Walt Weiss is the logical choice to succeed Brian Snitker as Atlanta Braves manager.
Bench coach for Snitker for the past eight seasons, familiarity with the “Braves way” as far as how player development is approached, and ready to field a starting lineup come opening day in March, Weiss’ being elevated to the manager’s role is a safe route for the ball club to take.
Weiss was as Snitkers’ side in 2021 when the Braves collected a World Series championship. Weiss represents success to the organization. With the Braves missing out on the postseason in 2025 for the first time in seven seasons, Atlanta’s general manager Alex Anthopoulos’ decision to fill the manager’s post with an internal candidate is not only seen as a safe play, but a bit unique in today’s MLB environment.
While Weiss, 61, should have, at least going into the 2026 regular season, the best opportunities for success among the game’s other managerial hires since the end of the 2025 season, success isn’t won on paper. How the players perform on the field is directly linked to a manager’s length of stay with a club.
Aside from his coaching and managerial experience on the MLB level, Weiss’ 14-year career as a play in the big leagues offers him an advantage in stepping back into a leadership role. As the starting shortstop for the Oakland A’s, Weiss was part of the club’s three consecutive American League pennant champions (1988–1990), and the 1989 World Series championship squad. During Weiss’ winding down of his playing career with Atlanta (1998–2000), success continues to follow. The 1999 Braves captured the National League flag.
The perceived value of coming from a winning environment, be it as a player or from the coaching side, is the intangible that those who operate clubs pursue in hopes of having it duplicated under their watch.
Five seasons removed from defeating the Houston Astros in the 117th edition of the World Series, it became clearer as the 2025 season progresses by the way the Braves’ roster performed that a change in the dugout was warranted. Coming in fourth place in the five-team National League East wasn’t going to be tolerated, when the past season came to an end. The Braves were 76–88.
Along with committing to Weiss as the new skipper, Anthopoulos has also made other moves to solidify the 26-man roster. Left-handed starter Chris Sale, who struck out 165 batters in 125.2 innings in 2025, had his club option picked up for next season.
The one-year, $18 million contract extension gives Weiss a solid No. 1 starter for the Braves’ rotation. In Sales’ two seasons in Atlanta, he’s been an all-star selection twice, won a Cy Young Award, and captured the National League pitching Triple-Crown.
The Braves have also exercised their option to keep their second baseman Ozzie Albies in their starting lineup next season. In picking up Albies’ option, Atlanta retains continuity in their infield for a club-friendly $7 million.
Along with Sale and Albies back in 2026, the Braves will once again assemble a starting lineup including Ronald Acuna Jr., Matt Olson, and Austin Riley. Clearly, the Braves aren’t in a rebuilding mode. They are fine-tuning a club with the personnel they already have. No doubt, Weiss will be taking advantage of having a clubhouse loaded with veterans, and who already know what he is all about for 162 games.
It was the experience, not the results that Weiss earned while piloting the Colorado Rockies for four seasons that is most important to the kind of manager he'll be come March. In Denver, Weiss’ clubs averaged 70 wins, and never higher than 75 victories in any season. This was Weiss’ first run at managing on the MLB level.
Those Rockies’ clubs were well stacked with some of the better players during his period (2013–2016) in the Rocky Mountains. Hall of Famer Todd Helton, Charlie Blackmon, Michael Cuddyer, Carlos Gonzalez, and Troy Tulowitzki should have shepherded more wins during the Weiss years for the Rockies. Learning through adversity during his first tenure as a manager can only assist Weiss into returning the 2026 Braves back into postseason play.
But, with Anthopoulos’ decision to go with a veteran skipper, this bucks the current trend in MLB managerial hirings.
The Baltimore Orioles recently introduced Craig Albernaz as their new manager. Albernaz, 43, is almost 20 years younger than Weiss, and has no MLB managerial experience. The past two seasons Albernaz has served on the Cleveland Guardians’ coaching staff.
Blake Butera, 33, was hired by the Washington Nationals as their new skipper. This makes Butera the youngest first-year MLB manager since 1972. Butera has never served on an MLB coaching staff, and during two minor league seasons as a player in the Tampa Bay Rays’ system only reached as high as Class-A ball.
Late last month, the San Francisco Giants signed a college coach with no professional experience to be their next manager. Tony Vitello, the first college coach to be hired and go directly into an MLB managerial position, is a risk the Giants are willing to take. Coaching the University of Tennessee for eight seasons, Vitello’s team in 2004 captured the College World Series championship.
With Vitello, 47, at the Giants’ helm in 2026, his hire continues the trend of selecting younger leaders, who besides demonstrate substantial leadership qualities, are likely to rely on analytics to drive their lineups as opposed to looking back to on-the-job experiences in their decision-making process.
Weiss appears to be a well-balanced leader, carefully weaving big league experience and new-age approaches to game planning, all with a goal to return baseball greatness to a franchise spoiled with success—beginning in 2026.
