The Atlanta Braves’ catching situation in 2025 has not gone exactly as planned.
After an offseason that saw veteran Travis d’Arnaud leave in free agency, Atlanta placed a big bet on Sean Murphy as their primary catcher.
However, a broken rib for Murphy opened the door for Drake Baldwin’s emergence and now the two are in a timeshare behind the plate.
Unfortunately, that meant little chance for a guy like veteran James McCann to get playing time anytime soon.
The Braves signed McCann in March as catching depth in the wake of Murphy’s injury in the event that Baldwin struggled and/or got hurt. McCann was among the better hitting catchers in baseball as recently as 2020, but the 35 year old has shown his age in recent years and was relegated to needing to wait for an opportunity to pop up somewhere.
That opportunity came on Sunday as the Braves released McCann so that he could sign a deal with the Diamondbacks.
McCann’s minor-league deal with the Braves included a rolling opt-out. If another club offered him a major-league job, the Braves needed to either promote him or allow him to depart.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) June 22, 2025
Braves lose James McCann after he received major league offer from Diamondbacks
Now, Atlanta didn’t let McCann leave just out of the goodness of their hearts.
McCann recently revealed that his minor league deal had a rolling opt-out clause that forced the Braves to call him up or release him if he was offered a big league contract with another team.
Arizona just lost Gold Glove catcher Gabriel Moreno to a hand injury and that offer obviously came to McCann in the wake of that.
While it stinks to lose depth at any position, this isn’t going to move the needle much unless one of Baldwin or Murphy gets hurt.
That could happen, but that would only mean that the other catcher would get the lion’s share of the playing time while McCann got the scraps. This allows him to get some time in the big leagues to prove that he still has something left in the tank.
With that, the Braves are pretty much all in on their Baldwin/Murphy pairing this season.
It has been a pretty fruitful platoon thus far, although one wonders how the split in playing time will shift as Murphy struggles at the plate.
