younger. Until the Nationals called up 19-year-old Juan Soto on Sunday, they were the two youngest players in the majors.
Just four duos age 21 and younger have produced full seasons in which each sported an OPS-plus above 100, according to Major League Baseball. One of those was Ted Williams and Bobby Doerr in 1939. Acuña (112 OPS-plus) and Albies (117) are well on their way.
“For them to be 20 and 21 at the top of our lineup, it’s almost unheard of,” Freeman said. “They do something every single night that you just sit back and go, ‘Wow.’ When you watch them play the game, you don’t think they’re 20 and 21. They’re above their years. They have fun playing the game. They make it fun to come to the yard every day. They bring an energy into the clubhouse that’s very refreshing.”
That youthful energy figures to become more prevalent. Top pitching prospect Mike Soroka, 20, made his major league debut May 1 and put up a 3.68 ERA in three starts before a shoulder strain sidelined him. Brazilian lefty Luiz Gohara, 21, was scheduled to start Wednesday.
Down on the farm, third baseman Austin Riley, the 41st overall pick in the
2015 draft, is knocking on the door after earning a promotion to Class AAA Gwinnett (Ga.) this month. Teammates Kolby Allard (2.02 ERA) and Max Fried
(3.80 ERA) are making a case for promotion as well.
That puts the Braves, who opened a new ballpark last season and have only
$38 million in salaries committed for next year, in prime position to challenge for division supremacy well into the
2020s.
Albies, a 5-8 native of Curacao, was the first member of the new wave to make a splash, batting .286 in 57 games and showing remarkable pop in the last two months last season. That proved foreshadowing to a stunning power surge that has him ranked among the NL’s top five in home runs, RBI (34) and slugging (.586). His 45 runs and 31 extra-base hits are by far the league’s highest totals.
“I’m not surprised. He’s a little guy with speed, but he has some pop too,” said Baltimore Orioles second baseman Jonathan Schoop, who sometimes works out with Albies in the offseason. “I did a home run derby with him and he almost beat me. He’s kind of like (Jose) Altuve: He’s small but can hit the ball out of the park.”
Acuña, considered baseball’s top prospect after tearing through three minor league levels at 19 last year, was called up April 25 and batted .326 over his first 11 games, becoming the youngest Brave to hit a homer since Andruw Jones in 1996. He soon found out life in the majors is not that easy and fell into a 9-for-49 slump before his two hits Tuesday. He’s batting .260 with a .774 OPS.
The son of a longtime minor league and Venezuelan league player, the younger Acuña doesn’t seem fazed by the game’s challenges, relying on his dad’s advice. “He always tells me that you have to play baseball with a lot of heart,” he said in Spanish, “keeping the same enthusiasm every day even when you have ups and downs and keeping a positive mind-set.”
Nobody will find that easier than Anthopoulos, who can count on at least five more years of team control on Albies and Acuña, in addition to having the consistently productive Freeman under contract through 2021.
The most difficult decision the GM might face in the upcoming months is whether to bolster the roster for a playoff run at the expense of prospects. Anthopoulos figures he has time to make that evaluation; his players are enjoying this winning feeling and want more.
Center fielder Ender Inciarte said it benefits the youngsters to join a club on the way up. “It’s not like we’re still rebuilding, waiting for the future,” Inciarte said. “The future is now, because we have so much talent in the bullpen, so much talent in the lineup, and thankfully we’re still a very young team.
“If we stay healthy and work on the small things we have to continue to improve on, we’ll be a winning team like the Atlanta Braves had for many years.”