Atlanta Braves General Manager Alex Anthopoulos Breaks Silence on Recent Spiral

The Atlanta Braves have lost five-straight games and are 10-games back of the Philadelphia Phillies.

Atlanta Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos / Lucas Peltier-USA TODAY Sports

In a recent interview with Bally Sports, Atlanta Braves general manager Alex Anthopoulos addressed the team's performance. Currently second in the NL East, the Braves are 10 games behind the Philadelphia Phillies and have a record of 17-23 in their last 40 games. 

“I know this is business at the end of the day," said Anthopoulos to Bally Sports. "Seems like that ball Sean Murphy hit last night should have been gone, but you shouldn’t be leaning that much on things over the course of 162. But when you are grinding and trying to get things going, they weigh on you a little more. We have young and accomplished players, but our best-performing player was our oldest one – Marcell Ozuna. People want to say that this is an aging core and diminishing talent and not performing, and that’s not true. The biggest part is we are all in the same boat, similar to '21 it allows us to hang around. The rest of the NL hasn’t really pulled away.”

Question: Why is the Braves offense struggling?

“In fairness I probably don’t wanna share this, because no one has the answer clearly. We are all in the same boat, we can have all the theories – there’s 30 teams and we are looking for results. Look, we haven’t played well; I’m stating the obvious there. When you look at the standing and when the rest of the National League isn’t playing well, it’s like '21 in a lot of ways. As much as you can look at the standing and playoff spots, we have to play better regardless.”

Question: How do you evaluate Murphy and Riley still coming back into the fold after injuries?

“The tough part about is you want to be objective but not make excuses. The team is similar with a deep lineup; normally, you have a few guys that are cold, but the other five or six step up. Rarely do you have it where the entire lineup is cold, minus Ozuna, who has been incredible. We would love to have a turnaround immediately. I’m doing what I can, but we haven’t gotten it done yet. The saving grace is that the NL hasn’t run away from us. However, the Phillies are playing exceptionally well. It’s about making sure you get to the playoffs; as of now, no one is playing the way they thought they would, barring the Brewers, Dodgers, Phillies.”

Question: What do you do in a situation like this? What can you do?

“We are all going to do everything we can, players, coaches, R&D. Everyone is doing what they can. I mentioned this maybe 10 days ago – I’m active with trade calls, and nothing is imminent; I have been more active than I have been in the past. We haven’t gotten any traction on anything, but from talking with other general managers, it seems everyone is dealing with offensive struggles. That doesn’t make us feel any better, but we are continuing to look and getting our own team playing well and we’ll see what we can come up with.”

The Braves general manager had plenty to say about the team’s struggles; now it’s just a matter of what strings the team pulls moving forward to see if they can turn the ship around.”