Now that the 2025 regular season has officially wrapped up, many folks around baseball circles are publicly stating their end of season award winners. Some award races are a foregone conclusion, like NL MVP and AL Rookie of the Year. However, other races will forge debates all the way until the final results are announced in November.
For the Atlanta Braves, Drake Baldwin's Rookie of the Year campaign is a vital storyline to follow until it's reveal. Baldwin ended the season on a hot stretch, and has the edge over his biggest competition (Cade Horton of the Cubs) of being on the roster since Opening Day. Earlier this week we saw Jayson Stark of The Athletic tell us why he picked Baldwin over Horton, and now that the season is over it seems more baseball pundits are hopping aboard the Drake Baldwin Rookie of the Year train.
Before you go to bed tonight please remember:
— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) September 30, 2025
Drake Baldwin should win NL Rookie of the Year 😇 pic.twitter.com/jag9ACINmb
Drake Baldwin earning more and more ROY love should excite Braves fans for eventual voting
Mike Petriello of mlb.com is one of the latest pundits to come out with Baldwin as his NL Rookie of the Year leader. Petriello went as far as putting Horton fourth in the pecking order with his reasoning pointing towards Horton's limited workload this season.
With each opinion that comes out regarding NL ROY voting, most agree that Horton's 118 innings doesn't feel like it matches up well against Baldwin's full body of work. That was the same reasoning Bob Nightengale of USA Today used when explaining his choice of Baldwin for NL Rookie of the Year. Of course this sample size isn't near large enough to start etching Baldwin's name on the trophy, but it is enough to give Braves fans hope that Baldwin will get his recognition come November.
Unfortunately, November is still months away, and that means Braves country won't get an answer to this dilemma anytime soon. Meanwhile, the team will not be participating in postseason play so the attention turns to Brian Snitker's future. Other team's across Major League Baseball were letting go of their managers left and right, but for Atlanta all of these important questions feel like they're going to drag out a bit longer.