With Ronald Acuña Jr. back in the Atlanta Braves’ starting lineup, the team fell 2–1 to the San Diego Padres—but not before Acuña made his presence felt with a home run on the very first pitch he saw.
The Braves have been eagerly awaiting his return, as he and Spencer Strider are the key pieces of a possible postseason push, and expectations are building. Everyone has their own take, but Chris Rose may have delivered the boldest prediction yet.
Chris Rose Believes the Atlanta Braves Will Win the NL East
At 24-26, this is an Atlanta Braves team that started the year 0-7. They’ve heard enough about how they were the slowest starting team in all of baseball, and the last team to pick up their first win. It took them seven games to do so, but they are still eight and a half games behind the leading Philadelphia Phillies.
The gap between second and third is also 5.5 games, with the New York Mets three games behind the Phillies.
On Baseball Today, Trevor Plouffe was hesitant to even say that the Braves will make the playoffs, “From what I’ve seen, if Strider can come back and be Spencer Strider again… then they seem like they’ll be a playoff team.”
He continued, “I think that’s a big if too, we have to see it. I wouldn’t be willing to call them an NL East champion, but I lean playoff team. Again, I’m not so sure about that”.
With him “not so sure about that”, Chris Rose immediately countered with not just the fact that they’ll be a playoff team, but a convincing argument as to why they will win the division.
“I definitely think they are going to be a playoff team. I’m going to say this, I think they will be champions of the NL East,” Rose said. “They have played three games against the two teams ahead of them. That means they have 10 more against the Phillies, and 13 more against the Mets.”
Shifting gears to the returning Ronald Acuña Jr., “I think they were trying to figure out how to get through without Ronald Acuña at the top of their lineup. It’s not just you’re bringing back Ronald Acuña… Wouldn’t surprise me if he hits multiple home runs this weekend” he added.
Sure enough, his prediction immediately came true.
That episode of the podcast was recorded before Acuña went deep on the very first pitch he saw.
Neither Rose nor Plouffe were doubting Acuña’s abilities in the big leagues, but he was able to prove all of the doubters wrong with one swing of the bat, even though it was the only run of the night for the Braves.