The Best Players in Atlanta Braves History, Position by Position

By 4Baseball Staff · November 5, 2026 · 12 min read

An all-time Atlanta Braves lineup, rotation, bullpen and manager built from franchise career leaders, awards and Hall of Fame service, with the selection rules stated and the close calls explained.

The Atlanta Braves are one of the few clubs that can field an all-time team from three different cities. The franchise played in Boston from 1876 through 1952, in Milwaukee from 1953 through 1965 and in Atlanta from 1966 on, and the historical record counts all of it as one club with 150 seasons through 2025 and a record of 11,190 wins and 11,035 losses. That history means an honest all-time team has to choose between a 19th-century pitcher who won 330 games and the 1990s trio of Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz, who anchored a run of division titles.

This article makes those choices. It builds a nine-man lineup, a five-man rotation, a closer and a manager, using only what the franchise's own career leaderboards, award lists and Hall of Fame service can support. Where the numbers settle a position, the pick is easy. Where they do not, the reasoning is spelled out so you can disagree with it.

The short version: the lineup is anchored by Hank Aaron, Chipper Jones and Andruw Jones, the rotation is Warren Spahn, Greg Maddux, Phil Niekro, Tom Glavine and John Smoltz, and the closer's job goes to Craig Kimbrel. The team that results would struggle to find room for Eddie Mathews, which tells you something about the franchise.

The rules for picking an all-time team

Every list like this needs rules, and these are the ones used here. Only statistics earned while with the franchise count, so Hank Aaron is measured by his 733 home runs in a Braves uniform rather than his career total, and Greg Maddux by his 194 wins with the club rather than the 355 he won overall. The pick has to have played the position in question for a meaningful stretch, as shown in the historical fielding records. Longevity with the club matters, but a short, spectacular run can beat a long, merely good one if it came with awards.

Three tiebreakers apply when two players are close. The first is major awards earned with the club: Most Valuable Player, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year. The second is Hall of Fame election, which the fact sheet records for any player with at least four seasons with the franchise. The third is the era: a hitter from the 1890s scored runs in a very different run environment than a hitter in 1998, and the comparison deserves a note when it decides a pick.

There is one rule about what cannot be used. The historical record carries no wins above replacement (WAR), no defensive runs saved, no Statcast measurements and no park adjustments. A reader who wants those should consult a source that carries them. Everything here is counting statistics, rate statistics, awards and positions played, which is enough to settle most of the lineup and to expose where the argument is open.

The lineup at a glance

The table gives the team, the position, the figure that best explains each choice and the years with the club. Remember that the numbers belong to the franchise, not to the career.

The figures for Lopez, Albies and Long are sums of their historical seasons with the franchise; the rest come from the club leaderboards. Albies is still active, so his line runs through the 2025 season only.

Catcher, first base and second base: the thin end of the lineup

Catcher is the position where the franchise has the least separation. Two catchers have real claims. Javy Lopez was the club's primary catcher from the early 1990s into 2003 and hit 214 home runs for the franchise with a .287 average, catching 1,106 of his 1,156 games. Brian McCann, the club's regular behind the plate from 2005, hit 188 home runs with a .275 average over 10 seasons with the club. The edge goes to Lopez on both counts and on longevity of the job, though a reader who values McCann's consistency over a decade has a defensible case. The historical record cannot tell us about framing or throwing, which is where catchers are now judged.

First base is easier. Freddie Freeman played 12 seasons for the club, hit 271 home runs, collected 1,704 hits and batted .295, and won the 2020 Most Valuable Player award. Behind him sit Joe Adcock, who hit 239 home runs between 1953 and 1962, and Fred McGriff, who hit 130 in five seasons and is a Hall of Famer. Freeman is the pick without much argument. His only competition would come from the DH slot, and that belongs to someone else.

Second base is the position that tests the idea of an all-time team, because the franchise has had no second baseman who dominates the leaderboards. Ozzie Albies, who has played second base for the club from 2017 through 2025, has more than a thousand games at the position and 157 home runs. Red Schoendienst, a Hall of Famer who spent four seasons with the club in its Milwaukee years, has the plaque but not the seasons. A reasonable all-time team could also pick any of several defensive specialists. Albies is the pick because he has the sustained run of everyday play, with the caveat that a second baseman's real value, range and the double play, is exactly what the historical record cannot see.

Shortstop and third base: an argument across centuries

Shortstop is a choice between two long careers separated by a generation. Herman Long played 13 seasons for the franchise in the 1890s, mostly at shortstop, and still leads the club with 434 stolen bases. He collected 1,902 hits and scored 1,292 runs. Rabbit Maranville spent 15 seasons with the club between 1912 and 1935, played the bulk of his games at shortstop and was elected to the Hall of Fame, but he hit .252 for the franchise with 23 home runs and 1,696 hits.

On the numbers alone, Long wins. His run total is the fourth highest in club history, behind only Aaron, Chipper Jones and Mathews, and his stolen-base total is the franchise's best by a wide margin. The caveat is the era: the 1890s offense is not comparable to the offense of 1915 or 1998, and a shortstop who stole 434 bases was playing a different game from one in a later decade. Maranville's case rests on a glove that the box score does not capture, and Rafael Furcal, who won the 2000 Rookie of the Year award and played 777 games at shortstop over six seasons, was a fine player who was not with the club long enough to challenge either.

Third base is where the lineup gets crowded. Chipper Jones played 1,992 games at third base for the franchise, hit 468 home runs, collected 2,726 hits and 1,623 runs batted in, walked 1,512 times, hit .303 and won the 1999 Most Valuable Player award. He is one of the best third basemen in the history of the sport, and nothing in the Braves leaderboards threatens him. The difficulty is that Eddie Mathews, who played 1,861 games at third base for the Milwaukee version of the club, is also on the leaderboards and also immortal. Mathews hit 493 home runs for the franchise, second only to Aaron, and drew 1,376 walks. One of them has to move.

The outfield and the designated hitter

Hank Aaron belongs in right field without discussion. For the franchise he hit 733 home runs, collected 3,600 hits, drove in 2,202 runs and scored 2,107, and every one of those numbers is a club record. His franchise batting average was .310. He played 21 seasons for the franchise, 12 of them in Milwaukee and nine in Atlanta, and he won the 1957 Most Valuable Player award with the Milwaukee club that won the World Series. He leads the franchise in home runs, hits, runs batted in and runs scored.

Center field belongs to Andruw Jones. Over 12 seasons from 1996 to 2007, he hit 368 home runs, drove in 1,117 runs and scored 1,045. The historical record cannot show his defense, but his reputation for range in center field is widely recorded and it matters here because the team is already spending its offense on corner positions. Dale Murphy has a stronger case than the center-field label suggests: he won the Most Valuable Player award in 1982 and again in 1983, hit 371 home runs for the club between 1976 and 1990, collected 1,901 hits and drove in 1,143 runs. Murphy played mostly in the outfield for Atlanta, with some time at catcher and first base early in his career. The team slots him in left field because Andruw Jones is the stronger defender at the premium position, and a manager would not move the better center fielder.

Hugh Duffy, the Hall of Famer who played for the club from 1892 to 1900, is the best argument against the outfield as written. He hit .332 for the franchise, the best average of any Braves hitter with at least 3,000 at-bats, stole 331 bases and drove in 927 runs. He is the type of player who is easy to leave off a list because the era is so far away, and he is on the bench here for that reason, with respect.

Designated hitter is the only slot in the lineup that has no historical meaning for most of the franchise's life, since the National League did not use one for much of it, but an all-time team can take the freedom. Mathews fits it: 493 home runs, 1,452 runs and 1,376 walks, the second-highest home run total in franchise history. He takes the move rather than Chipper Jones because Jones played more games at third base, 1,992 to Mathews's 1,861 with the Milwaukee club, and because a designated hitter is chosen for the bat alone.

The rotation: six candidates for five spots

If the lineup has a few real arguments, the rotation has an embarrassment of riches. Six pitchers could start, and the team has to leave one at home. The leaders are Warren Spahn with 356 wins for the franchise, Kid Nichols with 330, Phil Niekro with 268, Tom Glavine with 244, John Smoltz with 210 and Greg Maddux with 194.

Spahn is the first name on the staff. His 356 wins and 63 shutouts for the club are the franchise's best, his 2,493 strikeouts are third, and he won the 1957 Cy Young Award with the team that won the World Series. Maddux comes next on the strength of the quality of his run: a 2.63 earned run average over 11 seasons, the fourth lowest in franchise history among pitchers with 1,000 innings (the three below him all pitched before 1930), and three Cy Young Awards in a row from 1993 to 1995. Niekro, the knuckleball pitcher who appeared in 740 games for the franchise, more than anyone, took the ball for 21 seasons and has the most strikeouts of the group apart from Smoltz.

Glavine and Smoltz round out the five. Glavine won two Cy Youngs with the club, in 1991 and 1998, and won 244 games. Smoltz won the 1996 Cy Young Award, struck out 3,011 hitters in a Braves uniform, which is the club record, and also saved 154 games, which makes him the rare player who is on the leaderboards as both a starter and a closer. His flexibility is why the sixth rotation spot, which would otherwise be a battle between Smoltz and Nichols, can be settled by the team's other needs.

Nichols is the one who loses out, and the loss is arguably a tribute to the staff rather than a judgment of him. He won 330 games in 12 seasons with a 3.00 earned run average and 44 shutouts, but his seasons came in the 1890s, when the rules of pitching were still being reshaped and starters threw far more innings per season, so the numbers are not directly comparable. He is the pitcher who would be in the rotation of a team built only from raw totals. In a team that weighs what the wins meant in their time, he is the first man on the bench.

The bullpen and the dugout

Craig Kimbrel is the closer. He saved 186 games for the franchise, the most of any Brave, in a historical span that runs from 2010 to 2025, and he won the 2011 Rookie of the Year award. Smoltz's 154 saves are second, and the choice is to keep Smoltz in the rotation instead. Gene Garber is third with 141 saves, Mark Wohlers fourth with 112 and Raisel Iglesias fifth with 97 through 2025.

The manager is Bobby Cox, who won 2,142 and lost 1,707 for the franchise over 3,851 games. His tenure ran from 1978, with a later return, to 2010. The fact sheet reports Cox's span as 1978 to 2010, and his division titles run in a streak from 1991 through 2005 with the exception of the 1994 strike season, when no postseason was played. Brian Snitker, who manages the team through 2025 with 811 wins in 1,479 games and a World Series title in 2021, is the other name in the discussion. Frank Selee, who managed the club to pennants in the 1890s, won 1,004 games in 1,677 games for the Boston version of the franchise.

The players who just missed

A team picked by position has to leave out some great players, and a few absences are worth naming. Dale Murphy, who won back-to-back Most Valuable Player awards, only makes the lineup in left field. Eddie Mathews is a designated hitter on a team that would have preferred to play him at third. Chipper Jones is the lineup's best hitter by walks and runs batted in, and he had to share the field with Mathews. Joe Adcock was the club's first baseman for much of the 1950s and hit 239 home runs. Bob Horner, the 1978 Rookie of the Year, hit 215 home runs in nine seasons and is a reminder of how many good hitters a franchise can have who do not make the all-time team.

Among pitchers, Kid Nichols and Lew Burdette, who won 179 games and 30 shutouts with the Milwaukee club, are the main casualties. Vic Willis, a Hall of Famer, won 151 games in eight seasons. Julio Teheran is seventh on the franchise strikeout list with 1,184 from 2011 to 2019. Chris Sale won the Cy Young Award in 2024, which is recorded for the franchise, and Ronald Acuna won the Most Valuable Player award in 2023; both are the kind of player whose career with the club is still unfolding as of 2025, and the list should be revisited when it ends.

What the numbers cannot say

The honest limit of this exercise is that it uses counting statistics, and counting statistics reward longevity. Aaron's 3,600 hits are a product of talent and of 21 years with a single franchise. A player who spent 10 seasons at an extraordinary level and then moved on, as some Braves have, would lose to a durable good player on these leaderboards. Awards help, because they capture peak, but they depend on voters.

Defense is the largest blind spot. The best defensive players on this team, Andruw Jones in center, Albies at second and Maranville on the bench, are the ones whose value is hardest to see in the numbers, and the all-time team probably underrates them. If you want to extend the exercise, the next step would be adding WAR from a source that publishes it, then seeing which positions change.

Common questions

Why is Hank Aaron's total here 733 and not 755? Because the team is built from stats with the franchise only. Aaron's 755 career home runs include his final two seasons with the Brewers. His 733 Braves home runs remain a club record by a wide margin.

Where do Ronald Acuna and Chris Sale fit? They are recorded award winners with the club, Acuna as 2023 MVP and Sale as 2024 Cy Young winner, but their franchise statistics are not on the career leaderboards. The picture could change in a few seasons.

Who is the best player in club history? Aaron leads the club in home runs, hits, runs batted in and runs scored, which settles it on the numbers available. Chipper Jones is second in hits, runs batted in and runs scored.

Where to go next

For the full story behind these careers, read the history of the Atlanta Braves, then the account of the best Braves seasons and every October run. If you want to see where this group played, Truist Park is the club's current home and its ballpark page has the dimensions. The club's rivals in the division have their own stories, including the Phillies and the Mets, and the World Series history puts the four Braves titles in context. Live standings, scores and the roster are on the Braves team page, and the site's Braves topic page collects current news.