Does Ozuna's future lie with underperforming Braves?

July 23rd, 2025

ATLANTA -- didn’t mince words when he was asked about the frustration the Braves were feeling after a 2-4 homestand further damaged any lingering hopes of turning things around in the second half.

“It’s embarrassing,” Strider said. "It feels like we’ve had a million opportunities to make adjustments and get headed in the right direction that we think we’re capable of, nobody more so than myself, and we just haven’t been able to do it.”

Strider has actually been one of the few consistent bright spots for this team over the past two weeks. Yeah, he surrendered two homers in a 9-3 loss to the Giants on Wednesday afternoon at Truist Park. But while allowing just three runs over five innings, he also didn’t get much support from an offense that was silent for 17 of the final 18 innings of this three-game set.

“I got to thinking maybe we were on the verge of getting on that run I’ve been talking about all year,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said.

Sitting 13 games under .500 (44-57) and with four starting pitchers on the 60-day IL, the Braves are running out of time. Mathematically, they could make a miraculous run over the season’s final 61 games. But idealistically, the best move is to focus on 2026 and beyond.

, who is in the final year of his contract, was a significant part of the team’s recent past, but his future is likely elsewhere. Ozuna, closer Raisel Iglesias and veteran reliever Pierce Johnson could all be moved before the Trade Deadline arrives on July 31 at 6 p.m. ET. The Braves aren’t expected to move catcher Sean Murphy or second baseman Ozzie Albies, who have both been mentioned in the rumor mill.

“If we fail on the field, if I fail to do my job, then somebody else is probably going to be held accountable for it,” Strider said. “They probably don't deserve it in a lot of cases. So, that weighs pretty heavy on me, and I know it does a lot of other guys in here.

“It’s something we've talked about as a group for the last couple months. It's just the direction that we were headed that we might be saying goodbye to some friends if we don't turn things around. Unfortunately, we might be in that boat now.”

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Hector Gomez, a Dominican Republic journalist, reported Tuesday night that the Padres and Braves had intensified trade talks surrounding Ozuna. But a source has since said the two teams haven’t had any discussions of any kind regarding Ozuna.

Still, an Ozuna trade seems inevitable. Snitker came out of the All-Star break on Friday and said the designated hitter spot would be filled by either Murphy or Drake Baldwin, whichever of the two isn’t catching that day.

Ozuna has trade veto rights because he has played in the Majors for 10-plus years and has been with the same team for at least five years. But his desire to stay in Atlanta is likely subdued by the fact he would enter the free-agent market after spending this season’s final two months as a bench player.

“That’s what my agent and [Braves president of baseball operations Alex Anthopoulos] have been working on,” Ozuna said on Sunday.

When the Braves started the season with seven straight losses, the thought was things would turn around once Strider and Ronald Acuña Jr. were activated from the injured list. Well, even with Acuña constructing a 1.038 OPS, the team has gone 20-32 since he returned from knee surgery on May 23.

As for Strider, the team has gone 4-4 as he has posted a 2.83 ERA over his past eight starts. His efforts have too often been squandered by a maddening offense that averaged 6.3 runs over nine games, and then scored in just one of the final 18 innings of this Giants series.

Ozuna ranked ninth among all qualified MLB players with a .916 OPS over 306 games from 2023-24. He had a .901 OPS through June 1 this season. Despite hitting .164 with a .524 OPS over the 38 games that have followed, he still has a .749 OPS this year.

So, there’s reason to believe a team may be willing to take a chance on him, like the Braves gambled on Jorge Soler, who was hitting .190 with a .654 OPS when Atlanta acquired him from Kansas City before the 2021 Trade Deadline.

Trading Ozuna was not something the Braves envisioned. But that was way back when they entered this year with legit World Series aspirations.

“We see it happen all the time to our best friends, they don't come back, they get traded or whatever,” Snitker said. “It’s part of this business. It’s the way this game is. It’s not for the light-hearted.”