Atlanta Braves 2025 Payroll Breakdown and MLB Free Agent Pitching Salaries

Brad Rowland and Stephen Tolbert co-host Episode 121 of the Hammer Territory Podcast. The show focuses on Atlanta Braves payroll for 2025 and beyond, including key distinctions around cash spending and the Competitive Balance Tax (CBT) thresholds. The discussion also touches on skyrocketing pitching salaries in free agency, and much more.

[@MassBoost]

They're not "dishonest" answers, when they're not definitive statements. Alex stated the Braves "plan" was to exercise their options, but plans obviously changed, which probably had to do a lot with Joe Jimenez.

[@HammerTerritory]

We referenced the Jimenez change on this episode!

[@MassBoost]

@@HammerTerritory Yes you did mention Jimenez, but "dishonest" was also thrown around in reference to Anthopoulos and his statement on planning to tender d'Arnaud. I don't believe that to be correct at all as far as the dishonesty part.

[@aaronw4526]

As a born and raised northern CA Braves fan it made me smile when my boy Stephen hit the hella at the end of the pod. Yall are the best. Thank you for giving us year round Braves content. I miss baseball.

[@docscards]

Do you see AA bringing Soroka back on a 1- year deal, say in the $6-8 million range

[@csamples6784]

Does deferring part of the contract count towards the CBT and how?

[@HammerTerritory]

Kind of. The collective bargaining agreement has a calcuation for the CBT on a contract that includes deferred money. Most prominent example is Ohtani's CBT number is about $46 million a year. His AAV is $70 million. He's only taking home $2 million. But the formula spits out a tax hit of $46-ish.

[@MassBoost]

To add further context to what they stated, that $46mil is derived from what that remaining $68mil would be worth when it's paid out from 2034 to 2044 due to inflation.

[@MassBoost]

Also insinuating that the Braves went over the 3rd tier when Anthopoulos said they didn't is just dumb. What a lot of people miss is that they Braves made 2 deals before the season, one was Marco Gonzales to the Pirates, the other was Max Stassi to the White Sox, and both deals were for a PTBNL or cash, and the Braves never took a PTBNL from either team (which had to be resolved by the rule 4 draft on July 14th), thus they eventually took cash back on those deals. Every source out there doesn't show any money coming back to the Braves, only that the Braves paid the White Sox and Pirates what they were owed. Unless someone can provide us with the PTBNL, the Braves got the cash back on those deals, thus lowering their salary and luxury tax obligation.

[@HammerTerritory]

We didn’t insinuate that. We laid out the fact that there is a split between the public data and what Alex has said about the CBT threshold they reached. We also said probably 5 times that the public data is inexact.

[@MassBoost]

@@HammerTerritory I'm speaking from anyone in general, because Anthopoulos said they didn't, and there's no reason to lie about not going over the 3rd tier. And yes you did say it could be inexact, and I'm just laying out the groundwork as to what is likely inexact, as none of these salary sources have put any thought into some of the situations that were present in concerns to the PTBNL or cash trades, or possibly other things as well. It's things like that, that make people believe the Braves have all this money invested into getting Kelenic, and I don't believe that's accurate, but because of these gaffes, that's what the public talks about.

[@christophersmith1272]

How does the rest of the players on the 40 man rosters contracts effect both cash payroll and CBT?

[@acgonzales7]

The arb and pre arb salaries are one year so they should be 1:1 in cash to CBT

[@ShaneColeman-n1w]

How are y’all doing tonight?

[@MassBoost]

Luis Severino will be traded by the trade deadline, and the A's will collect more prospects, you just watch.

[@zachansen8293]

Good microphones aren't that expensive.