The Braves are in agreement with infielder/outfielder Whit Merrifield on a big league deal, according to Jeff Passan of ESPN. The Braves’ 40-man roster currently stands at 39 prior to the deal, meaning the club will only need to accommodate Merrifield’s addition to the active roster with a corresponding move.
Merrifield, released by the Phillies earlier this month, figures to help cover second base in place of Ozzie Albies, who suffered a fractured wrist yesterday and is expected to be out of action for approximately eight weeks. Reporting yesterday indicated that the Braves plan to promote top infield prospect Nacho Alvarez to take over for Albies as their regular second baseman, and it appears the addition of Merrifield won’t change that. As noted by the New York Post’s Jon Heyman, Merrifield is currently expected to take a bench role with the Braves, leaving the starting job at second base open for Alvarez.
The 35-year-old veteran is an excellent fit for Atlanta’s roster needs in a bench role, at least on paper. With clear holes at second base and in the outfield, Merrifield’s ability to play both left field and second base makes for a strong fit, allowing him to back up both Alvarez at second base and work into an outfield mix that currently features Adam Duvall, Eddie Rosario, Jarred Kelenic, and Ramon Laureano. That being said, Merrifield’s difficult stint with the Phillies gives some reason for concern about his ability to be an effective major league hitter at this stage of his career. In 174 trips to the plate this season with Philadelphia, Merrifield slashed a paltry .199/.277/.295 with a wRC+ of just 65.
Despite Merrifield’s lackluster performance with the Braves’ chief division rival, there are some reasons for optimism that his performance could improve going forward. While Merrifield is almost certainly not the above-average contributor he was earlier in his career with the Royals, for whom he posted a 111 wRC+ and 13.3 fWAR from 2017 to 2020, he nonetheless had a recent track record of being a serviceable bench bat in more recent years. Merrifield slashed a decent .268/.311/.385, good for a wRC+ of 90, with the Royals and Blue Jays between 2021 and 2023.
That sort of production still seems to be within the realm of possibility for the veteran, particularly looking at his underlying metrics. Merrifield’s 10.9% strikeout rate this year is actually the lowest of his big league career, and his 8.6% walk rate matches his career high from back in 2018. While Merrifield’s .096 ISO this year is the lowest of his career, the larger culprit for his downturn in performance appears to be his shockingly low .206 BABIP. Entering the 2024 campaign, Merrifield owned a healthy .321 BABIP for his career and had never posted a figure lower than .276 in any individual season. Even matching his previous career low set in 2022 would surely provide a noticeable lift in his production and make him a compelling bench piece when combined with his versatility and respectable 11-for-12 showing on the basepaths this year.
In addition to helping Alvarez cover for Albies at second base, the addition of Merrifield alongside Rosario earlier this month is somewhat reminiscent of Atlanta’s quantity-over-quality approach to retooling their outfield at the trade deadline in 2021, when they loaded up on rental outfield pieces in the form of Rosario, Duvall, Joc Pederson, and Jorge Soler in order to help boost the outfield’s production following the loss of Ronald Acuna Jr. to season-ending ACL surgery. With Acuna once again done for the year in 2024, the signing of Merrifield could serve as an indication that the Braves intend to follow a similar path forward this year rather than spend significant prospect capital to land a more significant piece like Jazz Chisholm Jr. of the Marlins or Luis Robert Jr. of the White Sox.
The rebirth of Whit Merrifield.
I really rooted for him to succeed in Philadelphia. His teammates loved him, but the problem was he stunk on ice (figuratively, that is).
perfect assesment i agree id rather have Whit Bissel! and i heard his body stunk two!
Whit Bissell really did nail his part in ‘The Time Tunnel’.
He didn’t leave the Royals well. Was that just a weird fluky situation?
Honestly asking, not trying to agitate or anything. If he is a good teammate, that’s fantastic.
Nope.
Who are you noping, Whit Merrifield or Whit Bissell?
Not surprised. Merrifield has the potential to be a nice pick up for Atlanta and stick his previous team, the Phillies, at the same time.
Whit is whipped. Nothing left in the tank.
Braves are whipped too. People will blame injuries but they’ve looked bad all season before the injuries. About 2 good weeks to start and by mid April looked like trash offensively
When did the injuries start?
Yup. That’s right. People forget that after April the hitting went in the toilet. Acuna was playing pretty mediocre when he got hurt. If they didn’t have a fantastic April they’d be around 500.
Murphy got hurt on opening day. Strider got hurt about 3 weeks into the season. Acuna didn’t get hurt until Memorial Day weekend.
@getrealgone2
Strider got hurt in his 2nd start of the season.
Harris, Olson, and Riley were all cold as well. Harris got injured, Riley’s heating up, Matt is still cold. At least Kelenic has worked out ok so far.
Ozzie broke his toe 2 weeks into the season.
Every single position player has been hurt, besides Olson this season. Its apart of the game. Braves hit harder than most teams have. I wouldn’t be surprised if they fall out of the playoff picture. Someone needs to get hot and stay hot.
Yeah and that was the 3rd week of the season.
Pretty crazy when Kelenic is your iron horse.
Strider got hurt in his 2nd start of the season.
=======================
I assume they are trolling.
Fried, Strider, Acuna, Riley and Murphy were all All-stars last year. They be maybe a .600 team with better health.
Four games up on one wild card slot, .500 ball puts them at 86-76. I think they’ll be okay. They may lose a home series though.
Why would he feel the need to “stick it to the” Phillies? They paid him well; they gave him oodles of rope to demonstrate whether or not he could right the ship, they supported him all along the way, and then they released him so that he would have a better shot at another opportunity.
It is a performance business and the pros understand that fact. YOU might want to stick it to the Phils, but there is no reason for Merrifield to give a Whit about that garbage.
good job andy!!!!!!right on da money yo!
id rather have david dahl and wes waltman instead of whitty!
I’m not seeing the potential.
Contact hitter that can steal a base. Why not.
So far his contact is clicking at a .199 rate with almost no power at all…..you have to get on to steal bases and let’s not get carried away with his walk rate….this guy is supposed to be a stick not eagle-eye at the plate gunning for walks……
He can steal a base after a walk just as well as he can after a single. So, that’s a cherry picking argument. As the article says, his BABIP suggests he is somewhat unlucky to go along with some of his best strikeout and walk rates of his career. Seems like the best potential upgrade to a bench you can hope for unless you are giving away prospects for trades. And he only has to be paid league minimum since the Phillies are footing the bill after releasing him. Solid addition, with virtually no downside.
I wanted Merrifield for the RS. He should be a solid UIF/5th OF/PR. Getting a guy like that for minimum wage doesn’t prevent you from picking up other needs.
Merrifield is about where he was last year with a lower BABIP. Contact hitter that can steal a base. I don’t see anyone here saying Whit is a world-beater. The kid they’re bringing up has never played 2B. Makes a lot of sense given that Albies just went down.
And a .206 BABIP well below league average that is begging for some positive regression.
“Positive regression.” Is that a thing? They sound like opposites. Maybe “reversion” is the word.
Unfortunately whit no longer makes contact.
Neither does Arcia, and he’s our starting SS.
You misspelled “can’t”
Nacho at SS , Whit at 2nd send Arcia to bench
That shortstop defense would get real ugly real fast.
you should be more concerned about Merrifield’s defensive capabilities at any position.
Hell no. Arcia’s defense is too good and Whit’s bat is as bad Arcia’s.
Mitt Where He Field.
Ozzie right to the 60 day IL or Short getting DFA’d? With Nacho in coming up, in addition to this, thats alot of infielders
Nacho Man’s minor league numbers are fantastique
Looks like this would be Nacho’s first innings at second base since he turned professional.
Not always the wisest move to have a player learn a new position at the big league level. The ball comes off the bat differently, the turn at second can be twisted, etc.
Hope the kid works hard at it. Good luck t o him.
That’s kinda what happened with Grissom when Ozzie was out a couple of years ago. It worked great short-term. Of course, there’s no Wash around to tutor him, but this isn’t entirely unprecedented.
No, they’re not.
1.007 OPS in AAA this year.
.805 OPS career in the minors..
He knows how to get on base and can steal bases.
I get that he’s a SS not a 2B, but saying his minor league numbers aren’t good is idiotic. It takes 5 seconds of effort to look up.
Braves in 6. This is what sends them over the top. He’ll hit .350 the rest of the way
@16 for 20
Braves need to get the Philly monkey off their back, first.
First the Cards in the WC
then the Phillies in the Division
Then the ? In the championship
And a rematch vs houston
Watch him clubs 2 HR game againts the Phillies after being let go.
Just kidding, Wheeler will strike him out twice in a game instead.
Smart move. He’s basically free. They don’t have a lot of trade chips.
Wont be used much the Braves don’t even play their bench.
Called it! I wish the braves would have signed Brandon Belt, he can still take at the plate and it probably wouldn’t cost much of anything.
The Braves have absolutely no place to play Belt. He’s too brittle for anything but 1B or DH. He wouldn’t be an improvement at either spot for Atlanta—–no matter how bad Olson looks right now.
I wasn’t talking about replacing Olson, he will be fine he is an incredibly streaky hitter. I know Brandon Belt has played some LF and was wishfully thinking about giving him a shot out there. Granted, he probably sucks in left but the braves desperately need some offensive production and he wouldn’t dip into the braves mid/weak farm system. I know it’s unrealistic but a fellow can dream right? Even if it’s a pipe dream haha.
Nothing wrong w/a crazy (hopeful) fever dream once in awhile, lol. You’re definitely right about them needing improved offense.
I do hope they give Nacho Alvarez the majority of the second base time or start him at shortstop on occasions though! I’m excited to see what the kid can do!
Just remember he is a 21 yr old playing in the show and keep expectations tempered.
Not pointing at you,. but so many on these boards just rip on these young men if they start out slow and say they are flops. Really gets old.
Too bad he’s not a lefty. We need a platoon partner for Duvall.
Hopefully Duvall is gone after the 31st.
Nothing like having a bad clubhouse teammate
And he’s nothing like a bad clubhouse teammate.
He must not be because the Braves don’t sign those.
If Nacho hits but struggles at 2B, it wouldn’t surprise me if they swapped him and Orlando in the infield.
As always these writers use BABIP without any context to indicate poor luck. While Whit has been terrible in almost every stat showing quality of contact. BABIP without that context is a worthless statistic.
100%. I’ve seen Merrifield live multiple times this year, and his bat speed and resulting exit velo are garbage. He can barely hit the ball out of the infield. But these “expert” writers don’t really know much to begin with.
Yes his bat speed was only in bottom 2%.
He basically said the Braves were his first choice in the winter due to Geography,never know, happy life could lead to happy hitting
I’d like to think AA made a knee jerk reaction to all the Nacho jokes made here yesterday…
Down bad.
With the injuries, Merrifield was getting some significant starts in Philly, and he just couldn’t get it going. Great teammate. Everyone loved him, but he couldn’t hit at all. It’s interesting to see the Braves taking a chance on him, but I have my doubts.
The Braves are bumping up against the third tier of the CBT. They don’t want to drop 10 spots in the draft. Not saying that it’s the driving force, but it is a consideration.
Yeah. It makes sense financially and also, his experience will help the younger callups. I just don’t see his bat as viable.
He fits right in with Eddie Rosario, Orlando Arcia, and Adam Duvall.
Love the pickup. Cheap and maybe he likes hitting against the backdrop at Truist. Much better than trading three prospects for Jazz.
This gives the Braves a little more flexibility at SP. Maybe they take a stab at Keuchel. Yeah, he has a 5 ERA, but will not cost prospects. Outside of that, I don’t trust most of the arms rumored to be available in trade, so would just prefer the Braves roll out some prospects.
That was a quick, cheap plug-and-play replacement to Albies!
As a Phillies fan that is one happy day for me. Can’t wait for the Braves to be down to their last out vs Phillies in Playoffs and watch Whitney strike out. Almost as good as a Pennant!
At this point, if the Braves make the playoffs that might be considered a win. Yes, they are leading the WC chase right now, but one cannot expect Sale and Lopez to finish out the year without a bit of a backslide at the very least. Maybe Schwellenbach will continue to improve and offset any downslide from the other two, but then still have to fill in the Fried loss.
And that’s just in the rotation. The starting nine are also showing very few signs of coming out of their funk.
The Braves are absolutely making the playoffs. No one wants that 3rd Wild Card. There’s no standout team. They’re all around .500. Braves are fine.
If you think the Cards, Mets and Padres are going full bore for those spots you are way off. That’s not counting the DbAcks, Cubs, and Giants who have no designs on truly taking at this point.
Now, if you just mean no one is really playing well and such, then I agree, but the Braves are taking big injury hits. Don’t get me wrong, a bunch of teams have as many players listed on the injury reports, but the Braves hits are much higher value players.
S, to my point, if the Braves get in I feel that is an achievement at this point. If they do get there, I hope that someone else eliminates the Phillies, because quite frankly, they are owning us in the playoffs recently. If not, then who knows, it would be fun to see nonetheless.
Of course I mean no one is really playing well. No one wants to lose on purpose, but the NL has four good teams and a bunch of teams struggling to stay at the .500 mark. So, that 1st WC is a pretty easy task for the Braves, even with the injuries.
Riley’s definitely come out of his “funk.” Ozuna hasn’t been in one all season.
Just heard that he hurt his finger during a warm-up and is being evaluated by Braves trainers so he might already be on the IL
You can’t make this up. What the hell is happening in the ATL?
Hell bat like .370 for the rest of the season watch
Now what am I gonna do with this “The Phillies like their cheesesteaks Whiz Whit!” sign I made with Merrifield top less holding a liberally whizzed sandwich??
Looks like Nacho got a new duty…
Whitney said in recent podcast he wanted to go back to Toronto but he wanted more than $7M. Talked about how he hates a team option. He also talked about wanting to play near home for the Braves (he said all this right after Phillies stupidly signed him). Seems like ink didnt dry on Braves contract before he was injured. I’d rather the Phanatic play than him. At least it would be legit funny instead of ungrateful and pathetic.