Grading day one of Atlanta's draft

The Braves added three shortstops in their first three picks of 2025

The Atlanta Braves added three shortstops to their organization in day one of the MLB Draft, selecting one prep and two college shortstops. Let’s talk about it.

Who they selected

Round 1, Pick 22: prep shortstop Tate Southisene

For full thoughts, including Atlanta’s official comments on Southisene, please see last night’s newsletter, “What to know about Atlanta’s first round pick, Tate Southisene”

Round 2, Pick 60: Florida State shortstop Alex Lodise

Lodise won the Dick Howser award last year, college baseball’s version of the Heisman, after hitting .394 with 18 doubles, 17 HR, 68 RBI, a .705 SLG and 1.167 OPS last season for the Seminoles. He successfully hit for the cycle, in dramatic fashion: The final of the four needed hits was the homer, coming as a walkoff grand slam to beat rival Florida in late March.

He’s good enough to stick at shortstop, but the question is how much better he can get at the position. He has good hands and actions to play the position at an average to above-average level. The arm strength is above-average, so he can likely stay on the left side of the diamond, but does he hold shortstop or get bumped to second or third by a stronger defender?

Round 3, Pick 96: East Tennessee State shortstop Cody Miller

Miller was a quality performer for ETSU last year, hitting .332 in his three-year career and putting up both 18 homers (with just a 12.3% strikeout rate) and 27 stolen bases in his final season. In a good sign of his ability to potentially stick at the position, he was named to the All-SoCon Defensive Team, as well as being a second team all-conference selection on the strength of his overall game.

He’s both somehow very aggressive at the plate but doesn’t miss much in the zone (8%), although he chases about a 30% rate and Atlanta will need to work to keep that in check. He does a good job of not hitting too many ground balls and can get into some decent pull-side power, although the overall power ceiling is perhaps fringe to average. I’ve seen conflicting reports on his ability to handle either elevated velocity or spin, so I’m still checking on those to figure out which is accurate and which isn’t.

Thoughts on strategy

I like what Atlanta did here - Lodise is a high-floor, lower-ceiling pick that could move quickly. Miller is another high-floor option, albeit with a more standard development timeline due to the chase. Both of them can stick in the infield and at shortstop, although they’d be at risk of getting beat out by a better defender (and if that happens, they should both have the physical tools for either second or third).

Miller was specifically singled out by Ronit Shah, Atlanta’s Vice President of Amateur Scouting, as someone who had the physical tools to move to the outfield if needed on account of his speed. As we discussed last night, Southisene played the outfield as well in his prep career, and so there are multiple development paths for two of the three shortstops.

Thoughts on signability

1-22: SS Tate Southisene, prep - $3.98M slot value
1-60: SS Alex Lodise, Florida State - $1.52M slot value
3-96: SS Cody Miller, East Tennessee State - $796,000 slot value

Based on a brief media availability with Southisene after being drafted, I expect him to sign for at or close to slot value. He gave a response about being excited to be with the organization that struck me in the same vein as Cam Caminiti’s response to being drafted by the Braves last year, and Caminiti signed for slot value. Using that logic, I don’t project this to be a long, drawn-out process. None of the three should be, although I don’t expect significant savings relative to slot on anyone but perhaps Miller.

What the Braves said about day one

Similar to last night, these comments are from Vice President of Amateur Scouting Ronit Shah.

When asked about Miller’s power increase in his draft year:

(His slugging jumped from .426 to .626 in his third year at ETSU, raising his homer total from 2 in each of his first two years to 18 this season)

 I think just hitting the weight room. He's strong physical kid that's really athletic. He's probably a 70 or 80 runner too. Um, and I think just getting more comfortable with the strength and conditioning program and also like going on the Cape and getting a taste of that really helped him out with that.

(Miller went to the Cape Cod League after the season and hit .261 with a .449 slug in the summer wood bat league.)

When asked about drafting three shortstops - was it the versatility?

 I think you nailed it, especially with guys that have speed and athleticism and having the tools to play short. If you have the tools to play short, you're gonna be able to fit in anywhere on the diamond, especially the infield. Right. And then with the speed that someone like Cody Miller has, for example, he's gonna be able to play in the outfield if he ever needs to do that.

What stood out about Alex Lodise and how long they’ve been scouting him:

 We've been on him the whole year. Even going back to the Cape, our area scout, John Bunnell did a great job of, uh, raising the flag on him last summer on the Cape, and really just identifying a guy that's a plus shortstop in our eyes.

No doubt about it. I mean, he's making highlight plays. He's making the routine play look easy. He's also making the spectacular play look easy, and we're really excited about him.

When they first had Cody Miller on their radar:

 Definitely this spring with, uh, our area scout Will Rich there living close by and locally. He's seen him a ton. He has been on the whole year, was one of his gut feel guys for sure going into the draft.

[…] And then he also went onto the Cape, had a couple home runs there. Uh, we continued to scout him up over there with the wood bat in his hands, and we still saw the power come off. And as I mentioned before, he is a top-of-the-scale runner that can play short.

On how they made the decisions tonight - was it Alex Anthopoulos calling the shots?

Yeah, it's a lot of collaboration here for sure. Top to bottom from me, area scouts, analysts, R&D, we got a lot of people involved in the selections.

On if they feel like they really fortified a weak position in the minor leagues:

 Yeah. Shortstops are always in demand, if you look at the draft. I mean, they're going higher and higher each year. Definitely something to that, I'm sure.

Ronit Shah’s media availability

Here’s a video of Shah speaking about the day one experience in general and those last two picks specifically.

We’ll be back tomorrow with a recap of the entire draft and some very early grades.