There was a lot of panic in Braves country about what the team would do with their short stop position when Dansby Swanson inked a 7-year, $177 Million with the Chicago Cubs.
Alex Anthopoulos and Brian Snitker let a Spring Training competition play out before naming Orlando Arcia the Opening Day starting shortstop over Vaughn Grissom and Braden Shewmake and also rewarded Arcia with a 3-year extension of his own (worth just $7.3 Million).
Despite lower-expectations, Orlando Arcia has outperformed Dansby Swanson and Andy Bunker and Randy McMichael credit Braves GM Alex Anthopoulos for getting things right again.
So far this season, Orlando Arcia is hitting .342 to Swanson's .270, with a higher slugging percentage and OPS. Despite playing in 20-less games due to injury he has more home runs than Dansby, and only 4-less RBI.
While many may point to the defensive side of things, Arcia has been pretty stellar in the field as well, with ZERO errors so far in 2023 (Swanson has 3 errors already this season)
