Everybody wanted to know what Freddie Freeman, the Yoda of the Braves’ clubhouse that he is at 25, thought of the offseason tear down. Doesn’t something seem a little wrong with that?
He is the Braves’ best player. He signed an eight-year contract extension in 2014, only to see the team turnaround nine months later and start selling off pieces like a corporate raider, prompting even manager Fredi Gonzalez to say, “You sit back during the winter and you think, ‘What’s going on?’” So, yeah, Freeman is a focal point.
But he’s young. He has only four years of major league experience. Four … years. How does it get to a point that a relative kid seemingly passes through a time warp and comes out the other side as the grizzled vet of the clubhouse, prompting media members to seek perspective from him, after four years?
“It’s definitely weird,” Freeman said, as he looked at the mostly unfamiliar nameplates above lockers at the Braves’ spring training facility. “I think Craig (Kimbrel) is the only guy who has more Atlanta Braves time than me. You come up and you have guys like Chipper Jones, who had been here like 17 years. We had Tim Hudson, Brian McCann, Billy Wagner, Eric Hinske. Kris Medlen kept things loose, but he got hurt last year and wasn’t around.”
Jones. Hudson. McCann. Hinske. Medlen. David Ross.
All are gone now.
That’s how this happens.
The Braves are rebuilding, even if they don't like to use that word because it doesn't play well in the world of marketing. "Come spend money on our rebuilding team! See players who might be really good tomorrow! Or maybe the day after!"
Freeman is the best of what’s left of the Braves’ core. He can hit and field. He plays with passion, has a Pepsodent smile and seems as likely to cause an off-field problem as the tenor in a church choir. The problem with being easily the best player but also one of the youngest players on a team is some want to force the athlete into a role that maybe he’s not ready for yet: leader.
It’s not in Freeman’s personality to call a team meeting or scream at a teammate or hold court for the media, ostensibly to send a message. There’s no guarantee it ever will be in his personality. Leadership comes naturally.
Maybe the Braves won’t be as bad as everybody thinks. But they’re likely to have significant growing pains and will need stabilizing influences in the clubhouse, something obviously lacking last season. That’s something former general manager Frank Wren often denied last season, but everybody in the organization now admits, including Freeman.
Braves executive John Hart brought in Jonny Gomes, Nick Markakis and Jason Grilli in hopes of keeping things loose. But simply because of Freeman’s stature — combined with the offseason exits of Justin Upton and Jason Heyward and others in recent years — the first baseman understands he’ll often be designated team spokesman, a role he never has been entirely comfortable with.
“It was comforting when I started and you saw No. 10 (Jones) walking through the clubhouse, or No. 16 (McCann),” Freeman said. “Those guys put you at ease. You follow their lead. It was definitely tough to see (Hudson and McCann) leave after the 2013 season. I don’t want to pinpoint that and say that’s why we didn’t play as well last year. But that kind of veteran leadership doesn’t come around very often. Hopefully it will be a better year in terms of people saying some things when they need to be said.”
When asked if he could help fill a leadership void, Freeman was nothing but honest.
“You have to kinda grow into that,” he said. “It’s built on people’s personalities. I’m not the guy yelling in the dugout. I want to play 162 games. I play the game hard, and hopefully that’s an example. I’ve never been the rah-rah guy.”
It’s notable that Jones wasn’t a rah-rah guy for much of his career. It wasn’t until the last five years or so of his career when he understood and accepted that role. He became the go-to guy for media members for his honesty. He said what needed to be said, did what needed to be done, even if that seldom involved screaming in the dugout.
“I only remember one or two times when he screamed at us in the dugout, and that was his last season,” Freeman said. “I think I made an error, and somebody else made an error and that’s when he felt like we weren’t giving it our all. So he came into dugout and started screaming at us. But usually he pulled somebody aside, and that’s how I think I’ll be.”
Freeman likely isn’t going anywhere for a while. What he thinks is important. That’s why Hart, Gonzalez and assistant general manager John Coppolella all contacted him in the winter to affirm that he was on board with the blueprint and the roster changes, which included trading close friend Heyward, Justin Upton and Evan Gattis for mostly prospects.
“He had great questions. ‘What kind of players did we get back? How close are they?’ He didn’t (complain) one time,” Gonzalez said.
Freeman is preaching the company line about youth, enthusiasm and the future.
“I know a lot of people are writing us off,” he said. “But hopefully we won’t strike out as much, put the ball in play and put some pressure on other teams.”
He also was quite candid about the problems with last year’s roster, which prompted Gonzalez to bat Heyward leadoff after exhausting all options.
“Having Jason Heyward hitting leadoff for you is not a well-constructed lineup,” he said. “We didn’t have a guy in the first or second hole to get on base to set the table. It was me and Justin trying to get on base and set the table with two outs, and then hope for the best. Now … we have guys who are going to fight for every at-bat.”
As for leadership, he plans on doing that by example and let the rest happen organically.
“No one grows up and thinks, ‘Hey, I want to be that guy who sits in front of his locker and answers questions to the media all day,’” he said, laughing. “But as you get older, you learn. I do think everyone wants to be the guy people turn to when things go wrong. I just don’t know if I’m there yet. But I think about it. We’ll see how it goes. Ask me again in a few months.”
