At this point, the Braves’ 2025 campaign is lost.
The club only has two healthy major league starters in Spencer Strider and Grant Holmes. Half of the lineup is pitifully inconsistent, and the other half just straight up sucks. There’s virtually no reason to believe the Braves can turn this around.
Everything from here on out should be geared to improve future teams in Atlanta, whether that’s 2026 or beyond. The trade deadline should have that goal, whether it’s buying or selling. Playing time should as well.
Tanking for a top draft pick is probably unreasonable, but what about playing for an extra draft pick? The Braves currently have the 4th best odds to have the top overall pick in the 2026 MLB Draft, but they also could earn an extra top draft selection.
Back in 2022, the league created a Prospect Promotion Incentive to motivate organizations to get their best prospects to the big leagues quicker and avoid manipulating service time.
Essentially, the Braves could earn an extra first-round pick because Drake Baldwin was on the Opening Day roster and was a top 100 prospect to begin the year. Now, the next step would be for him to take home the NL Rookie of the Year award, and he’s currently the co-favorite to do so, according to BetMGM.
NL Rookie of the Year Odds
- Drake Baldwin +150
- Jacob Misiorowski +150
- Augustin Ramirez +500
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Drake Baldwin is slashing .274/.352/.474 with 10 home runs, 5 doubles, and 28 RBIs, all of that is good for an OPS+ that is 30% above league average. He’s squarely in the conversation for one of the 10 best catchers in baseball.
Misiorowski has been unbelievable and has the kind of talent that is undeniable, but Baldwin has the advantage of being with the major league club for the entire season. Unfortunately, he’s been splitting time with Sean Murphy.
I’m not saying that the Braves should bench Murphy in favor of Baldwin, but they should absolutely find a way to get him more at-bats in order to help his chances of winning the Rookie of the Year award en route to an extra first-round pick.
This is a farm system that is devoid of talent and could use every prospect available. The Braves aren’t going to tank, but manufacturing more playing time for Baldwin can only be seen as a net positive. Even if he doesn’t win the award, the Braves will have more data on Baldwin to make a more informed decision on whether the club should trade Sean Murphy or not.
Many in Braves Country want the club to move Murphy in favor of the younger, cheaper Baldwin, but making that big of a decision with a small sample size like half of a season would be asinine, in my opinion. Just as we’ve seen with Michael Harris II, budding stars can sometimes flame out.
Now, I don’t want to compare Baldwin to Harris because the latter’s approach at the plate, even when he was hitting near .300, pales in comparison to his counterpart. Baldwin seems legit, but having more information to confirm that notion isn’t a bad thing.
The Braves have more than one incentive to play Drake Baldwin more.
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Photographer: Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire