Did Jurickson Profar Swindle the Atlanta Braves

Did Jurickson Profar Swindle the Atlanta Braves

A 31-year-old has a breakout season and then gets popped for peeds. Did the Atlanta Braves get fooled by Jerickson Proar or did they get what they paid for? And what do they do with him going forward? We’ll discuss all that on today’s episode of Locked on Braves. So, let’s get into it. You are Locked on Braves, your daily Atlanta Braves podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Hey, welcome back to Lockdown On Braves, part of Lockdown Sports Atlanta, where we cover your favorite Atlanta sports teams each and every day. I’m your host, Jake Mastriani. You can follow me on social media at shortstop.all. Check out the podcast there at Lockdown Braves onx and Lockdown Braves on Instagram. If you’re new and watching this on YouTube, please do me a huge favor. Stop what you’re doing. Real quick, three things. Hit the subscribe button, hit the thumbs up button, leave me a comment down below. Even if it just says comment. Many of you still do that to help out the algorithms and I appreciate it a ton. Thank you so much for your support here of Locked on Braves. And on the audio side, you can help out as well. Just leave me a fivestar review on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. Locked on Braves is available wherever you get your podcast. And big shout out to my everydayers out there, the comment gang as well. Thank you so much for riding here with us through this 2025 season. We got one more episode coming your way this week. Got a mailbag episode on Friday. Look out for a post Friday, early Friday morning from Lockdown Braves onx. Send in your question to that post to be answered on our Friday mailbag episode. On today’s episode though, we’re going to talk a lot about Jerickson Profar. We got about a hundred at bats now that he’s returned from his suspension. And I want to dive into the numbers and see are are the Braves getting what they paid for or did they get fooled with the breakout season at 31 year years old with the possible peed use in that. We’ll also talk about uh Terry Mcgherk’s comments as they had a shareholders meeting on Thursday morning. Some of his comments about the payroll and going forward. We’ll get into all of that on today’s episode. But I want to start with ProFAR and let’s just dive back a little bit. Let’s let’s roll back the curtain a little bit for ProFar and talk about what led up to this past offseason. Jere Proar as many of you may know was a top prospect coming up in the Rangers system but then kind of fizzled out. Never really lived up to those expectations from 2012 when he made his debut to 2023. So we’re talking about 10 11 year gather. There’s a couple years there where he didn’t play in the big leagues but you’re talking about nine 10 years in the big leagues. He had a combined a combined 4.8 F4. That’s Van Graph’s war. 4.8 Four from 2012 to 2023. Keep that in mind. In 2018 and in 2022, he had two plus F4 seasons. Um, so both of those were were between two and three F4. So, two good seasons for him, but that was his max. In 2023, he had a negative 1.6 F4. I I don’t see too many negative 1.6 F4 seasons. That is really, really bad. A 126 ISO league average is about 140 and ISO isolated power. You just subtract a batting average from slugging percentage to get ISO. And it’s to determine how many extra base hits you actually get. Who actually is hitting for power. That’s what the ISO number does. And we know 2023 was a year where the baseballs were juiced and he had a negative 1.6 F4, 126 ISO, and one of the worst seasons. I mean, it was an atrocious season that he had in 2023. And he was kind of becoming, when you look at the numbers, it was kind of an every other year type of thing that ProFar was was seeing, which we see with a lot of players. It feels like Aaron Nola is like that on the pitching side. Matt Olsson’s been like that to a degree on the offensive side. He was good in 2018, bad in 2019. Good in 2020, awful in 2021. Good in 2022, worse than awful in 2023. So, we’ve seen him kind of have these ups and downs. And the thing about ProFar positively, which I talked about when the signing happened, is that even in his bad years, he had a solid walk rate, a great strikeout rate, and decent on base numbers. I mean, considering what the average was, I mean, some of those bad years, the on base was still around 300. So, it’s a player that at least did that. He at least had that skill set to put the ball in play, take some walks, get on base a little bit. Then in 2024 at the age of 31, ProFar had the best season of his career, slashing 280, 380, 459 with 24 home runs, which is which was a careerhigh and 4.3 F4, almost double what his season high was before that. And like I mentioned, his combined F4 from his first, you know, 12 seasons in the big leagues was 4.8. And then in 2024, he had 4.3 F4 just in that season. So again, nearly doubled his career F4 in that one season. And that was despite a negative 10.7 defensive rating. And their defensive rating goes into Fang Graph’s overall war. And so even with that awful defensive rating, he still had over four wors. A lot of fours there. The 280 average was a careerhigh. And the only other season, he only had one other season with a batting average above 254. So this is a outlier. His previous high in on base percentage was 343. And again, it was 380. So nearly 40 points higher. That is that is an outlier. And it’s a guy that’s generally had a pretty good on base. And this was still way above that. He had a similar slug in 458, but most other years, you know, were much lower than that. But he has had some similar slugging type of numbers in the past. He’s had a couple of 20 home run seasons. So 24 is not outrageous total, but the other numbers, I mean, they are clear outliers. And look, there were reports, and we talked about this when he signed, there were reports of swing changes he made while working with Fernando Tati senior the offseason before that, and that’s what he attributed to helping this kind of breakout at age 31. But still, it it felt like an an outlier. I can understand making some swing changes, but at age 31 to then have a a season like that where you just don’t have a career season. It is a career season by a wide margin. Um always felt a little bit bit fishy, but I but I bought into it because of the swing changes. Now, even when we signed him, the Braves signed him, I talked about the fact that you have to sign him knowing that there’s probably going to be some regression from that. But the Braves do on January 23rd. We’ve been waiting for a big move all off seasonason. And the Braves signed Jerick Proar to a three-year $42 million deal. Now, this certainly was not a a massive deal for a playing that was coming a player coming off the year that he just had, but teams were obviously going to be very cautious with him. The San Diego Padres’s in particular. I had so many Padres’s fans, Jav himself of locked on Padres’s reach out to me and were so upset that the Padres’s didn’t bring him back. But even the team where he had that breakout year with, they weren’t willing to give him that type of money. And the Padres’s had a lot going on this past off season. You know, why they had kind of a weird offseason, didn’t spend a lot of money, and that could have been a big reason for it. But it was one of those deals that you feel like AA taking a shot on a guy that might be a bargain if he turns out to be the player that he was. And those are kind of deals that AA likes. Now, as the excitement of a new season was upon us, it was quickly deteriorated by, you know, starting 0 and4 against the Padres’s and then getting the news of Proar suspension on March 31st and got worse after that, losing three in LA. And so, all of a sudden, here you are 0 and4 to begin the year on the road against the Padres’s. The only big addition from the off season was immediately gone in ProFAR. And I I’ve mentioned I’ve mentioned many times on this podcast that I think losing Proofar like that that early while the team was already struggling was had a bigger effect than we we realize. Not only was he the big addition in the off seasonason, it was also a bat that was supposed to help even out this lineup and bring a bat that could put the ball in play and kind of fit the style that Tim Hires was going to bring in or that we thought Tim Hires was going to bring in that more patient approach, bat-to ball skill type of approach. So, it felt like not just, you know, they went out and got ProFar, but it felt like a changing of the guard and offensive philosophy going and getting a bat like ProFar and he’s gone immediately. Not only that, he also seemed like it was a he was going to be a great clubhouse guy. Like I said, I had many Padres’s uh fans reach out to me and just were so upset that Proofar was gone because he was such an exciting part of that team. He was such a good teammate and they wanted that excitement back and he’s gone. And this was a huge blow. Now, they did recover. The Braves did recover. They got two and above 500 by the middle of May. They got Ronald back. They got Strider back and nothing really changed. I think this would have been a bad team either way. But losing Proofar and losing ProFar like that for that long, I think had a a a much bigger impact than a I think a lot of people give it credit for. So, that’s everything leading up to now. So, when we come back, I want to take a look at 2025. What have we seen from ProFar this year to either make you think that the Braves got absolutely fooled by 2024 or to make you think the Braves actually got what they paid for and that he could be part of this future? And if he’s not, what do the Braves do with him? We’ll talk about all that here next. This episode is brought to you by Prize Picks, the daily fantasy platform that lets you turn your football predictions into real rewards. Preseason is already heating up and college football isn’t far behind. It’s the perfect time to lock in your seasonl long more or less picks for the 2025 football season, all before week 1 kicks off. Whether you’ve got your eye on a bigname quarterback or breakout running backs, prize picks makes it easy to get in the game. And the flex play option is a total gamecher. Even when one of your picks misses, you still double your money. And look, I I I know next to nothing about the upcoming NFL season and I I know next to very little about the college football season. So, don’t take my advice on that. And be honest, I don’t know how much I know about Major League Baseball because I predicted the Braves to win 94 games this year and that’s not going to happen. But you want to take your chances, get in on some of the seasonl long uh numbers that they have there at prize picks and pick higher more or less on those picks, you can do so over at prizepicks.com. Also stay ahead of the game with Responsible Play. Go to prizepix.com/responsible-gaming. If you need help in that area, download the prize app today. Use code locked on MLB to get $50 in lineups after you play your first $5 lineup. That’s code locked on MLB to get $50 in lineups after your first $5 play. Run your game. Thank you so much for making Lockdown Braves your first listen of the day. I really do appreciate it. The numbers have still been good. Yes, they’re going down a little bit just like the tendance for the Braves. Home games, but I appreciate so much those of you sticking with me through the season and the next couple of months here are going to be pretty rough, but it’s going to be a very busy offseason. So, make sure you subscribe here to Locked on Braves as we get prepared for that. And make sure you go check out Locked on MLB for your second listen of the day. slowly getting you caught up with everything happening around Major League Baseball and the guys will be game night talking about the good teams that are playing each and every night around Major League Baseball. So, set the stage for ProFar leading up to 2025 to this past off season. And in that, we saw that he did some good things. He’s always been a guy that that takes his walks, gets on base, doesn’t strike out, but there’s been it’s been the power levels have been up and down, and that was really the difference. And then in 2024, you saw, you know, a pretty big power. And again, it wasn’t even a huge power jump. He had had years of 20 home runs, but it was this was 24 and just overall was a much better offensive season. Now, 2025, what have we seen from him in 2025? You look at the overall numbers and again it’s 33 games played entering Thursday night’s action. 135 at bat. So we’re still dealing with a pretty small sample size at this point but enough I think to to judge the guy. 237 average. That’s obviously much lower than the 280 average from last year. 318 on base. Obviously much lower than the 380 on base from a season ago. 415 slug. Look, it is a good bit lower than what he had in 2024, but I think you would take that from poof far based on his career. It was a 459 slug last year. It’s, you know, again, 415 this year. 9.9% walk rate, 17.9% strikeout rate, five home runs, 19 runs scored, 13 runs batted in, two stolen bases, a 106 WRC plus. Again, 100 is average there. So, above average offensively, 0.0 zero F4 though and part of that is just because of the defensive metrics which we will talk about here in a second. Now he played in four games before the suspension this year. He had three singles, a walk and three strikeouts. All of those were in the first game of the year and didn’t strike out in the other three games and then he gets the suspension out for 80 games. His first six games back he goes six for 25 at the plate. No walks to seven strikeouts. He he looked like a guy that hadn’t played in the big leagues for a while now. Granted, he had he had played 13 games at Gwynette and was really good there. He slashed 333, 407, 583 with three doubles, three home runs with eight walks to six strikeouts at Gwynette before getting up to the big leagues. But obviously, there’s a big jump and a big difference between AAA pitching and major league pitching. And especially when you’re facing major league pitching that’s hot and it’s been in the the season. They’re they’re geared up already. They’re halfway through the season already. That’s a that’s a big difference and that’s a big jump. pitchers are clearly ahead of ProFar at that point. First six games back though, six for 25. Not very good. And like I said, a lot of strikeouts. He just looked lost. You could remember it at that time. It it did not look very good. I think maybe his first game, yeah, he hit a home run in his first two games back. But even, you know, outside of that, it just didn’t look great for Proofar and looked like a little bit lost. Like maybe he was selling out for power in those first couple of games back. Maybe trying to prove something in his last 23 games. Again, leading up to Thursday’s game, he slashed 242. That’s still well below where he was the year before. 345 on base, though. That’s getting back into a really good spot. Again, as I said when the Braves sign him, I don’t think you can expect 280 380, you know, nearly 500 OP, uh, slugging percentage. I don’t think you can expect that. You got to expect some regression, but I’d take a 345 on base. So, again, 242 average, 345 on base, 432 slug in his last 23 games. I take that all day from ProFar. And in that time, you’ve also seen the walk rate go up. 12.7% walk rate. The strikeout rate go down 15.5% strikeout rate in that time. 119 WRC plus. So now we’re we’re well above average uh offensively with a 119 WRC plus. And you’ve seen a 189 ISO over that stretch, too, which is even higher than his 2024 mark. And what’s kind of crazy, you look at his overall ISO from this year to last year, and they’re basically identical. And as I said, when he first came back, it’s almost like he was just trying to prove that the power was legit and maybe got outside of himself a little bit. But his last 23 games, I mean, it’s been fairly impressive what he’s done. Keep in mind that during that time, you know, the last couple of weeks especially, he’s had to be in the leadoff role even longer than that because even when Ronald was here, he was batting leadoff and the pressure that comes with that, he’s done a pretty good job of getting on base at the top of the order with a 345 on base percentage. Um, and again, it the bigger thing for me for Proofar was just the onbase ability. when this signing happened, I felt like it was a change in direction for the Braves offensive philosophy, or at least maybe a sign of that. Yes, you know, they were buying him, hoping that the power surge from 2024 was somewhat legitimate, but but I feel like they also bought in on ProAr hoping that he could come in and instill that type of bat-toball mentality, somebody that’s patient, can get on base. And I think he’s done that. I think he has shown that. And if if Proof Far can just be that guy who gets on base, who puts the ball in play, um, you know, has a 330, 340 on base, even if he hits, you know, 240, 250, obviously would love that to be more closer to 260. And even if the home runs are just, you know, 15 to 20, that’s a fairly productive player in your lineup and a type of player that this lineup really, really needs. So, I know a lot of people in Braves country are really down on ProFar and I and I get that he made a bad decision and it really hurt the team early on. You you can’t ignore that. It was not a great start with his teammates and with the fan base and you can say it was an accident. You got to do better and you’re a Major League Baseball player. You just signed a big deal. You got to you got to know what’s going in and out of out of your body these days. You know, you’re getting tested. you have to be more careful than than know what’s going into your body. So, I gonna I think there’s probably some frustration from Braves fans on that part of it and that, you know, he let the team down, he gets suspended as I’m watching the the game on Thursday night and Proar takes a walk. Um, but but I think the the frustration towards him and not being a good player is a bit misguided because you look at the numbers and you can look at the numbers overall and I still don’t think they’re awful. He’s still an above average offensive player, but especially if you look at the numbers over the past 23 games over the last month, and again, if you consider those first, you know, week back or so, just getting reaclimated to the big league level, I mean, he’s been not as good as 2024, but certainly a guy that I would take in my lineup and an offensive guy that I would want in this Braves lineup. So, if he is that player, and we got to see that the rest of the way, perfectly fine with keeping Proar around for the bat. Here is the problem and the part that we can’t ignore. The defense is absolutely dreadful. I mean, it it has been worse than I think any of us really could have thought that it would be. We all knew he was a bad defender, but it it has been it’s been pretty bad. It’s been more than pretty bad. It’s it’s been dreadful, as I said a minute ago. But I think the question that you have to ask now if you’re the Braves is, does he fit this team going forward? And I think part of that depends on the coaching staff that gets brought in, assuming that Snicker retires, steps down, whatever, mutual, you know, parting of ways, whatever the case is. I think a lot of that’s going to depend on the new coaching staff and the direction of this team going forward and what type of offense they want to be. It it was my main point early in the season and at the halfway mark, figuring out what the identity of this offense is going to be going forward. Are you going to be that boomer bust offense that just goes back to allout power, or are you going to try to be a more well-rounded offense that, you know, can hit for power, get on base, hit for average, can steal, you know, kind of what the Brewers showed us in that last series. Can you do a little bit of of everything? Can you can you hit with runners in score position? Can you have situational hitting? They got to figure out what type of offense they want to be and the players that fit that mold. And if I think if you were going to go with where I thought they were going with the the hiring of Tim Hires and the signing of Proofar, then I think he obviously makes sense for that. But I think you gota I think you got to figure that out. If at the end of the year we get to the end of the year, because again, we’re still dealing with a pretty small sample size. Even the sample size that I just gave you, I understand that is kind of cherry-picking. But if we get to the end of the year and his walk rate and his strikeout rates are still solid, you know, they’re both in the the 10 to to 15 range, something like that. If the ISO is is 150 plus, Drake Ballwin just went deep. Three-run home run, his second home run of the night here, if the the WRC plus is, you know, 110 or higher, I think there’s value in that player offensively, but you still got to figure out where you play him. He is bad in in left field. Can you live with it? Can you live with that in left field? If he’s going to be a positive offensive player, can you can you ignore the defensive efficiencies that he has out there? Can he play second base decently enough? Look, he hasn’t played second base since 2021. He hasn’t played a lot of second base since 2019 when he had a negative seven OA outs above average and that was in 500 or 405 attempts. So, he’s a really bad defender no matter where you put him. But can the Braves move him around enough, hide him enough because the bat is good enough? And that’s kind of what it has to be for Proofar right now is the bat has to be good enough to outweigh the negative defensively. And the other part of this is as Marcelo Zuna gets a base hit, do you keep the DH spot open next year for a ProFar? Do you have a defensive replacement like an Eli White next year for a ProFar? And does that kind of have to be your strategy with him going forward if he is part of this team? Because the defense is is costing the Braves. It is hurting the Braves and is he’s been a bad defensive player his entire career. You know that going in and the bat has to be exceptionally good to over overcome that. Um, but I think there’s ways to to kind of hide him, move him around in different spots, hide him, you know, put him in the DH spot every now and then to kind of hide that defense if the offense is going to be good enough. Or final option, do you try to trade him? Look, I I’ I’ve made a lot of arguments for ProFar why I think the bat is what the Braves paid for and could be good enough, but I think you have to at least consider it um if he’s not part of the future. The problem is he’s coming off the cheap here. He made 12 12 million in 2025. He’s set to make 15 million in each of the next two seasons. So, um you know, that’s the bigger part of this contract. I doubt there’s a ton of value in this deal. It’s not like you’re trading. It’s not a terrible deal. 15 million for a guy that you know could be a two three war player. That’s not a terrible deal, but it’s not a great value to the point where you’re going to get a top prospect for ProFar. Um but it’s also not to the point where it’s got to be a money dump. I think if you’re trading him, you’re getting something of value in return. Whether it’s a a reliever with, you know, years of control, a setup reliever, whether it’s a mid- rotation starter with an extra year of control, like I don’t you don’t just have to dump ProFar. I think there’s still enough value in the bat again depending on how the season plays out that you could get something of value in return for him if you wanted to move on. If there was another option in the outfield, if my dreams come true and they wanted to pay Kyle Tucker, which I know it’s not going to happen, but we’re dreaming here. I I think you can find out ways to either move Proofar around to try to hide his defense or move on from him through a trade because I don’t think you would absolutely just have to eat the money in order to move him. I still think there’s enough value even with what he’s owed the next two years with the player that he is offensively. So that’s my thoughts on Proofar. I think the offense has been good enough based on what the Braves have are have have are paying him. Um, I certainly think that there is a future with him on this team if they can figure out the defense or at least understand the defensive liability and have something for that, whether it’s a defensive replacement late in games or being able to use him in the DH spot more often. I think there’s an an option to trade him, too. I think that is certainly on the table. But offensively, at least what I’ve seen so far, it’s not far off from what you saw last year. And I think it’s a a good enough player. Look, with what the Braves have had offensively this year, it’s it’s one of the best offensive players. So, I think he’s getting a lot of unfair slack and criticism. Um, and I think a lot of that’s probably just driven by the suspension and how much it it hurt the team. But let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. What do you think of Proofar’s play so far offensively? What do you think of his future here with the team? Let me know down in the comment section below. Next, we’ll get into those comments from Terry Mcgherk. And will the Braves buy Kyle Tucker this off seasonason? Will they spin big? Well, they uh use all that that money that they’re making over there at the battery to spend a lot on players this off seasonason. We’ll talk about that here next. Have you ever decided at the last minute to head to a ball game with friends or family? Maybe it’s game day and suddenly you realize you want to be in the stands. That’s exactly where game time comes in. It’s the easiest way to grab last minute tickets without all the stress. With the money you save on tickets, you can splurge on food, drinks, merch, or even invite a bigger group to come with you. Game time makes it possible. Game time makes buying tickets fast and simple. Prices on the app actually drop the closer you get to first pitch. And they’ve got incredible lastminute deals, clear seat views, and a lowest price guarantee that takes the worry out of buying. And Game Time is the official ticketing partner of Locked on MLB, making it easy to browse the app for an upcoming Braves game. I promise you, you look for lastminute tickets on Game Time for Braves games right now, you’re going to get a great deal. I can guarantee you that. Game time has lastminute tickets and zone deals for big savings. Take the guesswork out of buying tickets with Game Time. Download the Game Time app. Create an account and use code locked on MLB for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, create an account. Use code locked on MLB for $20 off your first purchase. A couple of news items before we get into the comments from Terry Mcgherk. Uh it sounds like Ronnie is is progressing really quickly and and could be back very soon, which is would be great because I’ll be honest, watching this Braves team this week, it’s it’s been very uninspiring. Not a lot of fun. So to get Ronnie back uh would definitely give us another reason to watch this team. Uh Nacho had some side soreness in his day today, really hate it for him. I want him to get that audition and uh see some more what he can do with the battle. The one thing I’m really looking forward to watching this week with Riley and Ronnie out is what could Nacho do at the plate and I think you’ve seen some good things here and there certainly on the defensive side. Uh but unfortunately he’s dealing with some sideness and it sounds like Chris Sale could be back pretty soon as we talked about yesterday. Now Atlanta Braves holding ABH held an investor call on Thursday morning and shocker they made a lot of money and I don’t think that comes as a surprise to anybody. Uh Lindseay Crosby obviously host of the the postcast with me. He had covered all the details over on his newsletter at Braves today if you want to go check that out. But a couple of quotes that uh he put in that that newsletter that I found interesting. Uh the one quote that I think a lot of Braves fans will probably be upset about um says, “We’re disappointed with the year. There’s some underperformance, but the majority of its injuries and missing players. Everyone is back for spring training 26 and we expect to have a team that can.” And then he essentially he says, “Uh, I think we can. I know we can.” He essentially goes on to say, “I think we’ll have a team that has World Series aspirations.” But I think what a lot of Braves fans took issue with here is that you got the injuries excuse and then you had the line about these guys will be back ready to go in 2026. Look, I I get it. He has to It’s a diplomatic uh position. It’s a polit politicians type position that he’s in. you don’t want to hurt any feelings of players that are on this team right now and you want to try to make some excuses for them and for your company or you know one of your um you know your your assets why it’s so bad. I I get that. But I really hope that’s not the that’s not the inside view. That’s not the inside closed doors view of this team. You could have said that last year and I did and I said after 2024 I said I think you can chalk a lot of this up to injuries on the offensive side. If they get healthy then I think they’ll be back to top level performances. I was I was dead wrong on that. Um it it’s just it’s it’s been a decline of the offense for whatever reason. Whether it is just you know coaching changes and they changed up an offense philosophy to try to fit a a group of players that can’t fit that philosophy. whatever the case may be, that’s no longer an excuse. You could make that excuse for 2024. You cannot make that excuse for 2025 anymore. Yes, they’re injured and banged up now, but that hasn’t been that wasn’t the case for the first half of the season. So, I really hope that that’s just externally them trying to, you know, soften the blow to a fan base to say, you know, maybe some casuals out there to say injuries are why we’re here today and because we’ve been missing a lot of players. Anybody that’s watched this team now for the past two years know, as I said the other day, there is something fundamentally wrong. Because the one thing I will agree with and then I I still hold on to, I still think there’s a lot of talent. I still think there’s a talent here to win and be a good team which makes me again come back to the conclusion that there is something fundamentally wrong with the clubhouse the the the philosophy of the team something just mentally wrong and broke with the players right now and that’s got to be addressed and it has to be fixed and I don’t think this is going to happen but if they maintain that tagline through the offseason season and they run it back again next year, a lot of people are going to be very, very upset, especially if the results are similar. Now, the other thing that Terry talked about is when asked if the funds will be distributed to the team, all this money they’ve been making, are they going to distribute it and pour it into the team? Mcgherk said they’ve been at top 10 payroll and could see them moving up further. So, that’s nice to hear. He said they could have spent at the deadline if there was a move to help us in 2025 and beyond. And that kind of goes along with what we talked about with AA’s comments and with the Buckton rumor that we talked about yesterday. If you haven’t given that a list in it, it does feel like that at this trade deadline, they weren’t so much focused on, you know, pinninging free agents that they can trade. They were more so focused on bringing in talent to help them win for the future. which as I said yesterday, I think that’s potentially a great sign that this is going to be a busy offseason, that we are going to see a lot of shakeup and a lot of turnover this off seasonason to try to fix whatever is fundamentally broken with this team right now. So, I think in that comment there’s both some some negative and and some positives for what we could see this off seasonason. Again, I hope that’s just noise, the excuses about the injuries and missing players. And I hope the second part of this is that the second part of it is legitimate and that they’re willing to to spend to help this team in 2026 and beyond. But only the offseason will tell us that. Make sure you’re subscribed here to Locked on Braves because that’ll be a lot of our talk going forward is what are they going to do in the off season? Are they really going to shake things up? And what are some of these players like Proofar and others? Are they going to be part of that going forward? That’s we’ll be focusing on the rest of the way. So make sure you subscribe to Lockdown Braves podcast wherever you get your podcast. Hit that thumbs up button, leave me a comment down below. Make sure that you rate, review, and subscribe to the Lockdown Braves podcast wherever you get your podcast. And we will talk to you next time.

Jake Mastroianni analyzes Jurickson Profar’s career trajectory, dissecting his impressive .280/.380/.459 slash line and 24 home runs in 2024. The discussion covers Profar’s 80-game suspension, its impact on the Braves’ early 2025 struggles, and his post-suspension performance. Mastroianni explores potential strategies for maximizing Profar’s value, including DH roles and defensive adjustments.

Braves executive Terry McGuirk weighs in on the team’s disappointing 2025 season and future plans. Will increased payroll and roster moves propel Atlanta back to contention?

Tune in for an in-depth look at Profar’s impact and the Braves’ path forward in 2026 and beyond.

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0:00 Intro: Jerkson Profar’s breakout and suspension

5:06 Profar’s career stats and 2024 performance

10:11 Sponsor break: Prize Picks fantasy platform

13:15 Analyzing Profar’s 2025 performance so far

18:51 Profar’s defensive struggles and future fit

25:28 Sponsor break: Game Time ticketing app

26:59 Braves investor call and McGurk’s comments

32:06 Outro: Looking ahead to offseason moves