The one thing that the Atlanta Braves really need to go right this offseason is just for all of their injured players to get healthy again. If the Braves can get Ronald Acuna Jr., Spencer Strider, Sean Murphy, and Austin Riley back to full strength, they will be in really good shape heading into 2025 assuming that they can cover for the potential loss of Max Fried well. However, offseasons can be as much about what Atlanta's rivals do as what the Braves end up doing themselves.
Without question, the biggest name to watch this offseason in all of baseball is Juan Soto. Braves fans are obviously quite familiar with Soto going back to his time with the Nationals. Given his 1.118 OPS against the Braves in his career, Atlanta wasn't exactly upset to see him leave the division when the Nationals tore things down and traded Soto to the Padres.
However, Soto's time torturing Braves fans might not be over just yet. In addition to the Yankees (gross), Nationals (double gross), and the division rival Mets and Phillies (horrifyingly gross), Soto apparently has a new potential landing spot this offseason as the Dodgers are somehow expected to pursue Soto this offseason.
Report: Dodgers interested in signing Juan Soto. 😑😑😑 https://t.co/r6Ub6uAmFK pic.twitter.com/CTIWy6Pmh5
— theScore (@theScore) October 27, 2024
Dodgers entering the fray for Juan Soto would send Braves fans to a dark place
Let's get the obvious part out of the way: just because the Dodgers are "interested" in Juan Soto doesn't actually mean anything. Mentioning big spenders like LA is something that agents and teams often do to create urgency in the market and spook potential rivals into making bad financial choices. Especially this early in the offseason, taking rumors with a grain of salt is the way to go.
However, the ever-growing list of Soto suitors is looking awfully grim. The Yankees were the source of so much pain for Braves fans in the 1990's and they seem like the frontrunner for Soto at the moment. Then you have the division rival Nationals who got a haul for Soto when they traded him and now could make a play to bring him back as a free agent. Then you have another division rival in the Mets who just made it to the NLCS and who have more money then sense. Oh, and the Phillies still exist and have Dave Dombrowski running the team who has never seen a star player that he doesn't want to sign.
Adding the Dodgers to the fray makes things even worse. In addition to raising some very real questions for MLB about allowing deferred contracts (like the one given to Shohei Ohtani) that allows big market teams to buy up all the talent, the Dodgers would be a serious problem for many, many years if they were able to add Soto to their roster.
Perhaps Soto's preference for the east coast will end up winning out and keep LA out of the hunt realistically. Maybe a team like the Giants will throw a huge offer Soto's way that he and Scott Boras can't refuse. As things stand, Atlanta fans have to hope something changes because the Soto sweepstakes is shaping up to be pain for the Braves.