Braves Prospects That Could Move Quickly in 2025

It feels like there's a player every single season that shoots through the farm system. Who is that guy this year?

The Atlanta Braves don’t need a lot from their farm system.

After graduating a dynamic class of prospects that included Ozzie Albies, Ronald Acuña Jr., and Austin Riley, the Braves haven’t been very well-regarded amongst the prospectus apparatus for their collection of talent in the minor leagues.

But despite that, they’ve still been able to get impact players through and to the majors, including Michael Harris II (2022), AJ Smith-Shawer (2023), and Spencer Schwellenbach (2024). Combine those guys with the above-mentioned players, all signed to long-term deals, and you’ve got a roster good enough to be a perennial playoff participant and World Series contender.

But there’s always room for more.

There are a few guys in the system who could theoretically join that group. While they might not win Rookie of the Year like Harris or start a postseason game like Shawver, could appear at three or more levels and/or make an unexpected MLB debut in 2025.

Let’s talk about it.

A pair of “undersized” bulldog pitchers

I’m looking at the duo of Blake Burkhalter and Herick Hernandez in this category.

Both players are considered to be somewhere between undersized and average at best, with Hernandez listed at 5’10 and Burkhalter being listed at 6’0. Let’s take them one at a time, starting with Burkhalter.

A 2nd round pick in 2022 out of nearby Auburn University (where he played for former Braves starter Tim Hudson, who was his pitching coach), Burkhalter was a Second-Team All-American for the Tigers after finishing second in the country with sixteen saves, ten of which came in SEC play.

But Atlanta announced him as a starter at the draft, something that raised some eyebrows at the time since he didn’t have any collegiate experience starting games.¹

It’s a power profile, with Burkhalter throwing a fastball and cutter, backed up by a changeup. There’s good velocity here, with the fastball sitting mid-90s and touching 99. It’s more of a running shape than a pure backspin fastball, but it’s a nice contrast and tunnel to the cutter.

After coming back from Tommy John, Burkhalter was assigned to High-A Rome as a starter and was dominant, starting fourteen games and finishing with a 2.71 ERA. He walked only 2.1 per nine innings, a nice example of control when that often is slow to return after TJ. ‘Burky’ had four quality starts in his final two months of the Emperors’ season. One of those was a seven-inning complete-game shutout², while another was an eleven-strikeout effort with no runs allowed and just one walk in six innings.

If there’s something to watch for with Burkhalter, it’s his platoon splits. He allowed just a .230 batting average to righties last year, but a .288 to lefties. There’s no much to do there other than adding another pitch, but keep an eye on it because if there’s anything they’ll hold him back for, it’s working on that.

Herick Hernandez came to Atlanta in the 4th round last year out of Miami and with much less fanfare than Burkhalter - pitching to a 6.14 ERA in 14 starts for the Hurricanes last year, this was absolutely a '“pitch characteristics” selection by Ronit Shah and team.

But boy was it a good one. After walking 36 in 70.1 collegiate innings last season (with 95 strikeouts), Hernandez made two starts for the Braves with a combined ZERO walks. Over 6.2 innings, he struck out twelve with four hits and two runs allowed.

And it’s because of those pitch characteristics. This is absolutely a “Spencer Strider Starter Kit” kind of pitch mix - a high IVB fastball mixed with a tight slider, a slower curveball, and a changeup that’s the clear fourth pitch right now.

While the stuff isn’t on the level of Strider’s just yet - Hernandez sits low-to-mis 90s on the heater and the slider’s below my preferred 85 mph threshold - it’s a remarkably similar game to what Strider tries to do.

Does the velo improve with an offseason of rest and mound work? It’s possible. Hernandez’s last college outing came in relief on May 17th, pitching 1.2 innings in relief of a blow-up starter in a loss to Pitt. It’s tough for some guys to just do pen work for months and then get back into the groove of starting. The Braves are also pretty good at putting velo on guys, both conventional prospects and castoffs from other teams (like Grant Holmes, as I wrote about over at Athlon Sports last season).

If Hernandez can consistently have 95 at his disposal on the fastball and hit 85 with the slider, it’s a package that could start in High-A and end in AAA or even the majors.

(We talked about both of these guys in the third segment of today’s Braves Today podcast, if you want more some depth on both players.)

Position players that could rise rapidly

This one’s a bit harder, for two reasons.

First is just the heavy preference towards pitching in the system - with most of their lineup spots locked in long-term, the Braves have shifted their draft focus to be in pitching, both in quality (high picks) and quantity (number of selections).

Additionally, Atlanta’s entire minor league system is slanted towards pitching parks³ and so the surface stats don’t always illustrate the player’s true talent level. For example, Michael Harris II hit just five homers in 43 games at AA Mississippi before being called up for the rest of 2022…where he added 19 in 114 games and won Rookie of the Year honors over teammate Spencer Strider.

But we can still look at some guys with tools and intriguing potential and make some educated guesses.

SS John Gil is my first choice here.

Signing for $110,000 in the 2023 J15 class headlined by outfielder Luis Guanipa, I’ve got Gil as the best international hitter in the system. Starting 2024 in the Complex League, he hit .286 with 26 stolen bases at age 18. While he was overmatched in a short GreenJackets cameo to end 2024, a lot of that can be chalked up to accumulated fatigue from increasing his workload from 48 to 90 games as well as seeing legit pro-quality spin for the first time.

Defensively, he’s incredibly rangy at shortstop and has both the plate discipline and smooth swing to excel as a contact-oriented hitter. If he comes out of the gate hot, it’s entirely likely that the dearth of quality shortstop prospects in the system sees him get rapidly promoted.

Outfielder Junior Garcia is another. An international free agent in the 2022 class, he absolutely raked in the complex last year (.317/.432/.446) but also stumbled in a brief Augusta cameo late in the year. I like his power and plate discipline, with a more advanced eye than most 18-year-olds have, although his contact ability has a bit farther to go than some others in the system (24% strikeout rate in FCL). With some more consistent contact and the continued growth of his power, he could end the season in AA as a power-and-speed corner outfield option.

Way-too-early 2026 predictions: RHP Garrett Baumann, catcher Nick Montgomery, OF Isaiah Drake

1. To my credit, when I wrote his pre-draft scouting report that season while freelancing for SI, I pointed out that seventeen of his thirty appearances were more than one inning and he notably had two outings of 2.2 innings: Once in the Super Regional clincher against Oregon State and again in Omaha to take down Stanford.

2. Minor league doubleheaders are just seven innings for each game

3. It is important to note that AAA Gwinnett is closer to neutral than the rest and we don’t know how AA Columbus will play, so it’s possible the top half of the system is more neutral from a run-environment perspective next season.