A general manager spends every waking hour of every working day evaluating his team. We’ve arrived at the part of a season when teams evaluate their GMs. The trade deadline is July 30. Contending teams expect GMs to do their part.
Players have been grinding – not a day passes when Braves manager Brian Snitker doesn’t use that word – for four months. This deep into a season, every clubhouse wants reinforcements. There are avenues for post-deadline moves, but the heaviest lifting, playoff-wise, is about to happen. Or not happen. And if reinforcements aren’t found, the occupants of that clubhouse will wonder why.
Alex Anthopoulos concedes that players eye him differently in July. Over his first six seasons here, Anthopoulos has done something significant at every deadline save COVID-compacted 2020. He landed Kevin Gausman in 2018, Raisel Iglesias in 2022, Pierce Johnson last year. In 2019, AA built a new bullpen. In 2021, he famously bought a whole new outfield.
Despite losing their most gifted position player and pitcher for the duration, the Braves hit the All-Star break in decent shape. They had a comfortable lead in the wild card standings. They’ve yielded the fewest runs of any MLB team. They need another bat, but that’s why the deadline exists. Add a rental outfielder to a roster that includes three All-Star pitchers and they’d have a real October chance, Phillies or no Phillies.
Three games later, they’re without Ozzie Albies, lost to a broken wrist, and Max Fried, whose inning of All-Star deployment might have changed the Braves’ season. He’s on the 15-day injured list with forearm neuritis. The Braves believe he’ll be back soon, but forearm twinges sometimes begat elbow twinges, which is a whole ‘nother ballgame.
In less than one season, the Braves have gone from being the lineup without holes to being feeble whenever Marcell Ozuna isn’t up. We’re not supposed to mention batting averages anymore, but grant me this indulgence: Of the nine players on Snitker’s lineup card Sunday, only Ozuna finished the game hitting above .260. And yet …
Before the weekend, the Braves appeared to have succeeded in something they haven’t tried before – positioning themselves for the playoffs at the expense of the regular season. Without saying out loud, “Just get us to October,” they’d conducted business as a team looking only toward autumn. When Spencer Strider and Ronald Acuña were lost, they made no major acquisition. They watched and waited. They still are.
Of Chris Sale’s 18 starts, only two have come on four days’ rest. Of Reynaldo Lopez’s 17 starts, two have come on four days’ rest. (For most pitchers, four days is considered full rest.) That the Braves are 24-11 when Sale/Lopez work – and 30-33 when they don’t – seemed incidental. What counted was that they had three pitchers who, if healthy, could win playoff games.
With Fried’s forearm, they now have two. It’s possible he’ll return soon in peak Fried form. If he doesn’t, the October calculus will have changed – and the trade deadline will have passed.
Item No. 1 on Anthopoulos’ to-do list remains the same: find an outfielder. Item No. 2 is undetermined. Albies doesn’t figure to return until late September, which could compromise the get-us-to-October plan. Subtract a few Fried starts. Assume a lineup that hasn’t hit much will, minus Albies, hit even less. The Braves hold a four-game lead over the three teams sharing the NL’s sixth-best record. Is that enough of a cushion?
Nacho Alvarez, the Braves’ best prospect among position players, was summoned to play second base, though he’s a shortstop by trade. That should allow Anthopoulos to concentrate on the outfield. Michael Harris stands to return in August, but he’s one guy. The Braves don’t score much against anybody’s pitching. (Since April, they’re averaging 3.8 runs.) Imagine this lineup against postseason pitching.
A playoff-caliber bat is a must. So, too, is a healthy Fried. What Anthopoulos doesn’t know – can’t yet know – is how Albies and Fried will heal. Nobody said being a GM is easy.
As demanding as fans can be, a GM has a more important audience. Those guys in his clubhouse expect him to do something, and not just anything. They expect him to make them better enough for it to matter. Anthopoulos has done it before. His players need him to do it again.
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