Weekly news roundup: It's officially "best shape of his life" season, games start today
If the Atlanta Braves play a game but there's no televisions around to broadcast it, did it really scratch that itch?
Braves baseball is BACK…kinda.
The Atlanta Braves are officially back in action this afternoon, making a road trip to Ft. Myers to take on the Minnesota Twins at 1:05 PM ET.
One problem: It’s not televised. You can listen to Ben Ingram and the rest of the team over on the Atlanta Braves Radio Network, but it’s not being broadcast by either the Braves or the home team Twins.
I love how we were promised that the future would bring us flying cars and fully self-driving cars and fully self-flying cars1 and instead we’re stuck without a way to watch a baseball game in the year 2025.2
But while you’re getting ready for the game, let’s catch up on some of the news of the week that’s interesting but too short for its own newsletter.
It’s “best shape of his life” szn
Astute listeners of the podcast have heard me express disappointment that Marcell Ozuna’s power production cratered in the final month of the season - he slugged .383 in September and missed a second consecutive 40HR/100RBI season by one bomb because of it - as he dealt with “fatigue” after playing in every game for the first full season of his career.
Marcell Ozuna, welcome to the viewership of Braves Today.3
Talking to Justin Toscano of the AJC earlier this week, Ozuna admitted that he pushed too hard at the end of the season and it caught up with him. “At the end of the year, yeah, when you’re close to having a goal and you put a little bit extra work and you try a little bit too hard, that’s what happened,” he told Toscano.
Without setting a specific numerical goal, Ozuna told Toscano that he was approaching this free agent platform year intending to be available and effective for the entire 162. “I don’t have no goals. I just want to play and stay healthy the whole year like last year. […] I just (tried to work to) stay healthy and worked on a little bit more strength so at the end of the year, I won’t get tired,” he said. “And keeping in shape.”
I’ve been wondering what the team would do if Matt Olson were to ever miss time, a thing that hasn’t happened since 20214, as Ozuna takes reps at first base before every game and has even played the position in spring training contests. Maybe this is the year we finally find out.
ICYMI: We discussed the pros and cons of extending Ozuna on Friday’s podcast. (Links to all of this week’s content are down below in the content roundup)
Rumored interest in a free-agent starter
While it’s expected that Ian Anderson and Grant Holmes, both out of options, grab the final two spots in Atlanta’s rotation for Opening Day, it’s not a guarantee. Holmes specifically has experience pitching (and being effective) out of the pen.
Something that would necessitate Holmes (or Anderson, perhaps) being moved to relief would be signing a free-agent starter, and we got a report this week of supposed interest on Atlanta’s behalf in one of the top remaining options.
Per MLB insider Héctor Gómez, Atlanta is one of five teams interested in lefty Jose Quintana. (The other teams are the Mets, Rangers, Padres, and Brewers)
The Mets know him well - he’s spent the last two years there, going 13-16 with a 3.70 ERA and 195 strikeouts across 246 innings. He made 44 starts for New York, returning from injury to make 13 in 2023 and then a full 31-start slate last season.
The fit feels odd to me, though - the Braves arguably have plenty of backend options. He’s not disrupting the (eventual) top four of Chris Sale, Spencer Strider, Reynaldo López, and Spencer Schwellenbach, so there’s an open question as to whether they’d even use him in the postseason as anything more than a long man and relief option.
That being said, there are workload concerns/questions with every single projected starter and per AA’s own words, the hardest thing to find is affordable innings. Quintana reportedly turned down an unknown deal from the Pirates, who pivoted to signing Andrew Heaney for one year and $5.25M, so his demands seem to be higher than what Heaney ultimately signed for.
He was moderately successful as a low-velo “kitchen sink” lefty last season, throwing four pitches 19% of the time or more, so I get why teams would be interested. The fact that his old team in New York, one that is facing the loss of Frankie Montas for multiple months, isn’t interested in bringing him back leads me to think Atlanta also shouldn’t be committing guaranteed money to the 36-year-old either.
Want to watch a press conference?
Forgot to mention this here as I have on the podcast:
We have a playlist on the YouTube channel for media availabilities that the team allows us to post. We posted last week’s Alex Anthopoulos media availability5 and have been posting the daily Brian Snitker chats with the beat after workouts.
The playlist can be found HERE.
This week’s content
Incredibly busy and prolific week of content on both the podcast and newsletter. Here’s a roundup of everything by day.
(All podcast links below go to YouTube, but the Braves Today show can also be found on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts)
Mon: Previewing Atlanta’s position battles this spring (newsletter), Alex Anthopoulos discusses the offseason’s promised payroll increase (podcast)
Tues: What the Atlanta Braves saw in reliever Buck Farmer (both newsletter and podcast)
Wed: Stuff+ has thoughts about the Atlanta Braves (newsletter), notebook episode about new pitches, Sale starting on Saturday, and dumb trade rumors (podcast)
Thur: The six things that actually matter in spring training games (podcast)
Fri: New pitches for Hurston Waldrep and AJ Smith-Shawver (newsletter), Extending Raisel Iglesias, Marcell Ozuna, and others (podcast)
(The Braves Today show can be found on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts)
Why do so many aspirational predictions of progress as a society involve cars?
This is nothing against Ben Ingram - I love baseball on the radio and Ingram’s one of the best in the game right now - but it’s still frustrating that the entire spring schedule isn’t both televised and Statcast enabled.
If you have an idea for what fans of Braves Today should be called - the Braves Today Hive, Braves Todayaholics, etc - please let me know. As you can tell, my ideas are awful.
Matt Olson’s last missed start was Saturday, May 1st of 2021. Oakland started Seth Brown at first base and Mitch Moreland at DH, losing 8-4 to Baltimore at home. Olson started every game after that at first base save for three starts at designated hitter.
Fun fact: the 2nd-most viewed video on the entire channel is AA’s press conference after signing Jurickson Profar at 8,840 views.