Well, it didn’t take long after declining Tyler Kinley’s option for the Braves to go ahead and do the same thing to Pierce Johnson.
Like Kinley, Johnson was also
acquired from the Rockies in a Trade Deadline deal, back in 2023. He was lights out after the trade (17/66/48 ERA-/FIP-/xFIP-), and because he checked a lot of boxes the Braves like (or liked?) including z-whiff and a hard breaking pitch, they locked him up on a two-year deal that paid him $7 million in each of 2024 and 2025, and also came with a club option for another $7 million for 2026. Well, he probably isn’t getting that $7 million for 2026, at least not from the Braves at this point.
Johnson’s 2024 was pretty good — 0.5 fWAR, 89/91/90. Not dominant stuff, but basically your sort of generic better-than-average reliever guy. Fit for high leverage, but not that high leverage. His 2025, though, was more of a problem, as he posted his lowest strikeout rate since his sophomore 2018 campaign, after which he had to head to Japan to find a meaningful role. The aggregate 2025 performance was okay — 0.3 fWAR, 72/97/98, but honestly, that’s not the sort of thing you need to pay $7 million for. Johnson had particular problems down the stretch — 103/139/121, which may have motivated the Braves to move on, given that getting killed by HR/FB and having poor peripherals for two months of work is not what anyone wants to see.
Assuming no reunion on a smaller scale with either Kinley or Johnson, the Braves have now freed up $11.5 million ($12.5 million less their combined buyouts of $1 million) for… stuff. Whether that stuff is just other relievers, as has been this Front Office’s wont to date, or something else entirely, well, stay tuned.
