The Atlanta Braves farm system has been held in low regard for quite some time now. Some of that has to do with the lingering effects of the international restrictions that were placed on them years ago, leading to the exit of John Coppolella, but a lot of it also has to do with the sheer number of homegrown stars that have graduated and become integral pieces to the major-league club.
Nobody has developed more talent over the last decade than the Atlanta Braves. Even in recent years, several stars have emerged, but Keith Law still has the Braves ranked as the 28th-best farm system in baseball heading into the 2025 campaign.
“Atlanta’s farm is down from years of contention, with Alex Anthopoulos trading a lot of prospects away to build and maintain a playoff roster, and some drafts that haven’t worked out, including the 2022 class that started with three high school pitchers, all of whom have had Tommy John since signing,” Law writes for The Athletic. “They’re also still slowly recovering from the years they spent banned from participating in international free agency for rules violations in the mid-2010s, although now you can see some more prospects from Latin America popping up on their top 20 list.”
While I understand the sentiment, the Braves have had some porous injury luck with some of their younger pitchers, and the lower levels of the minors are not filled with high-upside talent like some other organizations. Eventually, you would think these prospect gurus would take a look in the mirror and think, “Perhaps we aren’t evaluating the Braves talent correctly.”
Atlanta’s been a bottom-ten farm system by nearly every outlet for several years. Yet each season, they call up another All-Star caliber talent. A few years ago, Michael Harris II and Spencer Strider duked it out for Rookie of the Year, and last season, Spencer Schwellenbach came out of nowhere and established himself as a frontline starter.
Look around the league, that just doesn’t happen, especially for organizations that truly have bad farm systems. So, while “prospect gurus” like Keith Law might not be impressed, the proof is in the pudding. You might not know his name yet, but odds are somebody in the Braves farm system is going to come up this year and make a major impact that nobody is expecting, which is why these rankings should always be taken with a grain of salt.
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Photo: Jeff Robinson/Icon Sportswire
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