It "only" took 124 games, but the Atlanta Braves are playing some of their best baseball of the season. Winners of five straight games, the Bravos just completed a road sweep of a Guardians team fighting for an AL Wild Card spot.
Despite rolling with a hodgepodge of starting pitchers due to the numerous injuries sustained within the rotation, the club keeps winning games thanks to their revitalized offense. While the Braves are still 10 games back from the final NL Wild card spot with less than 40 games to play, many fans are freaking out over the potential weakening of their 2026 draft odds.
However, a few more wins down the stretch thanks to a rejuvenated Michael Harris II and much better play overall isn't a terrible outcome. In fact, wins in general are not going to impact the Braves lottery odds as much as fans think. The MLB Draft lottery is a very unique system with many caveats to odds for each team across the league, in this article we will go over the specifics and how it all impacts Atlanta's draft odds.
Braves still set to have highest pick in nearly a decade
Seven consecutive postseason appearances for Atlanta has kept them from early in the draft for quite sometime. The last time Atlanta picked inside the top 10 was back in 2018 when they drafted RHP Carter Stewart (who they failed to sign because of red flags with his medicals). Not picking early is certainly a problem fans are fine with, but the nightmare 2025 season has provided the Braves the chance to scoop a high end prospect that could help replenish their farm system.
Unlike the NFL, Major League Baseball determines their final draft order through a lottery system much like the NBA. So, the historically bad Rockies will not be automatically rewarded the first pick even if they finish the season with the most losses in the league. In fact, the first team to miss the postseason (currently the Cincinnati Reds) still have a 0.35% chance to get the first overall pick. Much like the Dallas Mavericks this past NBA draft, and the Atlanta Hawks in the previous year's lottery, low lottery odds doesn't mean a high pick is off the table.
Get ready for some numbers, because a lot are about to be thrown your way. As things stand, the team with the best current odds for the first overall pick is the Chicago White Sox - who sit at 25.45%. For comparison, the Braves have the fourth best odds at 11.57%. These percentages can get a little wonky from year to year because of rules set in place to deter teams from tanking.
Four teams are going to forced to pick outside the top nine because of a few reasons: either winning previous lotteries, revenue sharing, or market size; these teams are the Colorado Rockies, Washington Nationals, St. Louis Cardinals, and Los Angeles Angels.
In a normal year with zero excluded teams, the five teams with the worst winning percentages account for 72.7% of the possible 100% odds for landing the top overall pick. Because of those teams mentioned earlier that are forced to select outside the top nice, the current five teams with the lowest winning percentages total 81.35 % of the odds for landing the top overall pick.
On top of all this, the lottery ONLY determines the draft order for the top six slots in the MLB Draft. Slots 7-18 are ordered by winning percentage. Even if the Braves go on a bit of a run to end the season, dropping below ninth is pretty unlikely. Finally, for those fans extremely worried, the schedule does get a lot harder down the stretch.
Amongst all the potential lottery teams, Atlanta has a tougher schedule based on current winning percentages. The Braves have just five series remaining against teams currently outside of a postseason spot. Thankfully, Atlanta's late season improvement isn't going to hurt them as much as fans think, and their final draft position is simply in the randomized bounces of the lottery ping pong balls.