The
Braves have, for obvious reasons, had to use a lot of scrapheap fill-ins this year. Some have already been jettisoned from the big league roster (Alex Verdugo, Carlos Carrasco). Some are really new (Cal Quantrill, Jake Fraley). Some have excelled thus far (Joey Wentz). Which ones do you think will make it to 2026 with Atlanta?
Here are some/most of the options:
- Vidal Brujan – this one is a real toss-up, as the Braves have been keen to give him playing time so far, but he offers basically nothing on paper. He’s also controlled for quite a while.
- Jake Fraley – this seems fairly likely given his additional year of team control, though he could flame out in the last five weeks of the season and get non-tendered. Fraley presents as a decent fourth outfielder on paper, which seems really nice… but the Braves are also in their current predicament because something approaching a bazillion decent fourth outfielders on paper that they had in-house this season all mostly sucked.
- Joey Wentz – he’s been so good (0.7 fWAR in 34 2/3 innings, an xFIP below 4.00 even if it’s way higher than his FIP) that I don’t know how the Braves don’t find a way to use him in 2026. A lot of what helps is that Braves-Wentz is very different than not-Braves-Wentz so far, which makes it easier to believe that he’s something other than a bad pitcher on a heater.
- Erick Fedde – the two things against him are that he’s a bonafide pending free agent, and that, well, he’s been awful.
- Cal Quantrill – also a pending free agent, and better than Fedde this year, but with a worse overall outlook.
- Carlos Carrasco – he wouldn’t even be on this list, except that he accepted a minor league deal to stick with the organization. I don’t think any team is going to be asking Carrasco for major league innings in 2026, but you never truly know.
- Dane Dunning – seems like an obvious non-tender candidate, but maybe he gets re-signed on a cheap deal. It’s hard to gauge how the Braves feel about him given his inconsistency so far, and it looks like he’ll be out of options next year, anyway.
- Hunter Stratton/Connor Seabold/etc. – I guess these guys technically qualify for this list, and it’s a safe bet that someone will be around to throw seven-ish mop-up relief innings for the 2026 Braves, but it may not be the same guys from 2025.
