Monday Morning: Braves offseason begins, shifts to manager decision

The MLB offseason officially has begun, meaning all attention in the South shifts to the Braves’ managerial search.

And Dodgers bench coach Danny Lehmann, commonly perceived as the Braves’ preferred choice, is available after his team’s thrilling Game 7 victory in the World Series on Saturday night in Toronto.

If Lehmann is indeed the Braves’ choice, the process shouldn’t drag much longer. Most of MLB has filled its manager openings; the Braves, though, have remained quiet on their search to replace Brian Snitker, their championship manager who transitioned into an advisory role earlier this month.

Lehmann, 40, appears to be the favorite (though nothing is certain until it’s official). He overlapped with Braves’ president of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos when the latter worked in the Dodgers’ front office (2016-17). Lehmann, a former player, joined the Dodgers organization in 2015 and has served a variety of roles over the past decade.

He was in multiple scouting and game-planning positions until he was promoted to bench coach in 2023. He’s won three championships with Los Angeles (2020, 2024, 2025), the organization that’s the clear standard in the sport, even beyond its seemingly infinite financial might. His background suggests Lehmann would be an analytics-emphasized hire.

Lehmann has almost no managerial experience, though plenty of first-time managers have had success recently. His lone opportunity came when he oversaw a Dodgers’ victory over the Padres in May 2023 as manager Dave Roberts attended his son’s graduation.

There always is some level of risk in such a hire, but Lehmann has drawn rave reviews for his scouting and game-prep work over the years. He’s spent a decade around perhaps the best organization in American sports.

Two years ago, Roberts said he was impressed with Lehmann’s “crazy bandwidth” for information, per the Los Angeles Daily News. Lehmann then expressed confidence that his path, although different from past conventional rises to managerial positions, was setting him up for success.

“How managers are picked today is very different than 10, 15, 20 years ago,” Lehmann said. “There was a progression in the past, where it was kind of like you managed whatever league in the minors, and you progress, or became a base coach. It’s just very different. I think now it’s a little bit more specific in how you want to run your team, and I think that makes a lot of sense.

“You see a lot of teams doing it now as far as their hires throughout the major league staff. Not just the manager. It’s more filling holes. You want to have a complete staff, all areas covered. Being around it in years past — this is my ninth year — it gave me a really good understanding of what is needed at the major league level, and to contribute however I could.”

Even beyond Roberts, the Dodgers have employed numerous former managers from whom Lehmann could learn. And it’s nothing new to see a franchise pluck talent from the Dodgers. Executives and coaches from Los Angeles and Tampa Bay, which consistently does more with less, often appeal to other clubs trying to emulate their success.

In the Braves’ case, this manager would inherit a talented core that just needs some tweaks. Perhaps new perspective could help the team, too, after two frustrating injury-plagued campaigns.