Atlanta Braves fans everywhere are understandably eager for the World Series to end. Sure, some of that is because they want to put the 2022 season in the rearview mirror especially since they are having to watch the Phillies in the World Series, but many fans are eager to get to the offseason to see whether or not Dansby Swanson is going to be returning to the Braves in 2023 and beyond.
It is basically a certainty that Swanson will test the free agent market and equally a certainty that he will have to turn down a qualifying offer from the Braves to get there. As we learned yesterday, The Athletic’s Keith Law seems to think that Dansby should be in line for a bigger payday than many of us thought. As our friends over at Battery Power wrote up yesterday, KLaw has Dansby as the third best free agent on the market behind just Trea Turner and Carlos Correa. An even more puckering part of Keith’s analysis is that he thinks Dansby should be looking for a six to eight year deal with an AAV of around $30 million a year. Ooof….we already knew that this offseason hinges on what happens at shortstop and it is looking like things could get VERY expensive.
Braves News
The Arizona Fall League continues to motor along and they announced yesterday that the final two roster spots for the AFL All-Star Game will be decided by a fan vote. On the National League side of the vote, two Braves prospects, Justin-Henry Malloy and Cal Conley, are among the four finalists that fans will be voting for. Make sure you go vote so we can see at least one Braves prospect in the AFL All-Star Game!
More from the minor leagues, we had an article go up yesterday on six Braves prospects that we think could be poised for breakout seasons in 2023. Its pretty much a guarantee that now that we have written about these guys that at least one will get traded away this offseason and another one will make us look remarkably silly. Following baseball prospects is a recipe for heartbreak.
Finally, we continued our player review series for the 2022 season with Dylan Lee. The Braves looked like they were loaded with strong lefty relievers going into the 2022 season, but injury and regression made it where Dylan had to play a very important role and he did it quite well.
MLB News
All eyes are on the World Series matchup between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Houston Astros at the moment. Game Four featured a match-up of Cristian Javier on the mound for the Astros and Cy Young candidate Aaron Nola for the Phillies. Both pitchers, especially Javier, were tough assignments for these offenses on Wednesday evening.
Nola and the Phillies would blink first as the Astros tagged Philadelphia for five runs in the fifth inning and with that, all eyes were on whether or not the Astros could pull off a no-hitter on the biggest stage in the sport of baseball.
A one-out walk in the ninth inning provided some drama, but the Astros did successfully no-hit the Phillies to even the series at two games a piece. This World Series is turning out to be a gem with some big time moments and haymakers being thrown by both sides.