It was an eventful trade deadline for the Atlanta Braves, to be sure.
Going into deadline day with major questions surrounding its outfield offense and bench production, the Atlanta Braves made a series of shrewd moves that suddenly provide manager Brian Snitker with a plethora of options.
On Friday, the Atlanta Braves traded with Cleveland for Eddie Rosario, dealt with division rival Miami to bring back old friend Adam Duvall, and snagged Kansas City’s Jorge Soler.
Sure, there’s no Joey Gallo or Kris Bryant or any other big-name star that a lot of fans may have hoped for, but there is reason to believe that the new additions to the Atlanta Braves will provide a sizable bump in offensive production.
The Atlanta Braves started out the 2021 season with outfield plans that were promising, but quickly fell apart.
Whether it was Cristian Pache’s early demotion to Triple-A Gwinnett, Marcell Ozuna’s off-the-field legal matters, or Ronald Acuna, Jr.’s devastating injury, the outfield suddenly became a significant question mark.
While players like Guillermo Heredia and Abraham Almonte have held their own about as well as could be expected, the outfield simply hasn’t performed well enough to establish the Braves as a legitimate contender.
Even with the quality addition of Joc Pederson, the Atlanta Braves still rank 23rd in MLB in outfield OPS for the month of July, per FanGraphs.
These latest moves could go a long ways in potentially transforming the team from a bottom-half outfield to an upper-half.
With the team seemingly opting for quantity – with upside – over star-player quality when addressing the outfield, there are now multiple lineup options that could be considered.