Hello Dynasty Baseball fans, and welcome to our poorly-named-yet-well-written, Companion Article Series! We will be publishing these the day after each team’s Top 10 Prospect Lists are shared. And while we will focus on the same organization, our companion pieces will not always be prospect-centric. Every author will choose to share their thoughts on whatever aspect of the team they are writing about.

What do we call a trend setter who is revolutionizing the game of baseball and the deals that are made within it? A maverick? Independent minded?

Scott Boras?

No. We call them Alex Anthopoulos. 

Thus far, in the start of the 2026 season, we have seen an astonishing number of extensions being handed out to both pre-arbitration players and players who have not even made the MLB team or been added to the 40 man roster! Cooper Pratt of the Brewers and Colt Emerson of the Mariners both signed before even accruing a single day of service time, and Konnor Griffin of course (wink wink) didn’t sign his until he was up enough time to allow for the Pirates to receive a prospect promotion incentive (PPI) pick at the end of the year when he likely finishes in the top two for Rookie of the Year. 

I think we largely have Anthopoulos to thank for beginning this trend of locking up your studs early, taking risks and big swings, and personally I think it infuses a much needed energy into the game as we see the new stars take the field even younger than before.

This may sound like a bit of an exaggeration, but I would argue that no one in all of Major League Baseball has been able to successfully lock up young talent at team friendly rates like the man at the helm in Atlanta and it isn’t even close. Let’s dive into his biggest extensions he’s handed out, and the value they’ve provided as the nucleus of the team.

First off, Ronald Acuña Jr. has to lead off this discussion. Despite his injuries, he has been nothing short of a superstar in the ATL. Having amassed 28.5 baseball reference wins above replacement (bWAR) before the age of 28, Acuña Jr. seems to be on his way to a surefire Hall of Fame career. He signed an eight year 100 million dollar extension in 2019, putting the average annual value (AAV) of the contract at 12.5 million dollars a year. That means that this extremely team friendly contract has provided value at a $3.51 million per 1 bWAR rate accumulated so far. Incredible. 

Next on the list we have the Curacao born Ozhaino Jurdy Jiandro Albies (80 grade name), more commonly known as Ozzie Albies. In 2019, Anthopoulos worked his magic and somehow managed to lock Albies up to a seven year $35 million extension with two club options at the back end of the deal to push the value up to $45 million. [Ed. note: Ozzie may have needed the cash, he does have a lot of fish to feed. We also love how he shares his “fish hobby” with local school children.] With Ozzie having produced a 24.5 bWAR career thus far, the entire deal (including the two club options) has provided value at an astonishing $1.83 million per 1 bWAR rate to this point. 

Now these two examples of course were slam dunk, amazing, generational players signed to team friendly deals. In the middle area of a more “good not great” player is the case of Michael Harris II. He signed a pre-arbitration contract extension locking him in to a nine year $72 million deal in 2023, after his 2022 rookie of the year campaign. Now Harris II has not put together a year on the same level of production, but at these rates he doesn’t have to.

That gets to the entire point of these pre-arbitration extensions the Braves have been so excellent at completing. Some people may say it’s a large risk to commit $72 million to a player who just finished their first year in the majors, but the risk is mitigated so much by spreading the money out over such a long period of time that it begins to make more financial sense. 

If Atlanta determined that Michael Harris II was not the player they wanted and literally released him today, they would have wasted just eight million dollars toward their competitive balance tax hit per year. That comes out to just over 4.7% of their entire current tax number of $171 million. 

Juxtapose these pre-arbitration signing AAVs with the $21 million and $21.2 million tax hits represented by arbitration extensions given to Matt Olson and Austin Riley, and you see why taking the risk on promising pre-arbitration players and rolling the dice that none bust makes sense. When you can fit almost two Ronalds Acuña into the tax imprint left behind by Austin Riley, you see the method to Anthopoulos’ madness. 

So whichever up and coming player the Braves extend next, be it Didier Fuentes, Cam Caminiti, or even Drue Hackenberg, be sure to put them on your shortlist, because given Anthopoulos’ track record to this point they’ll probably be a long term star in the league.