Ronald Acuña among 9 top Braves prospects receiving spring training invites

By Cory McCartney
Published

Ronald Acuña, the top prospect in all of baseball, highlights the Atlanta Braves' list of non-roster invitees to spring training.

The team announced 21 invitees Friday, with top pitching prospects Kolby Allard, Mike Soroka and Kyle Wright, third baseman Austin Riley and outfielder Cristian Pache all joining Acuña for their first big-league camps.

They'll be joined by other top minor leaguers in catchers William Contreras and Alex Jackson and outfielder Dustin Peterson.

That amounts to a list that includes the organization's Nos. 1 (Acuna), 2 (Allard), 3 (Wright) 4 (Soroka), 9 (Riley) 10 (Pache), 14 (Peterson) and 15 (Jackson) prospects, per MLB Pipeline.

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The Braves also extended invitations to left-handed pitcher Phil Pfeifer and righties Josh Graham, Luke Jackson and Miguel Socolovich; catchers Rob Brantly, Tyler Marlete and Kade Scivicque; infielders Christian Colon, Ray-Patrick Didder, Sean Kazmar and outfielders Jaff Decker and Danny Santana.

Pitchers report to the Braves' spring complex in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., on Feb. 13, with position players coming in Feb. 18.

The first full-squad workout is Feb. 19.

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Acuña, who was recently named Baseball America's top prospect, hit .325/.374/.522 with 21 home runs, 60 extra-base hits and stole 44 bases lats season across three minor-league levels ... at age 19. He continued his tear in the Arizona Fall League, topping all players with seven homers and 22 runs, while finishing second with a .639 slugging and 1.053 OPS.

Allard, Soroka, Wright and Riley are former first-round picks now listed as near-consensus top-100 prospects in baseball. Allard, Soroka and Riley — the franchise's three top picks from the 2015 draft — performed well as three of the youngest players at the Double-A level last season, while Wright, the No. 5 overall selection in the 2017 draft, is a polished collegiate arm who pushed his way up to High-A in his first taste of pro ball.

Pache is a former amateur free-agent signing considered one of the best defensive players in the minors, boasting a MLB-quality glove in center field at 19 years old. He will be the youngest player in Atlanta's camp.