Now that he is almost ready to make his season debut for the Atlanta Braves, Ronald Acuña Jr. is addressing the elephant in the room.
Acuña, who started a minor-league rehab assignment earlier this week, spoke with reporters on Wednesday. During the media session, Acuña apologized for his controversial social media post from last month.
“[I] just [want to] apologize and ask for [Braves manager Brian Snitker’s] forgiveness for what I posted and for being a distraction,” said Acuña through a translator. “Just wanted to clear the air and move on.
“I was just frustrated with my situation in the sense of my being able to return to the team,” Acuña added. “I’m coming off a second major injury, I’m in Florida away from my teammates, the team is struggling. Those were sort of the things that were frustrating me … I wanna be here [in Atlanta] my whole career. So just seeing the team and my teammates going through that and not being able to help and not being able to be with them was where the frustration was coming from.”
For context, the former NL MVP Acuña, who has not played all season due to a left ACL tear, had an X post calling out the Braves manager Snitker last month. During a game against the Minnesota Twins, Atlanta outfielder Jarred Kelenic was thrown out after admiring a ball that he thought was a home run (video here).
Snitker essentially downplayed the incident to the media after the game, which was a sharp contrast from an incident back in 2019 when Snitker benched Acuña for a very similar lapse in judgment. As a result of the Kelenic episode, Acuña posted a message on X that read, “If it were me, they would take me out of the game.”
Acuña was not wrong that Snitker treated the two incidents extremely differently. But Acuña’s problem was that he went public with his gripes. In the wake of Acuña’s post, a former Braves player slammed Acuña in a viral rant. Now Acuña is looking to put the controversy behind him by formally apologizing for his outspoken moment.
