Braves Freddie Freeman-less Opening Day lineup takes some getting used to

Freddie Freeman joined the Los Angeles Dodgers this season, and the Atlanta Braves will face a new journey without their long-time starting first-baseman.

Freddie Freeman played with the Atlanta Braves for 12 seasons and will be starting a new journey with the Los Angeles Dodgers this season.

Throughout his career with the Braves, he has started in 1,502 games and played 13,301 innings. Former Oakland Athletics first baseman Matt Olson will be starting on Opening Day in place of Freeman.

Will Matt Olson perform as well as Freddie Freeman?

Olson has been in the MLB half the amount of time Freeman has, so the stats differ. However, when comparing Freeman’s first six seasons to Olson’s, Freeman started in more than 100 games per season in five of the first six seasons, whereas Olson started in over 100 in only three of his six seasons. Olson has also played in the outfield consistently, whereas Freeman strictly played first base.

Freeman has several years of experience over Olson on first base, which will take both Olson and the Braves some time to adjust to. Olson is an extremely talented player with a fielding percentage on first base identical to Freeman’s at 0.995, but he has less experience both starting games and playing first base. He is also fairly new to the MLB and starting with a new team for the first time in his career, which could be a difficult adjustment.

Olson is a talented and versatile player and could do very well with the Braves from the beginning, but it will take time for the team to adjust to a new Opening Day first baseman considering Freeman has started on every Opening Day since 2011.

The Braves have a good lineup, but they may need time to adjust to their new journey without Freeman.