Ozzie Albies suffered a career-worst, injury-plagued 2024 season, much like his colleagues Michael Harris II, Sean Murphy, and Ronald Acuña Jr. of the Atlanta Braves. Isn’t it a relief that 2025 has finally arrived?
Ozzie wasn’t playing at his incredible 2023 level (125 wRC+, 33 HR, 4.1 fWAR) prior to his wrist injury in July, but he wasn’t as awful as you would recall. He had a 2.1 fWAR per 650 PA pace, a 98 wRC+, and 1.3 fWAR over 394 PA.
After returning from his 2024 wrist injury, he struggled greatly, making his last 41 plate appearances from the right side of the plate and hitting.184/.244/.368 with a 68 wRC+ and 0.0 fWAR. He actually posted a 98 wRC+ in 33 PA against. RHP while going 0-7 with a walk vs. LHP during his brief break from switch-hitting. Odd things happen in tiny samples. He wasn’t himself after racing back to try to add some substance to a ravenous offense, regardless of whether he wasn’t yet 100% or hadn’t had enough time to acclimate to live pitching.
The fan base’s attitude toward Ozzie appears to have soured a bit more than he deserves after his difficult season. His offense and health have had an every-other-year component that has made him “unreliable” in the eyes of some fans. Many people believe that he has deteriorated into one of the league’s worst 2Bs defensively; in fact, there have been rumors that he may take over as DH when Marcell Ozuna’s contract ends after the 2025 season. The most pessimistic supporters see a replacement-level player on the field when they combine the erratic offense with the supposedly awful defense.
In actuality, his defensive deterioration has been vastly exaggerated, and even his worst offensive seasons are still terrific.
He has struggled with injuries and poor performance in the even years since the 2019 season began, but has been outstanding in the three odd years. Nonetheless, some have overstated the underwhelming performance of his even-year seasons, which has led to the exaggerated accusations of his inconsistency. Let’s extrapolate each season to 650 PA throughout his career: