In his interview for 680 the Fan a couple of weeks ago, Atlanta Braves General Manager Alex Anthopoulos made the claim that the “identity” of this Braves team has been their offense, and that they need to find a way to rediscover that. He’s right, of course. To be even more specific, they need to get back to being aggressive with the intention of doing damage on contact.
From 2022-2024, the Braves led MLB in Barrel%, Hard-Hit%, HR, and ISO. They trailed only the Dodgers in runs scored during that three year stretch. You might be tempted to point out that most of these stats are dragged upward by their historic 2023 performance, but this has been their identity the whole way. Even last year – the one where 5 of the 9 position players on the Opening Day roster missed at least two months due to injury – the Braves finished top 5 in Barrel%, average exit velocity, HR, and ISO.
The team has gotten healthier in 2025, but that part of their identity – the mashing, bashing, and clobbering part – has fallen completely off a cliff. They rank 10th in Barrel%, 12th in Hard-Hit%, 19th in HR, and 24th in ISO. And there’s an argument that it’s an approach issue.
As you are probably aware, there was a big shift in the team’s coaching staff this offseason, with longtime hitting coach Kevin Seitzer and his assistant Bobby Magallanes losing their jobs following an ugly offensive performance in 2024. After a first-round exit for the third straight postseason, many fans were calling for a change from their slug-or-bust approach to something more on-base oriented, something that included improved plate discipline and an improved ability to execute when presented with run-scoring opportunities.
Well, the Braves did make a couple of significant changes in their approach. Needless to say, it hasn’t paid off.
If you look at the eight established big leaguers on the Braves by wRC+, here’s what you get:
One player who is dominating in a smallish sample size (Acuña Jr.)
Three players who are right at their career-average marks (Olson, Ozuna, and Murphy)
One player who is significantly below his career-average mark (Riley)
Two players who are having the worst season of their 9-year careers, by FAR (Albies and Verdugo)
One player who is having the worst season of his 4-year career by far, and has been the second-worst qualified hitter in baseball (Harris)
When you get a new hitting coach and four established big leaguers in your lineup — all in their twenties — are having their worst season by far in the last five years, that’s going to raise some eyebrows. Combine that with having only one player who has overperformed their career norms, and it’s time to start asking some questions.
Today, I want to focus on the changes the team has made on their swing decisions. Take a look:
(If you are on a mobile device, this table is best viewed in landscape mode.)
Braves Plate Discipline
Year
Overall Swing%
Z-Swing%
O-Swing%
Contact%
Year
Overall Swing%
Z-Swing%
O-Swing%
Contact%
2022-2024
2nd
1st
24th
25th
2025
15th
10th
12th
13th
Stats from Sports Info Solutions on Fangraphs
The goal here seems to be to chase less often and make more contact. They’ve certainly accomplished that, but it’s come at the cost of swinging far less frequently at pitches in the zone.
When you dig a little deeper, the picture gets much worse:
(If you are on a mobile device, this table is best viewed in landscape mode.)
Braves Advanced Plate Discipline Stats
Year
1st Pitch Swing%
Ahead in Count Swing%
Swing% on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Swing% on Middle-Middle Pitches
Swing% on Middle-Middle Fastballs
Year
1st Pitch Swing%
Ahead in Count Swing%
Swing% on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Swing% on Middle-Middle Pitches
Swing% on Middle-Middle Fastballs
2022-2024
3rd
1st
1st
1st
1st
2025
23rd
15th
8th
19th
21st
Stats from Statcast
As a team, they’ve gone from being the most aggressive in baseball – especially in favorable counts, and on pitches in the zone, and on pitches down the middle – to being in the middle of the pack in each of those categories.
Now let’s look at how the Braves hitters ranked in context-neutral run value per 100 pitches on these pitch types/situations:
(If you are on a mobile device, this table is best viewed in landscape mode.)
Braves Run Value per 100 pitches
Year
1st Pitches
Ahead in Count
Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Middle-Middle Pitches
Middle-Middle Fastballs
Year
1st Pitches
Ahead in Count
Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Middle-Middle Pitches
Middle-Middle Fastballs
2022-2024
1st
2nd
1st
1st
1st
2025
18th
10th
6th
15th
6th
Stats from Statcast
Now let’s see how the established big leaguers have changed their overall approach this year.
(If you are on a mobile device, these tables are best viewed in landscape mode.)
Plate Discipline Metrics for Veteran Braves Hitters
Year/Player
Overall Swing%
Z-Swing%
O-Swing%
Contact%
Year/Player
Overall Swing%
Z-Swing%
O-Swing%
Contact%
2022-2024
Ronald Acuña Jr.
46.9%
74.3%
27.4%
79.7%
Matt Olson
48.6%
74.0%
31.8%
75.1%
Marcell Ozuna
48.1%
72.5%
32.3%
72.9%
Austin Riley
49.9%
74.5%
32.4%
74.3%
Michael Harris II
53.3%
68.9%
41.9%
76.1%
Ozzie Albies
55.9%
82.0%
39.6%
80.6%
Sean Murphy
47.4%
70.1%
31.2%
76.3%
Alex Verdugo
43.5%
62.2%
27.5%
86.3%
2025
Ronald Acuña Jr.
43.4%
70.2%
25.7%
73.8%
Matt Olson
43.7%
66.5%
27.7%
77.1%
Marcell Ozuna
39.1%
60.7%
24.9%
76.4%
Austin Riley
50.3%
74.8%
30.8%
73.0%
Michael Harris II
56.4%
70.1%
46.2%
77.8%
Ozzie Albies
53.9%
78.9%
36.7%
79.9%
Sean Murphy
48.7%
70.1%
28.6%
76.3%
Alex Verdugo
38.4%
54.5%
23.8%
87.9%
Stats from SportsInfo Solutions on Fangraphs
And their situational approach:
Advanced Plate Discipline Metrics for Braves Veterans
Year
1st Pitch Swing%
Ahead in Count Swing%
Swing% on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Swing% on Middle-Middle Pitches
Middle-Middle Fastball Swing%
Year
1st Pitch Swing%
Ahead in Count Swing%
Swing% on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
Swing% on Middle-Middle Pitches
Middle-Middle Fastball Swing%
2022-2024
Ronald Acuña Jr.
38.6%
52.4%
54.7%
83.2%
88.9%
Matt Olson
33.2%
55.7%
58.8%
81.4%
86.7%
Marcell Ozuna
30.9%
57.4%
58.2%
82.0%
84.3%
Austin Riley
33.2%
56.8%
58.0%
82.0%
81.3%
Michael Harris II
31.1%
52.8%
51.3%
76.4%
74.8%
Ozzie Albies
39.6%
64.7%
65.4%
89.6%
92.1%
Sean Murphy
35.2%
44.7%
43.2%
78.4%
78.5%
Alex Verdugo
20.8%
46.3%
44.3%
72.1%
71.1%
2025
Ronald Acuña Jr.
37.5%
46.6%
41.6%
75.6%
89.3%
Matt Olson
27.3%
48.1%
52.2%
71.0%
77.1%
Marcell Ozuna
20.9%
44.3%
44.4%
72.0%
67.7%
Austin Riley
28.3%
58.6%
61.7%
83.0%
82.9%
Michael Harris II
36.1%
60.4%
61.8%
71.8%
65.9%
Ozzie Albies
37.2%
53.3%
50.0%
87.4%
84.0%
Sean Murphy
37.2%
46.7%
47.3%
78.3%
80.0%
Alex Verdugo
9.1%
39.3%
41.3%
43.9%
46.8%
Stats from Statcast
And their results by pitch type and situation:
Results by Pitch Type for Braves Veterans
Year
wOBA on pitches in zone
wOBA on pitches out of zone
1st Pitch wOBA
Ahead in Count wOBA
wOBA on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
wOBA on Middle-Middle Pitches
wOBA on Middle-Middle Fastballs
Year
wOBA on pitches in zone
wOBA on pitches out of zone
1st Pitch wOBA
Ahead in Count wOBA
wOBA on Fastballs when Ahead in the Count
wOBA on Middle-Middle Pitches
wOBA on Middle-Middle Fastballs
2022-2024
Ronald Acuña Jr.
0.380
0.376
0.490
0.430
0.442
0.424
0.427
Matt Olson
0.383
0.338
0.417
0.482
0.508
0.465
0.483
Marcell Ozuna
0.402
0.294
0.499
0.473
0.490
0.554
0.555
Austin Riley
0.396
0.293
0.460
0.452
0.447
0.491
0.482
Michael Harris II
0.389
0.259
0.446
0.431
0.442
0.440
0.418
Ozzie Albies
0.358
0.290
0.393
0.421
0.443
0.442
0.468
Sean Murphy
0.328
0.343
0.419
0.448
0.463
0.475
0.428
Alex Verdugo
0.325
0.269
0.377
0.405
0.438
0.403
0.371
2025
Ronald Acuña Jr.
0.463
0.486
0.923
0.474
0.432
0.548
0.522
Matt Olson
0.373
0.352
0.333
0.460
0.475
0.506
0.585
Marcell Ozuna
0.318
0.386
0.461
0.458
0.533
0.355
0.560
Austin Riley
0.341
0.291
0.484
0.424
0.450
0.368
0.376
Michael Harris II
0.302
0.126
0.235
0.310
0.326
0.243
0.263
Ozzie Albies
0.276
0.284
0.348
0.418
0.460
0.373
0.335
Sean Murphy
0.369
0.266
0.630
0.374
0.376
0.523
0.340
Alex Verdugo
0.255
0.308
0.338
0.459
0.471
0.518
0.460
Results on Pitch Types
Let’s dive in on each player, starting with the two biggest disappointments of 2025.
I’ll start by saying this – Ozzie Albies and Michael Harris are two of my personal favorite players, and it’s completely depressing to see them struggle this much.
These two have always had the worst plate discipline on the team. In Ozzie’s case, it’s gotten a bit better under Hyers, but he’s producing far worse results on his good swing decisions on pitches in the zone and down the middle. In MH2’s case…he’s just completely lost. Everything – every single thing – has gone in the wrong direction.
My working theory (which is completely unfounded and based fully on the eye test) is that Hyers is trying to get Harris and Ozzie to see pitches deeper before making decisions rather than selling out on swings and guessing pitch types. Ozzie has always been good at adjusting mid-swing, but anecdotally, it seems like he only takes one or two balanced swings per week. And while Harris is swinging at everything, he doesn’t seem to be taking any confident hacks with the intention to do damage.
Whatever’s going on, it isn’t working.
Nobody on the team hits middle-middle fastballs as well as Marcell Ozuna. He has a .560 wOBA on them this year, which is very similar to the .555 wOBA he had from 2022-2024. But he’s not actually using that incredible strength as much this year because his Swing% on middle-middle fastballs has dropped by more than 15 points. And yes, this more patient approach has led to an increased BB%, but the Braves are really missing the damage he used to do on the most hittable pitches.
Austin Riley has shown a slight increase in aggressiveness in most situations, but the big exception is that his 1st pitch swing% has dropped by about 5 points. When he does swing on 0-0 counts, he’s as good or better than he’s ever been. Like Ozuna on middle-middle fastballs, though, Riley isn’t getting to leverage this strength as often because he is taking more 1st pitches than he did before.
I don’t have much to say about Alex Verdugo. It’s perhaps a bit interesting to see his swing% drop in every single pitch category, given that he is the only one who was not on the Braves before this year. But, with Jurickson Profar set to return from his 80-game suspension tomorrow and the Angels throwing a lefty tonight, I’m mostly just grateful that we won’t be seeing much of him going forward.
Sean Murphy hasn’t seemed to change too much under Tim Hyers. If anything, he’s been a bit more aggressive. He’s certainly been streaky, but overall, it’s good to see Murph bounce back from his injury-maligned 2024.
Ronald Acuña Jr. might be an alien, but he also seems to be adopting some of the team’s new philosophy. It feels insane to nitpick anything about his season so far — his .923 wOBA on first pitches particularly cracked me up — but I would love to see him pull the trigger on more middle-middle pitches, considering that he has better results than anyone on those pitch types (and considering that he and Matt Olson are basically the only hope for producing any offense these days).
Speaking of Matt Olson, he seems to have really improved as a result of a more patient approach. An oversimplified look at Olson’s time in Atlanta suggests that the less he swings, the better. In each of his worst two offensive seasons as a Brave (2022 and 2024), he had a Swing% over 49%, and he produced an xwOBA between .340-.350. In each of his best two seasons (2023 and 2025), his Swing% was under 47%, and he produced an xwOBA between .390-.395. You read that right, by the way – Olson’s 2025 xwOBA is nearly identical to his 2023 xwOBA, which saw him finish top 5 in MVP voting.
pl
All in all, the more patient approach that Hyers seems to be after is mostly giving some serious square-peg-round-hole vibes. These hitters made their money based on their ability to do damage on hittable pitches in the zone, and I hope they find a way to rediscover that identity.
Later this week, we’ll look more deeply at another aspect of the Braves approach that has changed dramatically in 2025 – the damage they do on contact. Until then, here’s hoping that the PED-less version of Jurickson Profar can revive a season that already has one foot in the grave.