As the Atlanta Braves look to the 2025 season, there’s only one position on the diamond that truly looks like a question mark.
Though he surprisingly made the 2023 National League All-Star team, starting shortstop Orlando Arcia has been at risk of losing his job for quite some time now. A year removed from one of the worst offensive seasons in all of baseball, Arcia has to be on thin ice heading into spring training.
Fortunately for Arcia, the Braves haven’t made any signings or trades to replace him this winter, while their internal options to replace him remain thin. But there’s still time for Atlanta to pull off one of their signature surprise blockbuster deals before Opening Day.
If the Braves are feeling truly audacious, they could look to acquire one of the more risky contracts in the league from an NL rival hoping to shed salary.
On Monday, Zachary D. Rymer named San Diego Padres shortstop as an unlikely, but plausible trade candidate before the 2025 season, while singling out the Braves as the top team that should inquire about acquiring the four-time All-Star.
“It’s a real ‘Good luck with that…’ idea,” Rymer wrote. “Though Bogaerts has name value aplenty, he’s coming off a 1.2-rWAR season and his 11-year, $280 million contract still has nine seasons left.”
“But if trading for Bogaerts is a means of essentially buying a prospect, it could work. And if any contender should pick up the phone, it’s the shortstop-needy Braves.”
Bogaerts, 32, made all four of his All-Star teams and won five Silver Slugger Awards with the Boston Red Sox. The Padres surprised nearly everyone with their albatross contract offer two winters ago, and with the team now clawing to stay under the luxury tax, that expenditure seems unwise.
Still, Bogaerts has a 106 OPS+ in his injury-shortened time with the Padres thus far, and he’s got a .289/.352/.451 career slash line. Plus, he wouldn’t be the first veteran to find a second wind in Atlanta, should the Braves and Padres agree on an offer that both sides find agreeable.
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