In the blink of an eye the Winter Meetings went by and the baseball offseason quickly hit it’s stride. The past week in Dallas featured a lot of money handed out, and some big-time superstars finding new homes. Unfortunately, the Atlanta Braves mostly sat out the offseason transaction derby.

Alex Anthopoulos decided to forgo some of the deals that went down this weekend, although it does at least sound like he was somewhat involved with a couple. While we agree with most of those passes from AA, some of the deals we saw this week felt like the Braves could/should have been in the running for. Here we’ll go through each of the deals we wished the Braves did, and the deals we are glad they didn’t do and finish by giving Anthopoulos a final grade.

Crochet is the biggest swing and miss for Atlanta’s front office this week

All offseason free agent pitchers have been getting PAID. Each guy that came off the board this winter made it more and more evident that the White Sox young phenom Garrett Crochet would require a haul to pry him out of Chicago.

The Braves were rumored to be in the Crochet sweepstakes dating all the way back to last year’s trade deadline, but ultimately it was the Red Sox who ended up winning the Crochet sweepstakes. The deal came about with Boston sending Kyle Teel (number 25 overall prospect), Braden Montgomery (2024 first round pick), and two other top 15 prospects.

While the Braves do have two pitching prospects in MLB Pipeline’s Top 100, both rank in the 90’s. Other prospect rankings are much more intrigued with catching prospect Drake Baldwin, and a deal headlined by him should have been enough to get the job done. If the White Sox didn’t value Baldwin at the same level as Teel that’s fair, but as a result the Braves don’t really have many other places to turn for starting pitching.

Most of the free agent deals have been absurdly steep in cost, but one of Atlanta’s top targets ended up getting a deal that feels as if it could’ve been matched by Anthopoulos. Nathan Eovaldi signed a three year $75 million deal to return to the Rangers, and at 34 years of age this deal isn’t too far off from the combined one-year deals Charlie Morton pitched on from 2022-2024.

Yes, there is risk giving a three year deal to a veteran pitcher. However, Eovaldi checked all of the Braves boxes and now they continue navigating the offseason with some major question marks in the rotation.

Max got a bag and the Braves dodged a bullet

As I mentioned free agent pitchers have made bank this offseason. The biggest winner of them all so far…former Brave Max Fried. The 31 year-old ace got a massive eight year $218 million contract from the New York Yankees to join Gerrit Cole at the front of their rotation.

Most Braves fans knew that Max had likely priced himself out of Atlanta, but to receive the largest contract ever handed out to a left-handed pitcher was something nobody had on their bingo cards. The Braves will miss Fried in the immediate future, but handing out an eight year deal to a pitcher who has had his fair share of injury history is something Braves fans should be thanking Alex Anthopoulos for steering clear of.

As for the hitter’s who were on the market Atlanta was linked to top shortstop Willy Adames for much of the offseason. Adames is a great player, but doesn’t come without flaws. Which is why it was fascinating to see him land a seven year deal for over $180 million with San Francisco. Had the Braves won the Adames bidding war it likely wouldn’t have left them much money to address the other holes on their roster. And while Orlando Arica was quite bad last season he can still bounce back and be serviceable in 2025 on a very cheap contract.

Grade: C-

Overall I’m giving the Braves a C- for their Winter Meetings and offseason work so far. I hear your frustration for Anthopoulos’ lack of moves thus far, but we do have over two months remaining until pitchers and catchers report for Spring Training. The grade is subject to change as the offseason is still incomplete.

While all Anthopoulos has done so far is subtract from the roster, he has earned the benefit of the doubt until at least spring training. Some of the deals that have been handed out so far are just objectively bad ideas including the massive guarantee that Fried got.

However, sitting idle while other teams handout bad contracts doesn’t make up for not being aggressive enough for the players that got deals within Atlanta’s budget. All of Braves country is getting antsy waiting for a big move. I feel confident that move is coming, but until we actually get that blue square announcing a significant move, fans have a right to be a little skeptical.

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