Braves HOF Pitcher Weighs In On Acuña, Team When Healthy

The Atlanta Braves continue to struggle through the first third of the season, sitting at 27-31 and nine and a half games back from first place in the National League East. One Braves legend and Baseball Hall of Famer continues to keep the faith.

John Smoltz thinks that things will start to sort themselves out now that the team is getting healthy. A major part of this is getting Ronald Acuña Jr. back in the lineup.

In an interview with RG's DJ Siddiqi ahead of the Red Sox series over the weekend, Smoltz said Acuña is a guy who brings a high level of play, even if speed on the basepaths is removed from the equation.

“He just brings too many dynamics to the club,” Smoltz said of the 2023 NL MVP. “He’s instant offense at the top of the lineup. We don’t know how much he’s going to run based on his knees, but he’s an electric defensive player."

So far, Acuña has done his job, even if it's not translating to win yet and the rest of the lineup is currently out of sync. In nine games, he's batting .324 with a 1.042 OPS with three home runs and six RBIs.

Smoltz remains confident the Braves can get back in contention. However, he acknowledged that they need to get going soon.

“The Braves are lurking in a nice position, but you don’t want to stay there very long. There’s too many good teams in the National League to try to come back from a seven-, eight-, nine-game deficit. If you’re thinking about the Atlanta Braves coming up to the All-Star game, you got to be within striking distance."

Chipping away now is more doable when there's 104 games left on the docket. However, get to the point in the season Smoltz mentioned, which is in mid-July, nearly another 40 games will have come and gone. The Braves don't even have to gain a lot of ground in that time for them to be in it. Even if that nine and a half game deficit becomes a six and a half game deficit, a comeback is that much more realistic with 60-some-odd games to go in the official second half of the season.

That's just for the division, too. They're currently five and a half games back from a wild card spot. Shave off some of the space between them an the playoff line, and they're likely buyers at the deadline.

Along with health and a strong starting rotation, Smoltz thinks getting back in the playoffs is doable if the offense is even half of what it's been in recent years and they can clean up the bullpen.

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