Braves Offseason Breakdown with Grant McAuley

00:00:21
Speaker 1: Welcome to Hammer territory. It is always a pleasure to be with you, and it is always a pleasure number one to be with Steven Tober. But when we have a guest, and we have one of the best when it comes to covering the Braves, Grant McCauley from ninety to nine, has been kind enough to join us. We are going to jump into all things with the Braves off season. It's good to be back with you once again. Stephen. How have you been, sir?

00:00:46
Speaker 2: What's up buddy? Yeah, man, it's good to be back on with you. I know you were. You were down for a lot of the holidays six so welcome back to the land of the living. It's good to have you back on. And of course we've got our guest, Grant McCauley. Grant, we very much appreciate the time to join us. And how you doing tonight.

00:01:03
Speaker 3: Buddy, Yeah, happy to do it. I wish we had more to talk about, like as in things that have actually happened, but I guess we can continue talking about things maybe we think will happen or hope will happen, But bottom line is I think something is going to happen in the next, what thirty four days before the Brave show up down in Northport. That's my feeling anyway.

00:01:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I'm so let's just jump right in. Quite honestly, there's no need to beat around the bush. So obviously it's been a very cold winner. It's been a very quiet winner. It's been an unusually quiet winner. Grant, you've been around the entire and thoughtless era. You know as well as anybody that he's typically very aggressive, very active in November. Usually he gets a lot of his to do list done, you know, he finds deals early. So just to start out with tonight, how surprised are you that we are, you know, coming up on the middle of January and not a single thing off the to do list has been done yet? And are you at all has has the fact that it's been so long since a move or any move has happened. Has that changed your outlook on how this all season will potentially go.

00:02:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's interesting because there's a lot of different things. Let me answer the first part of that. I guess first we'll go in chronological order. Yes, I am surprised that nothing has happened. And I don't mean like you know, trying to keep up with every other major move that's been made by the Mets, and they're won Soda signing or what the Dodgers seem to do, which is different than just about everybody's off season. Typically every year they're kind of in some rare error. But you're right with Alex Antopolos, he does kind of like to get a couple of things knocked off that list. And you know, last year it was getting relievers re signed with Joejimenez and with Piers Johnson. Then of course we had the Chris Sale trade, Rinaldo Lopez signing was thrown in there, a whole bunch of things that happened by the time we got here a year ago, and for whatever reason, things have not come together the same this year. And I've talked to Alex a lot over the years, and as you know, he's not somebody that's going to publicly put out there, well, we want to do this, and once we do that, then we're going to do this. Like that line or that list is not a linear progression. It's okay, we have a whole bunch of things we need. We're going to start working on each one of them individually. And as they come together, we'll really put our winter where we wanted to. They feel like they will, And I don't know if this is a case of they needed to do a little bit of moving and shaking to free up some payroll and to see where they were going to be and to see how some of the free agency was going to shake out. But I know from talking to Alex at the winter meetings that they had engaged in talks for whatever that's worth, with free agents, with teams on trades, and I know that they're still working on it right now. But I don't think it makes anybody feel better about the fact that a lot of other teams, particularly in the division, are getting better, and it just doesn't feel like the Braves have done a whole lot outside of a bunch of minor league signings. And I don't think that's really what people were looking for out of this winter when you think about the twenty twenty fourth that they had, all of the injuries they had to overcome, the clear needs that they came into the winter with which I've talked about this a lot, is I have a more specific list than I think at any time in the last six, maybe seven years, and I think that there are some things that they need to do in order to get the club where they want it and then hopefully get healthy and then maybe get back to feeling like the club that they were prior to everything they went through in twenty twenty four. So I know that's a long answer and it's a whole lot of stuff to unpack, but that's what we're here to do.

00:04:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, Grant. And the other thing that I'll say about this that I don't think is talked about. Maybe I don't necessarily know enough, but you start to look at it. We have seen Max Freed go to the Yankees. We've seen Charlie Morton go to the Orioles, Travis Darnau and Hora Cilior Angels now aj mentor potentially in conversation with the Red Sox. We are seeing our last connections to that twenty twenty one World Series all go in one off season, and we're now three disappointing playoff appearances away from that twenty twenty one World Series. I think that's a theme that may not be talked about enough, and that like it really is kind of a reset this all season, especially from what twenty twenty four is there's going to be, yes, a lot of pre reduction on the field, but hopefully the Braves will fill in in the rest of the off season. But also in that clubhouse, there's going to be a lot of new leadership opportunities. And again, it just kind of feels like, naturally we were getting into a new era of Braves baseball. And that's something else that I think as we get into spring training and start the season, that's when I really think it's going to hit home about just how much talent the Braves have lost, but notable names the Braves and loss as well, especially connecting to that twenty one World Series.

00:05:28
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think as long as a balance, I mean, we knew with the way that baseball in sports is in general, like you can't keep an entire team together for a long period of time, and what the Braves have done is commendable to have a cord that they do have with the guys who are signed a long term to know that you have a viable roster or a viable core to build your roster around. Unfortunately, for some of these guys that left, it didn't work out. We don't need to rehash to Freddie Freeman saga. I don't think Dansby Swanson, I believe priced himself out of what the Braves were looking for. Short stuff. Max Freed got a deal to I did not see out there for Max Freed. So congratulations to him. I mean, that's a tremendous contract for him, but it's not one that I think the Braves were a willing to give. And b I don't think it's one that a whole lot of people can look at and say, I can't believe the Braves didn't give Max Freed eight years and two hundred and eighteen million dollars. But when you get into free agency, the whole paradigm shifts. But the Travis Darnau move, you know, not bringing him back, not picking up that option, that I think signal one thing. I don't think any of us were surprised to see them move Jorge Solair just because of the fit and what they might be looking for and looking to do this offseason. But that second part hasn't happened. And then you kind of look at I think the whole twenty twenty one departures. I mean, obviously the Freeman one of the SWANSA one and now the freed one. Those are some pretty big ones, but there's several other names, including Je Solaire, Adam Duval, Eddie Rosario, Tyler Matsik, Luke Jackson, AJ mintor Charlie Morton. I mean, there's a whole bunch of other guys that suited up for the Braves in twenty twenty four that are probably not going to be back in twenty twenty five or have already found a new home. AJ Miner another one among those. I don't know if I threw the in there, but that hasn't really been decided. We know it's going to look different. It's always going to continue to be kind of a fluid situation every winter as to what you're going to add and obviously what you're going to lose. But I think from a sentimental standpoint, maybe an emotional standpoint, it stings a little bit more because you know what that group was able to accomplish, and then you kind of think about it, or at least I do. Twenty twenty one was not the best Braves team that we've seen in the run of division title winners that they had, or really even maybe among the best Braves teams we've seen since the start of the nineties. But they got the job done in October. They got hot at the right time, as the saying goes, And you know, I don't know what the simple math of the simple answers are for it, because the Braves they got to figure out a few things when they get to October. I mean, that's really what they got to fix. They've been a pretty good team during the regular season, maybe even a great team during the regular season, but they got to find their answers come October. In one of those things, I'm going to continue to beat this drum. More so than the starting pitching. They got to figure out how to score runs. Again.

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00:09:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been an underrated part, honestly, is that the offense has disappeared three postseasons in a row, and you know, injuries were obviously part of twenty twenty four, but you know twenty twenty four was not an isolated incident. So I am curious, and that kind of leads to my next question for you, Grant. You and I were talking about this on Twitter a couple of days ago, and we had a lot of people interacting a lot of responses to this. But one of the questions I've been trying to figure out is, Okay, if the Braves do have some financial concerns, and that's been brought up. Justin Discano, who was on with Bradon Scott a couple of days ago, brought this up. Other people have talked about it that there's potentially some financial concerns for the Braves this offseason and maybe they won't be able to do everything they wanted to do. And the big needs that we've talked about all off season is left field, shortstop, starting pitcher, relief pitcher, and relief pitcher. Became even bigger when Joejimenez got hurt and yeah, probably he's going to miss all of twenty twenty five. So I'm going to ask you, in a hypothetical world where the Braves maybe do have some financial concerns and aren't able to address all of these, if you were GM, if you were Alex and Thoppolos, where would you prioritize? What would you go get, what would you make sure you had to have before opening day? Out of those big needs that we've talked about, what's the one that you think absolutely has to be addressed before we get the spring training.

00:10:27
Speaker 3: I really feel like it's the starting pitcher first, the outfielders second, the relief pitcher. Maybe you could say it's a toss up with the outfielder, because I believe Ronal Lacuney Junior, barring setbacks, is going to be back sooner than later. I think he's back sooner than Spencer's strider. But that's just my guess and kind of how I'm reading the tea leaves of you know, what Spencer's riders going through as a pitcher, and what Ronald's going through as a position player, and somebody who's you know, able to I think, come back and affect the game a little bit sooner and there'd be maybe a little bit less concern than getting your elbow all but reconstructed. But putting that, I do think that that's the order that you want to go in because one more proven starting pitcher, to me, would really alleviate a lot of the worry about losing Max Freed and Charlie Morton combined. I mean that post we were talking about and I wrote about this in the Mariada Daily Journal about a month ago. It's three hundred and forty innings and about sixty starts that you lost with you know, Max Freed and Charlie Morton. And while you know, it was a little bit of a roller coaster ride for Morton, and there were some injury concerns here and there for Max Freed. Overall pretty consistent and those are things that you've got to be able to address. The return to Spencer Strider's going to help, but win exactly that's going to be as a question. I think that there are some internal options that might have a little bit more upside than others. Grant Holmes, I felt like showed a lot. He got talked about by Alex Anthropolos. Certainly that's not plan A for how you want to address Max Freed and Charlie Morton leaving, but I do think he's earned the opportunity to show what he can do and to contribute to this club. And you know you're going to need more than five starting pitchers over the course of the season. But whether it's a j. Smith, Schalver or somebody else that could step in, Ian Anderson, perhaps maybe Bryce Elder. I know nobody wants to talk about the last two maybe of those who are kind of on their last legs as Braves in terms of they're at options. So if they can't factor in spring training or factor early in the season, are they even going to fit at all? So I feel like putting all that together tells me that they need to get somebody who's a little bit more stable and perhaps somebody that could really factor into their postseason rotation if you needed them to, because weirder things have happened at the end of the year, whether that's Max Freed and Spencer Strider getting hurt and then Charlie Morton getting hurt, or it's you know, Max Freed was as sick as a dog, I guess that one year, and then he had to deal with the blister injury, so that happened a couple of different times, and then Chris Sales backspasms. I mean, there's just a lot of things that can go wrong. So the quantity and the quality of that I think the Braves want to really add to. But as far as the outfielder goes, I think it's just somebody who's versatile that could help you out in left field, help you out in right field. While Ronald Lacuney Junior's out and still factor in in some way, shape or form a meaningful way in what the Braves are doing. But with no aj mentor and no, Joe Jimenez, I can't imagine that the brain aren't trying to figure out that relief thing because I feel like they need one more leverage arm there too.

00:13:05
Speaker 1: Grant, if you go back a year ago, I think that many would consider the Braves to probably, you know, have been the best team on paper entering into the twenty twenty four season. And I think that when you look at the team as itself, that was certainly the case. But then you had Spencer Schreider coming off the year he did in twenty three, and ronald'kuneye Junior coming off the year he did in twenty three. Those set us apart. I felt those were what I feel really set us aside, you know, as being you know, the true fravorite going into last year. Then, of course both of them have season ending injuries you were expecting. You heard good things about their recoveries. Ken Rosenthal talked about it, how you know, maybe their recoveries being better than the Braves have expected. Maybe that's kind of, you know, impacting what they're going to do this all season. But I want to take it a step further. We expect both Spencer Streider and ronald' Kunya Junior to be back, I would think before mid May both of them, but then being back to them being Spencer Streider and Ronald Kane, that's what this team really need. Do you think that that's not being spotlighted enough that them being back is perfect. It's great, it's awesome to see him on the field, but being at the superstar level that each of them were used to seeing them, I don't think that's going to be immediate. I think that there should be more put on that that it's going to take time for those two to really get back to who they are.

00:14:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not a given, and we saw Ronald in twenty twenty two. I mean he had to deal with a lot of residual pain in that knee, and I think that's something that's going to factor into how he's worked over the course of the winter and looking to get back in and maybe listened to his body as much as he can. For Strider, I just feel like there's certain progressions you have to go through when you deal with the kind of elbow surgery that he's had. I know it wasn't Tommy John, so he is able to come back quicker than that. But I just don't know if the expectations can be where they were. Certainly with what both of those players did in twenty twenty three, I think you're right about that, and I feel like as much as they can come in and make an impact, and I don't think people would be surprised. I just don't know if you can expect it to happen right out of the gates. And the case of Acunya in twenty two, there's a lot of knowledge that he's able to take. I think from his first recovery. You hate that he had to go down this road again, but maybe that'll help him out come the second time. But even when he was healthy in twenty twenty four, it was a really slow start for a couple of months. And I've watched Ronald play for a long time. I feel like he was going to figure it out eventually and somebody was going to pay. But then it didn't happen. Couldn't happen because of the knee injuries. So you've got to have You can't have as many Plan B, Plan C, Plan D, plan the entire alphabet that they needed a year ago. But I do think the Braves want to have more quality depth, whether that's in pitching or whether that's an extra outfielder that can help them out, because they really got caught. I feel like in the crossairs of one of the worst injury years I think I've ever seen last year, and I would prefer, as I'm sure many Brais fans would, to never see that kind of thing happen again.

00:15:55
Speaker 2: So I'm going to ask you this, and you can ask ten different people and they'll give you ten different answers. But just like justin the other day with Brad Scott, you cover the team, think your opinion matters a little more, So I'm gonna I want, I want to get your opinion on this. So the thought has been out there that the that there are some financial concerns, like I was talking about earlier, that the Braves are potentially worried about the first tier of the luxury tax. You know, as we said here today, the Braves said at about one hundred and ninety five million in terms of cash payroll, and then their luxury tax is about two seventeen you know, give or take a small margin of era there, which means they have about twenty four million to before they get to the first tier which is at two forty one for twenty twenty five. So I'm gonna ask you, do you feel like that staying below that tier and resetting the tax is something that Alex is seriously considering. Do you think it's playing a role in the quiet offseason we've seen. Do you think it's more to do with how how hot the market has been and Alex is not being able to find a deal. Where do you come down on this kind of financial debate that's been going on all off season.

00:17:01
Speaker 3: I feel like the market's the biggest factor in that, because you don't want to just go over it to go over it to say hey, we went out and did something. And the reason I say that is and I talked to Justin about this back at the winter meetings last month, there was a story that Alex told us the first year that he came over, and Justin obviously just joined the Beat a couple of years ago, but Alex was talking about his first year as a GM of the Blue Jays had a little bit of extra money left at the end of the winter, so he decided to spend it on a closer and I cannot remember if his Francisco Cordero or some other just veteran journeyman closer and it just didn't work out. He wasn't very good, and then in season he didn't have the flexibility and I know that's a popular term to talk about to go out and financially do what he wanted to do at the trade deadline for the Blue Jays that year, it ended up hurting him. So unless he's convicted in a move and really feel strongly about it, he's not going to do something just to do it. He's going to wait by this time and try to find the right deal. And I think he does want to leave the wiggle room to be able to do some stuff in season. As far as the luxury tax goes, I don't think they're trying to stay under it just to stay under it to reset it. I think that it has more to do with what exactly the moves could be that would push them over that. And I don't think they mind the first tier. It's just when you start to get beyond that to those next levels of it where they want to try to avoid being one of I guess the top paying luxury teams in all of baseball. So that's kind of the way I read it, That is how I interpreted what Alex Anthopolis has told us those couple of times. I feel like twenty four million dollars is not nothing, But I don't know if it's going to get you a starting pitcher, an outfielder, and a reliever. And I've kind of left shortstop out of all of this, not to turn it into a whole nother discussion, but I just don't see shortstop as as big of a need if other things on the team are going right. And that might not be a popular opinion either, but that's just kind of the way I look at it. If you've got healthy Ron Lacuna Junior and the rest of your lineup, the ry Leys and the Olsens and the Murphys of the world hitting, I don't think you're as worried about what Orlando Arci is doing down on the ninth spot. But again, he ended up with a bat in his hand an awful lot in twenty twenty four places where maybe he could have helped up or helped out with the Braves when they really needed him to step up. But again, we don't know what twenty twenty five is gonna look like. But the whole thing is just kind of I think we're getting caught up in maybe the numbers and the lack of moves and starting to wonder if maybe it's more than it is as far as the luxury tax is concerned.

00:19:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you mentioned Shortstop, and I think most of us have you know, other needs just popped up ahead of you know, the relief picture thing with Joejimenez popped up kind of out of nowhere. I think it popped up out of nowhere for the team as well. They still you know, aj Mincher is still out there, the Tanner Scott stuff, which I've got to get your opinion on here in a second. But are you cool with one more year of Orlando just because of the other needs? You know, I know Hassan Kim is still out there. That's basically the only free agent on the market that would be an upgrade over Rcia, and I've just been kind of waiting for him to sign somewhere else so I can officially mark Shortstop off my list.

00:20:00
Speaker 1: Are you cool?

00:20:01
Speaker 2: You know, if Scott Coleman was here, he would have a heart attack. But are you cool with one more year of Orlando Arcia? Or do you feel like it's time, you know, the dance we thing. They really haven't found a replacement since Dancy left. Do you think it's time to go at shortstop? Or are you cool with one more year?

00:20:17
Speaker 3: I feel like, you know the interpretation of being cool with and being accepting of that. If those other things are in place, I think I'd fall more into the ladder. I mean, if Orlando Arci is able to do what he did in twenty twenty three, I'm okay with it. But if Orlando Arci is going to hit two twenty and be historically bad with runners in scoring position, I don't think anybody, myself included, wants to watch one hundred and sixty two more games of that. So could that be the thing that maybe they try to address If some of the other needs won't fall in place, maybe they pivot to shortstop. And this is kind of just building off of what Alex talked about in twenty three when the Braves had the historic offense and everybody was excited about what was happening every night with this club because they were just, you know, setting home run records and doing all the big things. He was out there at the trade deadline trying to find arms. Then all of a sudden he was looking at adding maybe one more bat, which I thought, in hindsight was crazy. Obviously it didn't happen, but that was the way he was thinking. He was like, well, maybe we'll just take a strength and make it even stronger. Now, this would not be making shortstop even stronger and dealing from a place where you already have a strength. I think they do need a long term answer there. But when you consider what Orlando Arcia did in twenty three, what he does in terms of the payroll, which is not a small thing. I mean it's a small salary, but it's not you know, as you start to put together the math and figure it all out, it could play a role in that. And I think all of these things are kind of connected. So I go back to it and say it again. I feel like there are different levels of need in certain areas that to me just surpass shortstop. But if it continues to be a problem, then maybe they will revisit that when it comes time, if they can either find the right deal for a shortstop or maybe in season the right trade is out there and the Brays are able to make that move.

00:21:55
Speaker 1: Then so grant the other thing that you know and talking about, you know, current players on the team. I think if you were to rank the top three MVPs of the twenty twenty four season, Chris Sale, Marcelo Zuna, Risley Glacias. Of course, all three of them, you could say each of them had career years in twenty twenty four, But they also have another common thing. They're each entering or are already in their mid thirties. You do have you know, Azuna and Iglesias who are going into contract years. But just your thoughts. All three of them thankfully are having healthy off seasons, but there's always that risk when you have them having such big years in their mid thirties, could they also potentially be coming to that you know, theoretical, you know that figurative cliff. What are your thoughts on them and that if any of them were to naturally regress because of age in twenty twenty five, that's no small thing. What are your thoughts about each of them hopefully, you know, having big seasons again in twenty twenty five.

00:22:48
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I feel like all of these guys are capable of following up the years. I mean I'm not going to tell you Chris Sale is going to win another cy Young and have another triple crown. That's a pretty special season. But is he capable of going out there every fifth or six day, depending on how you do the math and how the Braves I think are going to do the math again this year with giving extra rest to some of their starters, I think he's in position to continue doing what he's done. Marcelo Zuna, I'm just not never going to second guess the guy again because he went from being one of the most easily cut, traded, released, whatever you want to call it players in the minds of most Braves fans by twenty twenty two to a pivotal part of the offense for the last two years and a guy they're going to be counting on again big time. So I wouldn't count him out in any way, shape or form. And Ry so Iglesias is just I think an important part of that bullpen would be putting it lightly. I think he was one of the best relievers in baseball last year, at least as far as ninth inning guys are concerned, and I think they're going to need that even more so heading into twenty twenty five, so hopefully none of them regress. I don't feel like they've gotten so far into their thirties that you have to worry about it being a steep decline. But I think, as we saw in twenty twenty four, expect the unexpect they can be a pretty bad thing when it comes to injuries, regression, or both. In the case of the Atlanta Braves, because we saw Austin Riley and Matt Olsen randomly struggling, regressing, whatever you want to call it. Some people would put it that way. I felt like it was just some prolonged struggles for them and for others. But those are the kind of things that can happen, and we don't know whose name is going to get called when it comes down to that as well. So I think you're counting on all those guys a lot. And I don't know if that's a real good answer to the question, but they need to do as much as they did in twenty twenty four for the Braves to be where they want to be. I think in twenty twenty five or at least close to.

00:24:30
Speaker 2: Yeah, Glacie has been one year away from free agency. I think he's probably a sneaky I think he's a sneaky good candidate for one of these blue box extensions that we've seen from Alex. It would not surprise me at all if they tried to lock him up some point this winner, just to get some more clarity for the bullpend. But that actually leads me to my next question. We're gonna like gret go here pretty soon because we've already gone twenty five minutes here. But the Tanner Scott stuff was out there. You saw it as well as we did. You know, there's been real smoke, and for the Braves it's not. We don't get a lot of smoke quite honestly on many names.

00:25:04
Speaker 1: So I do want you know.

00:25:05
Speaker 2: I didn't want to get you out here without getting your opinion on the Tanner Scott stuff. Is that potentially a deal where they, you know, give him three or four years as with the idea of him being the closer. You know, if Iglesias does leave after twenty twenty five, do you think they might try to lock Gleasias up and have both of them? Where do you see the bullpen and specifically the Tanner Scott rumor that came across about a week ago.

00:25:27
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think if there's one place the Braves have proven that they will spend it is the bullpen. And Alexandthopolos said it last spring when I was talking to him, I never want to have to rebuild another bullpen at the trade deadline. It's stressful and you just don't know if it's all going to come together. And remember he had to do that quite a few years ago twenty nineteen. I think into twenty twenty as well, had some of those pieces that he picked up with the trade deadline. But I feel like with the signing of Will Smith after the twenty nineteen season, they showed you that they will spend on a reliever and free agency and they'll lose the draft pick if that's what it comes down to as well. So I feel like that it's the one spot where I know the Braves catch a lot of flak and unlesser until they sign another big free agent deal of some other type it deserved or not. They haven't spent big on free agency except when it comes to relievers. And I'm interested to see if this Tanner Scott thing actually does happen. He would fit pretty well. I think and I talked about this earlier on formerly known as Twitter about how I don't know if people realize how big of a loss aj Minter could be when he goes somewhere else. And I know he's not healthy right now, but just look at the numbers and take that away from the Braves what he's been annually. That's another arm that you're going to have to figure out. And that's beyond just losing Joejimenez for potentially the entire season as well. So that would lead me to believe that if they were going to spend a considerable chunk of the money that they have allotted for this winter, maybe a reliever does jump the line. But I think they also need to look at the rotation quite obviously, like we talked about. So it's a good fit to me if they're able to get the Tanner Scott deal done and keeping Iglaciers around for another year or two, I don't think that would be a bad deal either. I feel like it's just you want as much quantity and quality as you can have. In the twenty twenty one postseason showed us a strong bullpen can carry you a long way. You've got to score some runs, but that bullpen can really be a difference maker, and those are the kind of arms you.

00:27:11
Speaker 1: Need and grant you you've hit on, you know. I think earlier today you talked about the fact that in the World Series it may have been or it may have been the entire playoffs the Braves one. I believe the World Series scoring four point twenty five runs per game. I couldn't remember if the World Series or the Playoffs as a whole. Doing that. Doing that today is going to be very, very hard to do. Of course, at the beginning of the off season, the talk was about, you know, Kevin Sitz are going you know elsewhere, you know, us hiring Tim Hires from the Texas Rangers. What are your thoughts in terms of, we know the offense has got to get better, But at the end of the day, especially with us talking so much about arms, that's going to be the internal improvement, you know, from Sean Murphy, hopefully Matt Olson getting closer to what he was in twenty twenty three, Acunya being healthy once again. How much faith, how much you know confidence do you have that this phrased team is going to get back to not only you know, being a powerful offense, but at offense that's got some depth to it, one that can win in multiple ways. How confident are you on the internal improvements going into next year?

00:28:17
Speaker 3: It's going to be critical, and I feel like maybe they got to this point where, and it was somewhat surprising to me, where they felt like the message needed to change. And sometimes in order to do that, you've got to go in and get a new voice that's going to be able to do that for you. And hopefully Tim Hyers and the guys that he has brought in to work with him can bring some fresh ideas that may help some guys out. Now, I will say this that we are in an age of like specialized coaching. I mean, every one of these players is going to go out and have somebody else helping them with their swing. It's not just a hitting coach anymore. Sometimes maybe it's a question of too many cooks in the kitchen, you know, maybe it's just too many things going on, pressing an awful lot. I talked to Austin Riley several times the first couple of months of the season, and he said, look, we know that we're pressing because we all want to be the that gets to hit that turns it around, the game, wins the series, turns around, our month, turns around our season. But we can't take that to the plate with us every single at bat. But Austin Riley, Matt Olson, Ozzy Alby's, Ronald Acunya Junior. I mean, those are four names right there that you've got to get more out of in twenty twenty five than you did in twenty twenty four. And I know injury played a large part, especially for Acunya, Albis and Riley, but you've got to get more out of that four and they are still very much in the prime of their careers. So if I were a betman, which I'm not, I would think that healthy they could put together the kind of numbers that you need for this offense to look maybe not like the twenty twenty three version, but a lot better than the twenty twenty four version. You just got to get those guys out there and give them the opportunity.

00:29:44
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't think that there's anything else I can add from the past thirty minutes. Grant, you once again have shown why you're the best when it comes to covering the braves, and I can confirm Grant is as kind and get a person in person as he is actually covering the Braves as well the one or two times I've had a chance to meet Grant. But Grant, speaking of that, where can people find your work? I obviously know you contribute in a lot of different ways. Where all can people find your great work?

00:30:07
Speaker 3: Well, hey, I appreciate that, and anytime you guys want me, I'll be happy to jump on here and give you as many of the answers that I can in an off season where we haven't gotten an answer to much of anything from the Braves just yet. But you can find me on Sports Radio ninety two nine. In the Game, I host my show From the Diamond that will be coming your way on Sundays throughout the course of baseball season. You can also subscribe to From the Diamond wherever you get your podcast. You can also follow my work on the Marietta Daily Journal, and I will be doing a lot of work on YouTube. Stay tuned. I'll be announcing everything that I've got going in twenty twenty five, but a lot of different outlets. From the Diamond dot Com has all the links on the top navigation you can find me there.

00:30:44
Speaker 1: You also obviously can find as you can see from the Twitter slash x handles for myself, Stephen and Grant. That's where you can follow us on Twitter slash x. You can follow us on YouTube of course. Hammer Territory part of the Foul Territory family of podcast if you'll stick with us for just a second after the show. But thanks so much and I have a very happy start to the new year to you, sir. Thank you for your time today.

00:31:07
Speaker 3: Thanks guys, Happy new Year.

00:31:08
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:31:09
Speaker 1: For Steven Toller and Grant MC call him. My name is Sean Coleman. Always a pleasure being with you. You could check out all the great content from Hammer Territory. We're going to be here to cover it. Even if there's no moves, the content never stops. For Granted, Stephen, my name is Sean Coleman. Will talk to you again soon here on the Hammer Territory Podcast.