This past Saturday morning, Alex Anthopoulos spoke with the media in a bit of an offseason debriefing moment. While the bulk of that presser was spent discussing Brian Snitker’s departure and trying to figure out who any potential replacements could be, the topic did eventually switch to what the team will be focused on when it comes to improving the squad ahead of the 2026 season.
When the President of Baseball Operations/GM of the Atlanta Braves was asked point blank about which positions the Braves would target in the offseason, Anthopoulos responded with some of the clearest talk that we got throughout the entire press conference.
“I would say shortstop, clearly,” stated AA when it came to responding to that particular question. “We made the move to acquire [Ha-Seong] Kim and I think I said it at the time, the thought was that it was attractive that there was a potential for beyond ‘25. Not knowing that there were any guarantees but there was the potential to at least get to know him and have conversations. There are paths for him to be here…we like him as a player and we’d like to have him back.”
He did pour some cold water on the idea of potentially going out and picking up an outfielder — though as we all know, AA loves him some GM-speak so take all of this with a huge grain of salt). “Right-handed hitting outfielders is not something that’s a front-burner for us, and that’s being candid,” admitted AA. “Maybe as we go through the winter, that does become something but right now, that’s not a front-burner. I would say that rotation is absolutely front-burner for us. That’s definitely something where I think I’m stating the obvious there.”
Anthopoulos did circle back to discussing their actual priorities, such as relief pitching. “In the bullpen, we’ve got some free agents…I think every year bullpen is on your list,” said AA. “When we traded for Tyler Kinley, we said at the time that we were focused on ‘26. We weren’t buying necessarily, we were looking for things that could impact us in ‘26. Whether it was a pending free agent or someone with club control — Kinley had club control and Kim has the potential to be under contract and even if [he exercised his option] we had the potential to get to know him and feel better about him and have discussions.”
AA continued to reiterate about how their dealings during the final stages of this past season were meant to focus on what would happen next season. “Everything [we did at the Deadline] had ‘26 in mind,” explained Anthopoulos. “So clearly, shortstop and bullpen were there. We explored starters at the Trade Deadline. I think those three (shortstop, bullpen, starting pitching) were fair and will definitely be in the discussion. I think if you add a right-handed hitting outfielder, that would be fourth [on the priority list]. I think we’ve been more focused on the other things you’ve brought up.”
Anthopoulos was asked specifically about Ha-Seong Kim and what things were looking like when it came to the potential of Kim exercising his player option in order to stay in town. After a fair bit of deflection from AA talking about how they couldn’t really get anything done until immediately following the World Series, the GM finally did get down to at least discussing how he feels about bringing in Kim. “Kim right now is under contract. He’s got a player option…we’ll see,” stated AA. “He’s got a decision to make. That’ll be soon after the World Series…we’ll know at that time what his status is and we’ll address that and deal with it. He did a great job for us, he was a great fit in the clubhouse, he was a great teammate, it was great to get to know him and we hope he’s here.”
So if you’ve got any ideas of what the Braves need to focus on in the offseason, the President of Baseball Operations just laid it out there — well, at least as much as a man who is known for misdirections could possibly do. We’ll see if that’s actually the roadmap that the Braves actually stick to once we get to spring training and then eventually Opening Day next March but for now, it’s time to start looking at starters, relievers and maybe shortstops if Ha-Seong Kim isn’t sticking around. Shortstop may not be attractive considering what that market is looking like but we’ll see what they can do when it comes to fortifying their entire pitching staff.
