Bowman Baseball is one of the most highly anticipated sets of baseball cards released every year. Bowman Baseball releases in May. Bowman Chrome releases in September. Bowman Draft releases in January. Every release is going to have the top players, the Matt Olson's, the Chris Sale's, the Ronald Acuna's. The most anticipated part of the releases is top prospects and, more specifically, the release of Bowman 1sts for those top prospects.
Bowman 1sts are the first time a prospect has a card and the first time you can find their autograph in a licensed Topps product affiliated with a professional team. No matter how many times in a career a player signs for a set, there can only ever be one 1st auto. Over the past year brought Bowman 1sts for Tate Southisene, Eric Hartman, Owen Carey, Conor Essenburg, Briggs McKenzie and more. So why did this last release bring so much disappointment?
September brought the release of Bowman Chrome. Atlanta's system had one of the most impactful years prospect wise that it has had in arguably a decade. Fans will have to wait until January to see the draftees from a very highly touted class in AJ Gracia, Carter Beck, Jensen Hirschkorn, and Kaiden McCarthy, but who was on this release?
Bowman released the checklist of upcoming players on the release, and there was shock when looking under the Braves. There was only one prospect. One Bowman 1st auto. Alex Lodise. Alex didn't sign until a year after being selected in the second round by Atlanta, but it was well worth the wait. While it was a very disappointing checklist, Alex had an incredible year, going all the way from A ball in Augusta to hitting .283 in 23 games in Columbus and launched 28 home runs this year. He had had an incredible year and his first autos where going to come with a large amount of value, but brought on the question, where was everyone else?
These are the Braves prospects that need to be next up to get Bowman 1st autos
Bowman Chrome is typically where you will see the release of January's international free agents. Last year brought John Gil and Diego Tornes. They are the highest ranked prospects to come out of last years international class, currently ranked No. 8 and No. 18 on Baseball America's top 30 rankings.
Where is Starlyn De La Cruz who was the second ranked prospect in the class who hit .360 in his debut and already made his way stateside? Where was the top signing Jose Manon who hit .302 in his debut? Where was breakout prospect Jorwin Pulido who hit .337 and also already made his way stateside? Why did Bowman Chrome not come with any of the Braves top international free agents? Speaking of breakout prospects, where are players that had very good years and have yet to have an auto dropped?
Ethan Bagwell has a 1st Bowman card, but has yet to have an auto released for fans to chase. He threw for a 3.17 ERA in 21 games with 105 strikeouts and is ranked No. 23 on Baseball America's rankings. Davis Polo just finished his fourth year in the Braves' system and threw to a 3.00 ERA from A-ball all the way to AAA with a 1.08 WHIP and 140 strikeouts after being signed in 2022 as an international free agent, yet he still doesn't have a Bowman 1st auto.
Dixon Williams was a fourth round pick in 2025 and just finished a year with 24 home runs, 33 stolen bases and an OPS above .804 and has yet to be seen in Bowman. Luke Sinnard is the No. 12 ranked prospect on Baseball America and has had a 1st Bowman, but no autograph. He threw to a 2.94 ERA in 52 innings this year.
Draft prospects are typically going to sign. January will come with more autographs to chase in Bowman Draft. The Braves system had its best year overall in terms of strength of their system in almost 10 years. One hopes that the next few Bowman releases are more robust in terms of Braves representation than what this year's Bowman Chrome was.
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