How Have Atlanta's Recent Drafts Produced?

The Atlanta Braves have had clear strategies entering the draft every season, but to mixed results.

The Atlanta Braves know what they’re about when it comes to the MLB Draft.

Almsot every single team drafts more pitchers than position players. But the Braves are unique in that they’re willing to PAY those pitchers. From 2019 through 2023, no team has devoted a larger percentage of their MLB Draft bonus pool to arms than the Atlanta Braves, who are the only team to exceed 60% in that timespan with 61% of all dollars going to pitching prospects.

(One of my offseason projects is updating this to include 2024, but I don’t expect the core fact of this team investing heavily in pitching to change.)

But what sort of return have the Braves gotten in the draft, both for their investment and relative to their peers? Let’s look at it year-by-year. (The number in parenthesees denotes the round the player was selected in.)

2019: We’d call this a success

By my count, six of Atlanta’s draft picks from this season have Major League service time.

The most successful is Michael Harris II (3), who was the 2022 NL Rookie of the Year and signed a 8/$72M extension that August. I’ve got him as a future Gold Glove candidate and All-Star.

Right behind Harris in service time is catcher Shea Langeliers (1), who was traded that same season to the then-Oakland Athletics in the Matt Olson deal. He debuted that August and has hit .215 w/ 57 HRs across two full seasons, amassing 4.1 WAR.

Joey Estes (16) was in that same deal and has a career 5.16 ERA for the A’s across 26 MLB starts.

Darius Vines (7) saw some time as both a starter and reliever for the Braves, although he was DFA’d during the 2024 season and finished up in Double-A Mississippi.

Other major leaguers are infielders Braden Shewmake (1) and Vaughn Grissom (11), both of which have been traded after not working out at shortstop in Atlanta. Shewmake wasn’t able to hit, with a career minor league slugging of just .402, and was traded to the Chicago White Sox last season. Grissom showed he couldn’t handle shortstop defensively despite Ron Washington’s best efforts, with his 2023 fill-in for an injured Orlando Arcia saw him put up a stunning -6 OAA in just 158 innings. He’s since been traded to the Boston Red Sox, where he played second base around multiple injury absences.

Biggest Hit: Harris - getting a major leaguer in the third round is nice, but to get an impact player that can both defend and hit at the level he has so far is an absolute win.
Biggest Miss: Shwemake - he wasn’t a power producer at Texas A&M, hitting just 22 hoemrs in three seasons, but his OBP cratering by 85 points and his batting average falling by eighty in the minors just doomed him as a major leaguer.
Most Valuable Pick: Harris - he’s put up 11.6 WAR in just 362 career regular-season games.
Jury’s Still Out: Tyler Owens (13). Traded twice last year, first to Texas in the J.P. Martinez deal and then again to the Detroit Tigers, he put up decent numbers as a 23-year-old in Double A and could be in line for some relief innings for the Tigers as soon as next season.

2020: Short draft, but a successful one

Not only was the 2020 draft only five rounds due to the Covid-19 pandemic wiping out senior seasons for most college and prep players, but the Braves entered the event with only four picks after signing free agent reliever Will Smith ahead of the 2019 season.

Depsite that, this was a successful draft by every possible measure: Three of the four players have reached the majors, with one already receiving a contract extension and two of them being All-Stars.

Spencer Strider (4) is obviously the headliner here, signing for just under the $451.8k slot value (a $2500 difference, which was covered by the contingency bonus). I don’t have to tell you how good he’s been and he’ll absolutely take multiple superlatives at the end of this section.

Bryce Elder (5) is the other win here, coming out of Texas and making an All-Star Game in 2023. While fans have a weirdly-irrational hate of the guy at times, it’s a legitimately useful skill set that could still be developed into someone who can stick at the major league level as a back-end starter and innings eater. Book’s not closed on him just yet.

Jared Shuster (1) joined Shwemake in Chicago, being moved last offseason, and pitched to a 4.42 ERA as mostly a reliever last season. It’s an odd profile - he’s a fly ball pitcher that mostly avoids hard-contact, but when it is hit, it’s almost always a barrel. I imagine he’ll be back in Chicago’s pen for another season, but if Garrett Crochet does get traded, maybe he gets another shot as a starter in 2025.

Jesse Franklin V (3) is the sad story here - a well-rounded college performer at Michigan, he’s dealt with both a torn UCL and left shoulder tendinitis that has limited him to just 210 games across four seasons. Having missed all of 2024, he’s fallen out of most prospect rankings for the Braves.

Biggest Hit: Strider and it isn’t particularly close. He’s put up 7 WAR in just two full seasons as a starter, leading all of baseball in strikeouts in 2023 and sitting on a career K/9 (13.5) that is among the best all-time
(The career leader in K/9, minimum 1000 innings, is Blake Snell with 11.2267, followed by Chris Sale at 11.0941.)
Biggest Miss: Shuster - after some rough first few years on campus at Wake Forest, he thrived on the Cape and then in his draft year with significant drops in his walk rate and increases in his velo, touching 97. Neither of those trends carried over into pro ball, however.
Most Valuable Pick: Strider and it once again isn’t particularly close
Jury’s Still Out: Elder. While he was capital-B BAD last season in Atlanta (6.52 ERA in 10 starts), his AAA stats were remarkably similar to his 2023 MLB performance. He flashed improved fastball velo and ability to get whiffs, opening the possiblity of some further development getting him back into a potential back-end innings eater.

2021: How do they keep getting away with it?

Not as many major leaguers here, which tracks, as most prep draftees would just now be hitting their third year in professional baseball (and finally draftable had they gone to college).

But despite that, there’s some big names here that you’re already aware of: Spencer Schwellenbach (2) and AJ Smith-Shawver (5), as well as a few others that were traded and are either already up or on the cusp of a call-up.

Schwellenbach is the big positive to come out of Atlanta’s injury-riddled 2024 season, establishing himself as a top half of the rotation caliber performer after making the jump straight from Double-A to the bigs. A converted college shortstop who also closed in his draft year, the conversion to a starter was delayed for a season by Tommy John surgery but is a roaring success and could lead to downballot Rookie of the Year votes and an extension in the near future.

Smnith-Shawver’s already pitched in two postseasons, including one start, despite just turning 21 this season. One of the most athletic players in Atlanta’s organization, he’s my dark horse for a rotation spot next season. His 2024 was set back by an oblique injury and then some needless tinkering Atlanta did with his slider shapes, but AJSS’s got both the stuff and the mindset to be a major league performer as soon as 2025.

A forgotten name from this class, owing to a trade, is Justyn Henry-Malloy (6). Taken out of nearby Georgia Tech as a third baseman, he quickly converted to left field before being traded to the Detroit Tigers prior to 2023 for Joe Jiménez. He hit eight homers down the stretch for Detroit as they fought their way to the postseason for the first time in over a decade before going 5-11 against Houston and Cleveland as a DH and pinch hitter.

Dylan Dodd (3) debuted back in 2023, putting up a 7.60 ERA in seven starts and then backing that up with two runs allowed in two innings of relief last season. With an ERA of 5.35 across 20 starts for Gwinnett this season, he feels like he’s at the absolute end of the 40-man’s pecking order for pitching and I wouldn’t be surprised to see him either DFA’d or moved this offseason.

There’s a few other names here that are on the cusp of debuting, including Ryan Cusick (1) and Caleb Durbin (14)…although when they do it, it’ll be for other teams. Cusick was moved to the Athletics in the Olson deal along with Langeliers and Estes, while Durbin is likely one that Atlanta would want back: He was part of the deal, along with RHP Indigo Diaz, for reliever Lucas Luetge…who pitched 13.2 innings for Atlanta last season, putting up a 7.24 ERA, before spending last season in the Red Sox system and then joining the Cubs on a minor league deal late in the year.

Biggest Hit: AJ Smith-Shawver, who has the prospect pedigree and potential of a frontline starter despite being a 7th-round pick that hadn’t played much baseball to that point of his career.
Biggest Miss: As much as Cusick not panning out so far made the Braves stop drafting Wake Forest pitchers, I’m going to argue Cal Conley (4). Taken out of Texas Tech as a jack of all trades shortstop without much power, his bat cratered in professional ball. He’s a career .235 hitter across parts of four seasons in the minors, including just .242 in AA this last season despite repeating the level. If he makes the majors, which is a big if at this point, it’ll be as a utilityman at best.
Most Valuable Pick: Schwellenbach, who was worth 2.7 WAR last season despite making only 21 starts.
Jury’s Still Out: Dylan Dodd. Yes he’s not performed well in his major league career, but there’s potential here. Its just unlikely that Atlanta has the runway to unlock it - it’s hard to let a guy ‘figure it out’ at the major league level (or even the high minors) when you’re a World Series contender. A change of scenery would do him good

2022: You can see what they were trying to do

There’s a very clear strategy at play with several of the day two picks here for Atlanta: Let’s try to find value by grabbing guys and moving them to more valuable positions.

The results are…mixed so far.

The success story from that strategy is Blake Burkhalter (2C). An All-SEC closer at Auburn, the Braves moved him into a starting role and after a delay for Tommy John surgery in 2023, he came out of the gate firing: Burkhalter put up a 2.71 ERA across 14 starts for High-A Rome, striking out 63 against only 16 walks and 3 homers. It wasn’t all two and three-inning stints, either - after his first month at the level, he averaged over five innings a start and had a seven inning complete game against Hickory in his next-to-last outing of the season.

Some of the other position swaps haven’t been as successful - Nacho Alvarez Jr.(5) was a community college third baseman that they tried at shortstop and David McCabe (4) was a D1 first baseman that they tried at third base. Both of those experiments have largely been failures, with Alvarez considered to be more of a 2B/3B than shortstop now and McCabe playing first base in this year’s AFL after UCL repair delayed the start of his season and confined him to DH duties all year.

The hits keep piling on this class: Top picks Owen Murphy (1) and JR Ritchie (CB-A) have already had Tommy John, with Murphy going down soon after Ritchie returned this season. Both of their timelines have been delayed at least a full year now, an unfortunate commonality with this system as of late.

Biggest Hit: Burkhalter - even if he ends up not working out as a starter, the experience should help him rapidly move through the system as a reliever should the Braves want to go that direction. I’m confident he could see MLB bullpen time in 2025 and hold his own, if Atlanta needs him to.
Biggest Miss: Cole Phillips - the 2nd rounder missed time with Tommy John surgery, was traded as part of the Jarred Kelenic acquisition, and then went down with Tommy John again after joining the Mariners. He has yet to throw a pitch in professional baseball and is not expected to get on a mound until sometime in 2025.
Most Valuable Pick: N/A, as no one but Alvarez has accumulated MLB service time to accumulate WAR
Jury’s Still Out: McCabe. Prior to the injury, he wasn’t producing much power (17 homers in 123 combined A/A+ games) but looked to be a competent hitter outside of that. Now that he’ll have some time to get healthy and back into form, 2025 could potentially be a strong year for the slugger as he eyes a potentially vacated DH spot in Atlanta for 2026.

2023: Looking good so far, but it’s not perfect

As expected given a draft class that has had exactly one full MLB season, things are still looking bright for a majority of this class so far.

Hurston Waldrep (1) already made his debut, although he showed across his two starts that he clearly wasn’t ready before an elbow injury shut him down for most of the year. Drue Hackenberg (2) was a surprise overslot draft-eligible sophomore that has done nothing but excel in professional ball, going from a 4.50 college ERA to a 2.99 mark in the minors. Cade Kuehler (2C) was in the midst of a breakout first season (2.52 ERA in Single-A) before going down with a UCL injury, while Lucas Braun (6) and Garrett Baumann (4) are in Atlanta’s top 20 prospects after perfectly acceptable first seasons in professional baseball

Biggest Hit: Hackenberg - I’ve got him on my shortlist of prospects to debut in 2025 and I think he’s the platonic ideal of a sinker/slider guy, one that can get whiffs as well as fall back on generating weak contact pretty consistently.
Biggest Miss: Sabin Ceballos (3). Continuing a theme from 2022, Ceballos was a D1 third baseman (Oregon) that was told he’d be tried at shortstop. Whatever the Braves saw in workouts and spring must have disassuaded them of that notion, with all of his defensive reps coming at third base in 2024. Having hit just .259 with three homers in 84 games for Rome, he was traded to the San Francisco Giants in the Jorge Soler deal at the trade deadline.
Most Valuable Pick: N/A, as no one but Waldrep has accumulated MLB service time to accumulate WAR
Jury’s Still Out: Isaiah Drake (5). As an uber-athletic prep outfielder, there was always some work to be done here to get his offense where it needed to be. But a 69 game sample in Single-A Augusta resulting in a .163 batting average and .511 OPS can’t be what the organization had in mind when they went almost double slot value to sign him away from a Georgia Tech commitment. While the speed was as advertised, with Drake going 23-27 on stolen base attempts, the hit tool needs to develop by leaps to give him a future as even a defense-first bench outfielder at the major league level.

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If you’re interested in learning more about several of these prospects, I teamed up with fellow substacker

Chris Clegg

of

The Dynasty Dugout

to break down the Braves farm system recently on the Braves Today podcast: