Aaron Nola signed first, going back to the Philadelphia Phillies on a seven year deal worth $172M. (For what it’s worth, Atlanta reportedly outbid Philly for Nola’s services, but he chose to stay home.) Sonny Gray was the next to sign, taking $75M for a three-year deal with the St. Louis Cardinals.

And then the Shohei Ohtani deal happened. Ten years, $700M, with an astounding $680M deferred, bringing the luxury tax calculation down to $46M a year.

(Worth noting – all of those free agents received qualifying offers and would have required the Braves to sacrifice their 2nd and 5th-highest draft picks in the 2024 MLB Draft were they to sign with Atlanta.)

We’ve also seen lots of third tier (and fourth tier) pitchers sign, as well, including Seth Lugo, Eduardo Rodriguez, Michael Wacha, Kenta Maeda, Tyler Mahle, and Jack Flaherty.

When you look across the ecosystem of Braves fans and where they congregate online (twitter and facebook groups, mostly, but occasionally on reddit as well), there’s quite a bit of angst that Atlanta’s being “cheap” by not outbidding other teams for these starters that are entering their early 30s (or, in the case of Sonny Gray, already 33 when signing).