The Braves reportedly want a left-handed outfielder in free agency
Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that Atlanta's preference is to sign a left-handed hitting outfielder this winter to help balance the lineup
Balance in a lineup is key - a mix of sluggers and on-base types, a variety of speed and quality baserunners, and a good mix of lefties and righties.
Alex Anthopoulos apparently feels that the Braves don’t have enough lefties.
Entering an offseason where the lefties on the roster consist of CF Michael Harris II, first baseman Matt Olson, outfielder Jarred Kelenic (who isn’t a lock to play full time in 2025) and switch hitter Ozzie Albies (who isn’t a lock to be healthy in 2025), MLB insider Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that the Braves are looking to add a left-handed hitting outfielder to the mix this winter.1
So let’s have some fun: What are some of the various profiles out in the free agency class for lefty outfielders and who might the Braves target this winter?
Too pricey and/or have a qualifying offer
The first cohort of hitters that we can likely rule out, whether or not the Braves are trying to enforce austerity this offseason to reset the luxury tax, are guys expected to come in at the top of the market or hold qualifying offers.
Juan Soto’s likely getting 600+ million. If you’re smart enough to regularly read this Substack, I don’t need to tell you why the Braves aren’t in on Soto despite his obvious fit on the roster.
Switch-hitter Anthony Santander, formerly of the Baltimore Orioles, is a defensively-challenged corner outfielder who can MASH: 44 homers and 102 RBI in 2024. But he’s saddled with a qualifying offer and is both a negative defender AND baserunner - the DH spot will be open after 2025, but it still feels like this won’t be a commitment the Braves want to make.
Jurickson Profar (Padres) is expected to sign a multi-year deal this offseason and I’m not 100% sold on the mid-career breakout.2 Would rather not buy high on a guy that’s never put it together until rejoining the Padres late in 2023, even though the underlying metrics say this isn’t a fluke.
Multi-year veterans with a selling point
There are two options I’m watching on the market for lefty-swinging veterans with one prominent skill: Max Kepler and Michael Conforto.
Kepler, formerly of the Minnesota Twins, is a big burly German with absurd raw power but some glaring flaws - ridiculous inconsistency. Throwing out the juiced ball 2019 season, where he hit 36 homers for a Twins team that set the single-season homer record with 307 (since tied by the 2023 Braves), he’s vacillated between double and single-digit homers:
2021 = 19 homers (.211 BA)
2022 = 9 homers (.227 BA)
2023 = 24 homers (.260 BA)
2024 = 8 homers (.253 BA)
Now, while it feels like the season to buy in on a one-year deal (maybe just like Ozzie Albies, he likes odd years?), the 31-year-old will probably be looking for a multi-year deal this winter. But for a guy who is still a positive defender and can put up some good homer totals, I’d be fine with this. While he’s not on the MLBTR Top 50 free agents predictions list, Spotrac has him at $10.6M AAV on a three-year deal, so $31.76M total.
Conforto is another 31-year-old lefty that should sign a multi-year deal, but he’s in an opposite situation of Kepler: A negative defender, he was worth +11 Run Value with the bat now that he’s fully healed from the shoulder issue that dashed his hopes of a long-term deal during the winter of 2022 - declining a $18.4M qualifying offer from the Mets, he signed for 1/$18M with the Giants and then exercised a player option to make another $18M last season.
Conforto batted just .237 with 20 homers and 66 RBI in 130 games while playing a below-average left field, but had some pretty stellar underlying metrics that should make him attractive this offseason: An 66th percentile expected batting average of .257, an 89th-percentile expected slugging of .479, and top-tier barrel rates (11.8%, 80th percentile) and hard-hit percentage (46.0%, 77th percentile.)
Hitting in a more suitable park for his batted ball profile would help, as well: Conforto’s expected 15 homers in San Francisco’s Oracle Park become 20 in Truist Park, thanks to the Chop House’s short-ish porch in right field.3
Also, health is a big factor here. He was hitting .280 through a May hamstring strain, slumping to just .164 for June and July, before rebounding to a .265 down the stretch. MLBTR predicts him to a two-year, $18M deal and I think that’d be perfectly fine for the Braves to stomach this offseason.
Young players with something to prove
Yankees fans, for some reason, HATE Alex Verdugo.
Maybe it’s the fact he joined them immediately after leaving the Boston Red Sox.4 Maybe it’s the fact that he underperformed last season’s batting average by 31 points while not hitting a single homer more than the 13 he hit in Boston last season.
But he’s a free agent and he does some stuff well - he doesn’t whiff a lot, with a 93rd percentile whiff rate of 15.5%, and he’s still one of the better left-field defenders in the game, being an AL Gold Glove finalist with +6 DRS, +3 OAA, and seven outfield assists in 2024.
(It’s important to note that he’s considered a good clubhouse guy that’s well-liked by his teammates, something that has an outsized importance to the Braves.)
The biggest add here would be the plate discipline and contact abilities - he’s not very aggressive with his swings, just 59% in the zone, but makes contact in the zone at a 93.2% rate. Remember the introductory press conference from new hitting coach Tim Hyers and his focus on swing decisions? What better way to improve the collective swing decisions of the roster than by adding a guy who does that really well?
(Also, Verdugo’s first two years in Boston overlapped with the end of Hyers’ tenure, so they already know each other.)
Spotrac has him at a four-year, $60M deal…which seems high. I’m willing to bet that he signs for less, in both years and money, and looks to rebuild some value before hitting free agency again at the age of 29 or 30.
Another option here is Dylan Carlson. The former Rookie of the Year finalist (2021, 3rd place finish) was traded to Tampa Bay at the deadline and then non-tendered by the Rays after being unable to regain that 2021 form: After hitting .266 with eighteen homers, his batting average and homer totals have both dropped every year as he’s struggled with injuries and ineffectiveness.
This one’s a bit harder to understand from an “under the hood” perspective unless you’re working off the understanding that he’s been injured virtually every single season and assuming that’s what has sapped his performance on the field. He’s had six different IL stints in the past four seasons, including absences for a wrist sprain (2021), hamstring and thumb sprains (2022), ankle and oblique sprains (2023), and a sprained AC joint (2024).
Spotrac has him at six years and $31.7M, a $5.3M AAV that feels wildly optimistic in both amount and length considering his recent performance trends and injury history. A one-year pillow contract feels more likely here, allowing him to re-hit the market at age 27.
Veterans with something left in the tank
By far the most prolific demographic here, there are lots of options for a one-year flyer: Jesse Winker, David Peralta, or even former Brave Jason Heyward.5
Winker could continue the divisional tour by signing with Atlanta - he played for both the Washington Nationals and New York Mets last season after being traded at the deadline. While he hasn’t hit 20+ homers since 2021 (and that was in Cincinnati, so glaringly large caveat there), he’s still a high-contact bat that has a double-digit walk rate in all but one season of his career.6 While he doesn’t run or defend particularly well at this point in his career, he does still make plenty of contact and has the arm strength to keep runners honest. Perfectly reasonable to have him in a platoon with Jarred Kelenic after Acuña returns to right field.
Peralta batted .267 for the Padres as a fourth outfielder behind the trio of Jackson Merrill, Fernando Tatis Jr., and Jurickson Profar. He wasn’t bad, he was just behind three guys good enough to play almost every single day. After returning from elbow surgery in late May, he got into 91 games (66 starts) while playing both outfield corners and designated hitter.7
He signed for $6.5M with the Dodgers for 2023 and then played on a minor league contract for the Cubs (who released him in May) and San Diego last season. This is the real budget signing of the offseason, if that’s the direction Atlanta’s taking this winter.
It feels like a certainty that Atlanta makes an add here - the real question is how much they spend. And whichever direction they go, it feels like there are multiple options at every price point.
This was the topic of Tuesday’s ‘Braves Today’ podcast, which is available in both video and audio form (on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you get your podcasts)
The roster as a whole isn’t totally deficient at hitting lefties, for the record - in 2024, the team hit .257 against LHP and .239 against RHP. The damage was pretty evenly split across the lineup, as well, with the incumbent lefty hitters putting up a .262 and the righties a .256.
FINALLY. I remember when he was 2013’s number-one prospect for the Texas Rangers as a shortstop. Glad he’s finally living up to the billing, even if it took him until age-31 to do it.)
If you’re not familiar with how this works in Statcast, they overlay all of a player’s batted ball events with the ballpark’s dimensions to see what a hitter would produce for homers were they to play all of their games at that ballpark, not just a home slate. (Everyone misses that “all 162 games” caveat.) It also doesn’t factor in wind *cough cough Wrigley*, so y’know, not really a perfect measure.
Although for the record, he was traded to New York from Boston. It’s not like he chose to play for both sides of ESPN’s favorite baseball rivalry, like Johnny Damon did.
Don’t actually do this - that was a joke.
9.9% in 2019 while with the Reds.
Most notably for the early season Ronald Acuña Jr.-less outfield, he hit .301 as a rightfielder. Don’t know if it’s meaningful, but it’s interesting.