Ozzie Albies Establishes Major Goal for Bounce Back with Braves

With the World Baseball Classic behind him, Ozzie Albies enters the push for a bounce-back season. The Atlanta Braves second baseman said on Friday that he felt he was at 100% and was ready to go. After a season-ending injury, once again to his wrist, it's a good first start.

When looking to reestablish yourself as an All-Star there are definitely goals in mind. One of those for him is on the basepaths. Antoan Richardson has been working with the entire team with baserunner since he took over as the first base coach.

He came over from the New York Mets, so he saw a major jump in stolen bases last season, highlighted by Juan Soto. Before last season, he had never stolen more than 12 in a season. In one year with Richardson, he more than tripled it to 38 bags. That helped Soto pick up his first 30/30 season and be a finalist in the National League MVP voting.

Albies said the gameplan is coming together, and he has his number set and ready to go.

"I'm looking forward to at least, at minimum 20-plus, 30 bags for sure," Albies said in an interview with Gray TV.

The most stolen bases that Albies has swiped in a season is 20, which came back in 2021, when the Braves won the World Series. Last season, he swiped 14. Overall, Albies generally has a high success rate when stealing bases. For his career, he has 98 stolen bases on 121 attempts (about 81%).

So, when he said, at minimum, the goal is to steal 20-plus to 30 bases, we know what he's thinking when reading between the lines. He wants to set career-highs. It would make for a nice statemet after the past couple of seasons.

Now, if his goal is to steal beyond 30, maybe 35 or 40, we'll have to see about that. We're not going to sit here and guarantee that he goes and nearly doubles a career high he has achieved once.

However, those are good aspirations to have. If the bar is higher, you're more likely to end up somewhere further than you would have otherwise. Reaching a lofty stolen base goal would also mean he likely did much better overall at the plate. It would be a sign he's finding his way on base way more and hitting the ball well.

It's doubtful that he bats .240 again and can reach those goals, even if he's more aggressive. If he gets back to All-Star form, where he has a .330 on-base percentage or better, then he has the chance to make this happen.

We know he's capable of 30 home runs and 20 stolen bases. So, if he comes close to a 30/30, then that is a success. It may not be in his own mind, which is OK. Better he stay hungry for more. But for the overall success of the team, if these goals just get him to where he's been before, the team is in much better shape.

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