Braves have decisions to make on future with Acuña, Albies

Two of Atlanta’s foundational pieces are at a crossroads in their respective futures with the Braves.

Ronald Acuña Jr. and Ozzie Albies are both in option years of their current contracts. Simply put, the Braves can renew their deals and keep them a part of the 2027 roster or decline those options and allow them to become free agents.

Acuña is in the first of two such option years per his contract while Albies is facing the second of the two option years in his deal.

“We always wait — it’s within five days after the World Series that you have to exercise or decline, right?” Braves president of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos said Sunday. “With all options, you make those decisions when the time comes.”

The World Series could end, at the earliest, Oct. 27 or, at the latest, Oct. 31. Thus, it will be early November when the fates of two of Atlanta’s most-favored players are decided.

Acuña, who turns 29 in December, would be paid $17 million for the 2027 season should the Braves extend him. That’s a relative steal given Acuña’s talent level and popularity.

But Acuña also hasn’t lived up to the lofty statistical standards he set for himself in 2023 when he stole 73 bases, hit 41 homers, had an OPS of 1.012 and won the National League MVP. In the three injury-riddled seasons since he has been a .267 hitter and played 251 games out of a possible 486.

And in Atlanta’s last three postseason appearances, Acuña has a .132 batting average with zero RBIs. In the National League Division Series against the Dodgers, Acuña hurt his right knee on a slide into second base.

“If you look at (Acuña’s) year, the leg issues, right?” Anthopoulos said. “The first one (hamstring injury) he had, I think he came back in three weeks? Then he had it again. He had a great series against the Reds. He dominated. And about three weeks later, I think he got hurt again. We took an extra amount of time to bring him back. We waited a long time. We sent him down to Florida during the All-Star break, but it was a long layoff.

“The last month or so, obviously, he played at a really high level from an offensive standpoint. Just had a great month of September and made some great plays in the outfield. From a range standpoint, the way he was moving, some balls he caught in the gaps, some balls he came (in on), I thought he moved better than he had in a long time.

“Look, his (right) knee was barking. You know that late position switch in Game 4, he was in right field and we switched him to a DH, we still got him on a sprint speed of 29.1 on the ground ball to second base. We brought him into (manager) Walt (Weiss’) office to talk to him because he was in the outfield doing stuff, and he told us he would feel it when he would load, and he would feel it when he ran. But he wanted to play, and he still was able to gut it out. But, look, it’s certainly a thing.”

Anthopoulos and his team will have to weigh whether they believe the Acuña of old still exists — or not. The player, though, after the Braves’ season-ending loss to the Dodgers on Wednesday in the NLDS, remained steadfast in his desire to continue to wear the ‘A.’

“I want to stay here my whole career, that hasn’t changed,” Acuña told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Wednesday. “But I can’t control that. It’s hard when you don’t help your team. It’s tough.”

Hours later, it must be noted, Acuña deleted all mentions of the Braves’ organization from his Instagram page and replaced his profile picture with the word, “desconectado” — which translates to “offline.”