Walter “Rabbit” Maranville was known for quite a few things, his sense of humor, his durability, and defensive skills, the latter two, which ranked him on this list of all-time Braves.

Torre would have a strong start in baseball where he was the runner-up for the National League Rookie of the Year in 1961 and in 1963 he would be named to the National League All Star Team, which would occur for the next five seasons.  Torre would show off power with four straight 20 Home Run seasons (1964 to 1967) with a solid Batting Average, though he would later be traded to the St. Louis Cardinals.

A member of the Boston Braves for his entire career except for the last one (which was with Brooklyn) Tommy Holmes was one of the most popular players when the team was in Boston. 

Wally Berger was one of 18 starters in the 1934 All Star Game and the other 17 are in the Hall of Fame.  We aren’t necessarily saying that Berger is a Hall of Fame snub, but we will state that the Outfielder was a very good player who at one time was spoken in the likes with some elite talent. 

Playing for the Boston Beaneaters for 15 seasons (1894 to 1907) Fred Tenney was somewhat of a trail blazer as he joined professional baseball after playing college ball (in his case, Brown).  Tenney began as a Catcher but transitioned to First Base where he would be known as one of the better defensive First Basemen in his era.  Tenney was also a good hitter for Boston as he was six shy of 2,000 Hits with a .300 Batting Average and three top ten finishes in that metric.

Freddie Freeman played his first dozen seasons with the Atlanta Braves where he was shown to be one of the best First Basemen in the National League. 

From Curacao, Andruw Jones made his debut with the Braves at age 19 and it was clear from the beginning that this was a star in the making.  Jones would have his first 30 Home Run season in 1998 and from 2000 to 2003 he would hit that mark with three 100 RBI seasons and a .300 season in 2000, which surprisingly was the only one he ever had.  Jones would add to his already prolific power numbers in the 2005 season where he had a league leading (and career high) 51 Home Runs and also was the champion in Runs Batted In with 128. For his efforts he was the runner-up for the National League MVP.  His overall power totals for the Braves would be an impressive 368 Home Runs, 1,117 RBIs with a .497 Slugging Percentage.

We return back to the 1880’s (we seem to be in the 1800’s a lot on this franchise list) with Righthander, Jim Whitney who had a 133 and 121 record over his five seasons with the Boston Red Caps/Beaneaters and as a rookie (1881) he was first in both Wins (33) and Losses and would later have two seasons where he was first in FIP (1883 & 1884) and three straight where he was first in SO/BB (1883-85), a stat in which he is still first all-time in the franchise.  Whitney never finished with an Earned Run Average over 3.00 and was in the top ten four times with Boston.

Tommy Bond arrived in Boston in 1877 after a disagreement with his former Manager with the Hartford Dark Blues and the then-named Red Stockings would quickly love having the Irish-born Pitcher on the team.  Bond was a huge force on the mound where the sidearmer was arguably the best Pitcher in the National League from 1877 to 1879.  In that timeframe, which was basically the infancy of baseball, Bond won 40 Games each year, the first two of which were league-leading. He would also win the ERA Title twice, the Strikeout title twice, and was also first in WHIP twice.  1877 would see Bond win the Pitcher’s Triple Crown, making him the first to do so in the National League.  Bond tailed off quickly after his arm got weak but for the franchise he would win 149 Games.

Prior to his arrival to Boston John Clarkson was considered one of the best Pitchers in the National League.  With the Chicago White Stockings (which would later be named the Chicago Cubs), he had twice finished first in Wins (1885 & 1887) and was thought of as an elite Pitcher.  The Boston Beaneaters sure thought so and they purchased him from Chicago for $10,000, which was a fortune in 1888!  This proved to be a decent choice, and Clarkson had a good 1888 with a 33 Win season (2^nd overall) but exploded the following season with what has to be considered one of the greatest seasons in franchise history.

Debuting as a rookie with the Boston Beaneaters in 1898, Vic Willis would win the ERA Title as a sophomore with a 2.50 ERA with 27 Wins.  He was also first for bWAR for Pitchers that season.  1900 was not great as his ERA ballooned over 4.00 but he rebounded with four straight seasons with an ERA below 3.00 and he finished up with Boston in 1905 with a 3.21 ERA.  Unfortunately, in those last two seasons in Boston he would have a record of 30 and 54 as he was the victim of limited run support.  He would finish his stint in Boston with a record of 151 and 147 and an ERA of 2.82.

While the Atlanta Braves of the 1990s and early 2000’ will always (and should be) known primarily for the elite starting pitching, Chipper Jones had the perfect path to greatness from the number one draft pick in 1990 to first ballot Hall of Fame inductee in 2018.

The Atlanta Braves essentially stole John Smoltz when they traded what was left of Doyle Alexander to the Detroit Tigers for him and doesn’t the latter could have that one back?

Phil Niekro played an incredible 24 seasons in the Major Leagues, 20 of which took place in a Braves uniform, and seemingly no matter how old he was (and how old he looked) he defied Father Time much longer than any Pitcher had the right to.

One of ten Pitchers to have struckout 3,000 batters and rack up 300 Wins (when will we ever see that again!), Greg Maddux accomplished a lot of that with the Atlanta Braves.

Dale Murphy was the offensive star of the Atlanta Braves through the 1980s and was also one of the top power hitters of the game.  Murphy was named the National League MVP in back-to-back seasons (1982 & 1983) and he would finish atop the NL leaderboard in Runs Batted In while also being named an All-Star, a Silver Slugger, and a Gold Glove winner.  The next two seasons were almost as good as he while he was not the MVP he would repeat the All-Star/Silver Slugger/Gold Glove trifecta and would win the Home Run Title in both of those years.  The seven-time All-Star would have six 30 Home Run seasons with 371 in total for Atlanta along with 1,143 Runs Batted In.  He was also the National League leader in OPS in 1983 and would finish second in the following three seasons.

Along with Greg Maddux and John Smoltz, Tom Glavine was part of a devastating Hall of Fame trio that dominated starting pitching in the 1990s. 

The only player in franchise history to play for the organization when the team was in Boston, Milwaukee, and Atlanta, Eddie Mathews is historically regarded as one of the best Third Baseman in the game’s history.

Kid Nichols played the entire 1890’s for the Boston Beaneaters and there was a time where he was arguably the best Pitcher of the National League.  Nichols’s rookie season in 1890 would see him win 27 Games lead the NL in bWAR for Pitchers and he followed that up with four consecutive 30 Win seasons, which would have another league-leading bWAR campaign.

Not only are we comfortable saying that Warren Spahn was the greatest Pitcher in Braves history he is in the top ten all-time and the greatest left-hander ever.