The nightmare 2024 Atlanta Braves season is long enough passed that the only thing that still haunts fans is the near daily barrage of injuries that crippled the team into their short stay in the postseason. However, one thing fans might have forgotten about is the drastic decrease in homers. The disbelief after a ball smoked by one of the many Braves sluggers seemed to die at the track.
Thanks to a recent MLB.com article by Mike Petriello, at least some questions about much blame should be put on the wind can be answered.
How unlucky the Atlanta Braves were due to wind in 2024
While Truist Park was certainly nowhere near the windy chaos as parks like Wrigley Field in Chicago, Fenway Park in Boston, or Citi Field in New York, the Braves home ballpark ranked 12th in most batted balls affected 25 feet or more by wind among the the 29 ballparks with coverage (Toronto’s Rogers Centre is absent from data).
From 2023-2024, wind at Truist Park prevented 21 flyballs from going over the fence, while aiding five. Below is one hard hit flyball that the wind pushed back. (Thankfully, the Braves were still able to come away with the win in this game).
No Braves player or ball hit at Truist made the list for either most aided homer or biggest-wind prevented homer, although a few rival players had wind-assisted long balls show up, but the ballpark itself saw a drastic shift from 2023-2024.
In 2023, Truist Park ranked as the fifth-friendliest stadium in MLB for hitters based on environmental factors, with 1.9 added feet. MLB’s environmental score doesn’t only involve wind, but it is one of the primary factors in the rating.
In 2024, however, Truist Park became the fifth-friendliest stadium in MLB for pitchers, as the stadium lost 4.1 feet to wind. Whether it was just the wind patterns when Atlanta hosted home games, or if games just happened to be rainier or less humid, the stadium’s environmental park factors completely flipped.
Losing distance because of wind isn’t a new thing to Truist, however. In fact, since the Braves moved into Truist Park in 2017, there have only been two seasons where batted balls gained distance due to wind: 2023, and the shortened 2020 season.
Of course, the graphic provided by MLB doesn’t say how many flyballs the Braves pitchers benefitted from, but knowing the club’s philosophy on long balls, there are certainly a fairshare of balls hit by Braves batters that were robbed by the wind.
With that in mind, the trend will likely continue where the Braves will lose more homers to wind than they will gain bombs, but hopefully the heavy hitters can just continue to crush balls.
