The Braves Have the Wrong Blueprint for Building a Farm System

Why Atlanta’s approach to scouting and signing talent is leaving the farm system shallow and unbalanced

A few weeks ago, I wrote a well-received piece on how Atlanta’s farm system isn’t delivering a strong return on its investment in pitching prospects.

Consider this part two, because that is not the only thing wrong with the Braves farm system.

They’re not effectively maximizing the opportunities available to them to produce position player prospects, either. Let’s talk about it.

There are two main errors here

The Braves are paying for the wrong players and they’re at the wrong positions.

Let’s take this one at a time.

From the outside, Atlanta’s player acquisition strategy is pretty clear - the draft is focused on adding pitching early while international free agency is focused on one big dollar bonus and several upside players.

But we can get even more specific here.

In the draft, the Braves prefer (but aren’t exclusive towards) college arms early while taking one bat somewhere in the first five rounds (but rarely in the 1st). Later in the draft, opposite of most organizations, they then go after position players, loading up on bats late.

In 2024, the Braves took four straight pitchers to open the draft, one bat (prep catcher Nick Montgomery) in the 5th, and then finished day two with five more arms. Day three was eight bats and two pitchers, with the team getting one shortstop (JuCo Colby Jones), one first baseman (Oregon State’s Mason Guerra), and six outfielders.

In 2023, Atlanta took two bats in their first six picks (since traded college third baseman Sebin Ceballos in the 3rd and prep outfielder Isaiah Drake in the 5th), four more pitchers and an outfielder to wrap day two, and then six bats among their final ten picks to close the draft. Those six bats were two outfielders, a third baseman, a catcher, and a shortstop (Kansas State’s Brady Day, who did not sign).¹

In 2022, guess what? The pattern holds. They took four straight arms to open the draft, followed by a small run on bats with the picks of catcher Drake Baldwin in the 3rd, college 1B David McCabe in the fourth (announced as a third baseman), and third baseman Nacho Alvarez Jr. in the fifth (announced as a shortstop).² But on day three, six of Atlanta’s ten picks were of position players.

I’m not entirely sure this is the best potential use of Atlanta’s draft resources, for two reasons, and we’ll get to those later. Put a pin in this.

International free agency is another recognizable pattern, albeit one with a shorter shelf-life since the organization spent so long locked out of the IFA market during the fallout from the John Coppolella shenanigans. Atlanta likes to be in the mix for one of the top free agents, paying one of the larger bonuses in the class, and then throws a couple mid-major bonuses behind it and then fills the rest of the class on the cheap.

In 2025’s class, they spent over half their $6.26M pool on outfielder Diego Tornes and added flamethrowing righty Raudy Reyes for almost $1.8M behind him.

In 2024, they spent $5M, nearly the entire bonus pool allotment, on shortstop Jose Perdomo, adding in a six-figure bonus for outfielder Juan Espinal.

In 2023, outfielder Luis Guanipa got $2.5M and four other players, including the team’s current top shortstop prospect in Single-A’s John Gil, got six-figure bonuses behind him.

But this approach, both to the draft and international free agency, is a bit flawed.

The numbers don’t support this spending distribution

The ever excellent Down on the Farm Substack recently dove into amateur player acquisition and what commonalities there are behind getting players to the majors. They had a few actionable takeaways from their dive into the data:

1. International amateur signings are mostly random - spending big money on a prospect is nowhere near a guarantee that the player will make the majors.

2. The draft is a much more “reliable” method of player acquisition, but there’s not much difference between taking prep or college players, other than a slightly higher floor for a college guy.

3. Defensive position matters - centerfield, shortstop, and catchers have much more value than other positions when it comes to getting prospects to the majors.

Atlanta’s doing all of these things wrong.

---

Subscription break! We’re adding more premium subs every single day, and you should join the crew! If you’re a frequent reader and/or find yourself really appreciating what we do both here and on the YouTube channel, which includes daily podcasts, bonus or live shows when news breaks, our private group chat, and a soon-to-be-scheduled meetup for a Braves game, why not become a paying member? It’s $6/month or $69 a year, and it helps support everything we’re going over here on Braves Today.

---

1: International free agency

International free agency is a quantity game, not a quality game (under the premise that bonus size is a proxy for the “quality” of a prospect).

While there are success stories from the large bonus recipients - Jasson Dominguez of the Yankees received $5.1M in the 2019 class and is panning out to be a pretty decent outfielder for New York, while their crosstown rivals inked Juan Soto to a $765M deal this offseason almost a full decade after the Nationals signed him for $1.5M in the summer of 2015 - that’s more the exception than the rule.

The Braves officially signed Ronald Acuña Jr. out of Venezuela for $100,000 in 2014, and he has the most WAR of any international free agent the organization has signed since Andruw Jones put pen to paper out of Curacao in 1993. Going outside of the organization, Elly De La Cruz joined the Reds for just $65,000 in the 2018-2019 class, while Andy Pages of the Dodgers and Ceddanne Rafaela of the Red Sox were considered All-Star snubs this season while signing in 2017 for $300,000 and $10,000, respectively.

Is Atlanta’s decision to stay near the top of the IFA market, with only a handful of supporting signings, the best use of their limited resources? The data says no, they should instead be trying to grab as many players as possible, expanding to two DSL teams if needed, so that they have as many ‘lottery tickets’ as possible.

2: Draft spending

Similarly, Atlanta’s focus on arms early and position players late in July’s draft means they’re giving up on potential impact. Per research from Oyster Analytics, each additional $100k bonus given to a hitter in the MLB Draft results in an additional .031 WAR.

Atlanta occasionally splurges on late-round prep hitters - like the $337.5K they gave Eric Hartman last year - but that’s more the exception than the rule; most guys they take late are lucky to get anything over the basic, non-draft-pool-impacting amount of $125k.

Put simply: For the most part, you get what you pay for from drafted hitters.

Atlanta’s only homegrown first-round pick in their lineup is Austin Riley,³ although it’s worth mentioning that Matt Olson was a first-round pick by the Athletics in 2012 and Chris Sale was taken by the White Sox in 2010’s first round.

It’s possible that there’s a reason the Braves are one of the only teams that pay for pitching early and then pivot to hitters late - as I discussed last week, the Braves are the only team to devote 60% or more of their bonus pool to arms from the 2018-2023 span - and that’s because it’s not as effective of a return on investment.

SIDEBAR: It’s worth pointing out that this decision is at least defensible by Atlanta, as the major league roster has been full of long-term deals while they’ve needed to supplement with arms. I’ve gone on the record many times with the statement that the farm system, while not considered good by many external standards, was the right one for them at the time. Unfortunately, with the lagging offense and pending lineup holes, it’s no longer configured correctly and needs to be recomposed.

3: Positional distribution

This has long bothered me about Atlanta’s farm system.

While the team has taken some shortstops in recent years, including back-to-back picks in 2021 of Texas Tech’s Cal Conley (4th) and Georgia Tech’s Luke Waddell (5th), the position doesn’t seem to be a priority for the Braves.

Instead, what the Braves are seemingly drawn to do is attempt to move players up the defensive spectrum. As I alluded to above, 2022 saw both Nacho Alvarez (a college third baseman announced as a shortstop) and David McCabe (announced as a third baseman despite playing first base in college) move to more demanding positions in pro ball. It’s a strategy that doesn’t seem to track with expectations - the general consensus is that shortstops are more valuable because of their ability to play anywhere else on the diamond.

And again, the research bears this out. Defensively valuable players, those who man either shortstop, centerfield, or catcher, have a much stronger chance of making the majors than players who man less premium positions. Additionally, a strong infield defender at any position was likely a former shortstop at some point in time, while players drafted as second or third basemen are more likely to be negatively graded defenders if they make the majors.

And if you think about it, this makes sense. A shortstop who can’t stick at the position still has multiple fallback options, depending on his flaw: If is arm isn’t good enough, he can kick inside to second base. If his range can’t hack it at short but the arm is good, kick him out to third. If he doesn’t have the smooth hands but has decent speed, he can head to the grass.⁴

If you’re starting with a third or second baseman, those fallback options are fewer and farther between. The bat has to carry more of the weight, as well.

This holds for infield versus outfield draftees, as well. Per Down On The Farm, a high school shortstop who receives a $4M bonus, on average, produces double the WAR per season than a high school leftfielder who receives the same bonus. He likely either produces more defensive value or has more opportunities to change positions until he finds something that sticks.

But that’s not how Atlanta approaches the draft. They still take marginal defenders like Wadell or the 2022 9th-round pick Cory Acton, who was announced as a second baseman, instead of doubling or tripling down on shortstop, center field, and catcher. They draft third basemen like Alvarez and try to convert them into shortstops rather than just grabbing a natural shortstop and enjoying the multiple fallback options.⁵

The Braves aren’t out of talent; they’re just out of alignment. They’re spending big in international free agency where randomness rules, drafting pitchers early while hoping to uncover hidden gems late, and converting third basemen into shortstops instead of just drafting shortstops.

It’s a strategy that bets on outliers and ignores what the data (and common sense) have been screaming for years: centerfielders, catchers, and shortstops stick. Draft athletes. Sign in volume. Build from the middle out.

Or, sure: keep loading up on bullpen arms and hoping one of the converted corner infielders turns into the next Brandon Crawford. That’s a plan, too.

But if Atlanta wants a farm system that actually supports this core for the long haul, it’s time to stop zigging where everyone else zags - and start building smart.

1. He elected to return to Kansas State rather than sign with Atlanta for 12th-round money. The Phillies took him in the 10th last year, successfully signed him, and he’s currently hitting .260 in Single-A Clearwater while playing third base.

2. I’ve previously complained about this insistence on attempting to convert prospects up the defensive ladder after college, and there’s no better example than these last two position player picks (plus last year’s selection of Ceballos).

And just wait, I’m going to do it some more in just a minute.

3. Matter of fact: Riley is Atlanta’s only first-round pick on the Major League roster.

4. At one point in time last season, the San Diego Padres were playing seven former shortstops in their starting nine - everything but the catcher and the leftfielder.

5. The counterpoint here is that Atlanta might already have the confidence that Alvarez can play third base if his attempts to learn shortstop don’t work out, which is exactly what happened and so they view the attempted transition as an opportunity to build in surplus value to the pick.