The Braves have fired three coaches who were previously under contract through 2025, with David O’Brien of The Athletic among those to relay the news (X links here). The three coaches are hitting coach Kevin Seitzer, assistant hitting coach Bobby Magallanes and catching coach Sal Fasano. Atlanta will fill the two hitting coach positions but won’t replace Fasano, who was in a role specifically created for him. General manager Alex Anthopoulos had previously said he expected the entire coaching staff to return but O’Brien reports that the club hadn’t yet begun its evaluation process at that time.
Atlanta undoubtedly had a disappointing year, including on offense. The club came into the season with championship aspirations but just barely snuck into the playoffs and then were quickly eliminated. The club’s hitters posted a collective line of .243/.309/.415, leading to a league-average wRC+ of 100. That was a big drop from last year when Atlanta collectively hit .276/.344/.501 for a league-leading 125 wRC+.
How much credit or blame the hitting coach deserves for such a swing is a matter of debate. Seitzer has been the club’s hitting coach since October of 2014 and overseen plenty of good clubs since then, as Atlanta has the playoffs in each of the last seven years and won the 2021 World Series. While the 2024 club didn’t meet expectations, injuries undoubtedly played a role there, with Ronald Acuña Jr., Austin Riley, Michael Harris II, Ozzie Albies, Sean Murphy and others missing significant time. Regardless, the club has decided that a change is necessary, so they will be looking for a new hitting coach for the time time in a decade.
Seitzer played in the majors from 1986 to 1997, suiting up for Kansas City, Milwaukee, Oakland and Cleveland. The Diamondbacks hired him as their hitting coach going into the 2007 season and he later had the same job with the Royals and Blue Jays before coming to Atlanta. Magallanes was a minor leaguer in the ’90s but never made it to the show. He became a minor league coach early in this century and was able to get up to the majors with Atlanta for the 2021 season.
Fasano played in the bigs from 1996 to 2008, playing for nine different teams. He quickly began coaching in the minors, getting hired by the Blue Jays in late 2009, around the same time Anthopoulos became the GM of that club. In late 2017, Anthopoulos became GM in Atlanta and Fasano was hired by the club as a catching instructor that same month.
Saint Nick
Thank God
metsin4
Why because your GM brought in a bunch of waiver replacements and they didn’t hit? This was on your GM.
formegn hardgin
a lot of guys underperformed…the ones who didn’t get hurt. it also could just be that there aren’t going to be a lot of on-field changes so you want to try and switch up the vibes somehow.
metsin4
He was the hitting coach for the best offense in baseball last year. Someone will grab him and reap the rewards. I guess the Royals make the most sense.
bhambrave
Laureano had a 128 OPS+ as a Brave. Soler had a 134. Urshela had a 95, and played great defense. Merrifield had a 93, but had a broken foot for much of September.
What hurt the Braves was their pitching issues at the end of the season. Those two rained out games and Sale’s injury screwed up their rotation.
metsin4
So fire the hitting coach? No one on the Braves needed to be fired. The had one semi down year compared to expectations.
bhambrave
I never said they should have fired Seitzer. That was someone else. I was just pointing out that most of their WW imports did pretty well. Rosario was a bust.
metsin4
Soler killed you from making better moves in the offseason. He makes 16m a year and is a defensive liability. It wasn’t a good move. He has no were to play next year.
bhambrave
He has trade value as a DH, even if the Braves have to eat part of his salary. BTW, he’s only making $13M in 25 and 26.
I agree it wasn’t a great trade, but it doesn’t really hold them back next year.
metsin4
Sorry it’s a 16m cap hit and 13m pay. I read that wrong. Nobody else wanted to trade for him last year. I don’t think he’s going to be that easy to move. It will make a difference in the starting pitchers you go get to replace Fried and Morton.
atlbraves
What a stupid, uninformed comment.
ronnyalton
Kevin will be back. Threepeat
getrealgone2
Should have cleaned house entirely.
10centBeerNight
Confident ATL will be back dominating NL east next year.
metsin4
You shouldn’t be. Most of your players are seriously regressing. Acuna wasn’t very good the year after returning from knee surgery and your payroll leaves you no room to maneuver.
bigalcathey
He made the all-star team the year after his first knee surgery (2022) and won the MVP the following year.
rct
@metsin4: as a fellow Mets fan, if you don’t expect the Braves to be in the thick of it next year, you’re delusional. Olson was on fire over the last two months and Harris closed the season out great. Riley will be back. Murphy will likely be better purely for health reasons. Ozuna will probably regress, but only because he was so good this year. And they’ll have Acuña back.
Pitching-wise, they get Strider back. Schwellenbach looks solid. They’ll probably lose Fried, but will still have Sale and Lopez. Braves are still serious contenders.
metsin4
I didn’t say that. The original poster said they would dominate. That isn’t happening.
10centBeerNight
As a 32 year Mets season ticket holder, I stand by the statement
rct
@metsin4: You said “Most of your players are seriously regressing”. Like who? I was responding to that.
formegn hardgin
they have 30MM to spend
Samuel
metsin4;
Don’t get too big headed.
Braves are one of the best organizations in MLB. They know ball, and know how to bring players along.
A year ago did you know the name Spencer Schwellenbach? Better than any Mets starting pitcher.
Did you laugh when the Braves traded for Chris Sale?
Team has 2-way gamers like Michael Harris II and Ozzie Albies when healthy.
Mets got a starter as good as Spencer Strider when he’s healthy?
Sean Murphy played hurt.
The Braves Acuna is arguably the best overall position player in the NL when healthy.
–
You had an incredible season. David Stearns is extremely baseball smart. Enjoy. Don’t get boastful. The Mets have more players on their roster that are aging then than the Braves do.
You haven’t won the ’24 WS, or even gotten to it yet. Don’t
be like the classless Yankee fans. Probably something in the water. Suggest you consider buying bottled water.
metsin4
Sean Murphy didn’t play hurt. He isn’t as good as you thought he was. He is a backup catcher now. Contreras was better than him when traded and it was a horrible trade. The Mets do have pitchers better than Schwellenbach. Senga, Manea, Peterson are all better. Severino is about the same. Strider is a two pitch fastball pitcher that might lose velocity when returning. He isn’t the long term pitcher you think he is. Who on the Mets is aging? I know we have 6 top 100 prospects that are coming and that doesn’t include young Acuna. You all are in Lala land if you think you’re going to dominate the east again. Not to mention the Nationals are coming and the Phillies aren’t going anywhere. You all are the ones with the big heads saying you are going to dominate the division.
bhambrave
According to Cot’s, they have a $186M payroll next year and a $195M CBT. They have plenty of room.
metsin4
According to spottrac their payroll is at 218m. You are losing most of your rotation and bullpen. You aren’t in a good salary cap space at all.
bhambrave
According to Cot’s, it’s a lot less. Not losing most of either the rotation or the BP. Returning starters are Sale, Lopez, Strider and Schwellenbach. Returning BP are Iglesias, Jimenez, Bummer, Johnson, Lee.
getrealgone2
Metsin4 you’re either a troll, 15 years old, insanely clueless or all 3.
hoof hearted
I really don’t like the word “fired”,; I’d give them the option to be reassign to “locker room attendant”. This would at least give them a choice.
Samuel
I see the kids got home from school today.
Things were going good in the comment section earlier.
Ignorant Son-of-a-b
Wow I remember having Kevin Seitzer rookie cards up the wazoo but none of them looked like the picture of Seitzer MLBTR put up for this article.
bag o ballz
lol i know right I had to look it up to see if it really was the same guy
Citizen1
What took them so long?
Wild card team beat the top seeded team again in nl playoffs. Womp Philly
hllywdjff
Come on Mariners hire seitzer!
piratesanddbacksfan
Pirates plz get Seitzer
southi
I don’t see the hate for Seitzer. In 2023 they set a major league record for slugging percentage. He can’t help all the injuries this season, and he can’t help that the majority of the players that Atlanta has acquired has a lot of swing and miss in their game.
From my understanding his philosophy has always been about making hard contact up the middle and towards the opposite field gap. There has been a lot of praise for his approach in the past.
I’ve also saw data that showed that Atlanta has more hard hit outs than anyone else in baseball while their percentages of hard hits, flat balls, line drives, and ground outs were all comparable to 2023 when they had a record setting year. That points mainly to bad luck or significantly better defensive positioning by the other teams.
So what has happened behind the scenes?
What has happened since Snitker said that everyone would be returning?
getrealgone2
He’s taking the fall.
southi
To be honest, it has always been easy for someone to take the fall so it makes it look like the team is being proactive. That may very well be the case here.
I believe that if Seitzer wants to continue to coach that he will NOT be long without a job.
case
The angry mob must be appeased.
NashvilleJeff
Well stated southi. Great question to end your thoughtful post.
geotheo
Sometimes when a coach is fired it isn’t necessarily about the fired coach. Could be the Braves have a young ( cheap) hitting coach in their system that they would like to hold on to. Seitzer is 62 so maybe the Braves are looking for someone for the long term. Of course watch the Braves go out and hire Rod Carew totally destroying my theory
RunDMC
Enter Chipper??
bigalcathey
Chipper isn’t interested.
getrealgone2
He doesn’t want it.
metsin4
GM is in cover his backside mode.
Dash 2
Seitzer was a great hitter when he played for the KC Royals. I’d love to see them bring him back.
Braves Butt-Head
It’s a fickle business just last year he was the best hitting coach in baseball with a record setting offense and now he’s looking in the help wanted section of mlbtraderumors.
But it’s the players and their attitudes more than anything you can lead a horse to water but that horse will still hack away with runners on 2nd and 3rd and less than 2 out with wiff because “chicks dig the long ball” and meanwhile those hens on 2nd 3rd never come “Home” to Roost and nobody is feeling “Chipper” about that.
CardsFan57
I’m beginning to wonder if there will be anything but first year hitting coaches in MLB next year.
Ben K
Hitting Coaches TM
Taking the fall for the offense since time immemorial.
bravos4life
Something that should have been done three months ago
Citizen1
Employees not fired with enthusiasm soon will be.
bhambrave
Wondering if Contreras’ improvement after leaving Atlanta contributed to Fasano’s firing. That trade and the Adam Wainwright/J.D. Drew trade are the two trades I most regret them making.
Citizen1
Braves wanted to win at the time and had enough pitching depth, just not the offense. David justice /grissom to Cleveland for Kenny lofton and Alan embree was bad too except for embree.
bhambrave
At the time, Wainwright had a big growth spurt and lost his release point. The Braves downgraded their estimate of him, making him trade bait. The Braves had plenty of offense. Trading Wainwright for one year of Drew was shortsighted.
metsin4
Contreras hasn’t improved that much. He was pretty good with the Braves. He was actually better offensively with the Braves. He should have never been traded.
showmebb
Cards need a hitting coach…
DodgerOK
So he was a good hitting coach when they won the World Series and now he is a bad hitting coach?
TheMan 3
Andy Haines is looking for a job
Monkey’s Uncle
You can fire Sal, but you can never fire his mustache.
Mike56
MLB causing a lot of hitting coaches there jobs this year putting that dead ball back in this year
letitbelowenstein
I would so hate to be a coach right now.
Benjamin101677
Sometimes a team needs a new voice in coaching. Sure the Braves had someone lined up already or they won’t have moved on from them.
Chipper Jones in like August of 2024 really attacked the way the Braves were hitting. The Braves really failed at the basics, with things like getting a runner in from 3rd; 2 strike approaches, etc.
ATLbravos
Shitker should go as well so we can get rid of all the bobby cox cronies.. Go get david ross and start from there.
Grump
If team would go back to hitting line drives and quit swinging for the fences the homers would come. Go back to old school: see ball hit ball run like hell. Batters should be fined by the team every time they take more than one shot at the fence per at bat. Braves have had to many strikeouts verses the number of homers just because of launch angle GO BACK TO BASICS: SINGLES, BUNTS, LINE DRIVES BEAT US THIS YEAR!!!!!!
bhambrave
“Every time I see you hit one in the air, you owe me twenty pushups.”
-Lou Brown
Robertq50
Fire Snitker. If there was a WAR for managers his would be negative
ATLbravos
great at developing players but his in-game management is atrocious