Acuna impressing Braves in Australian League

ATLANTA — Ronald Acuna was a relatively obscure prospect until Bobby Cox and some other Braves executives returned from the instructional league last year raving about this five-tool prospect who had caught their attention with essentially anything and everything he did on the baseball field.

Still just 19 years old and in the midst of the early portion of his development as a center fielder, Acuna has already drawn comparisons to Pittsburgh’s Starling Marte and established himself with Kevin Maitan as the two highest-upside position players in the Braves’ system.

After missing a significant portion of this past season with a thumb injury, Acuna has made up for lost time by spending the past few weeks producing impressive statistics in the Australian Baseball League. He was selected to participate in the All-Star Game, which will air Thursday at 3:30 a.m. ET on MLB Network.

Acuna hit .375 (27-for-72) and compiled a 1.001 OPS through the first 20 games he played for the Melbourne Aces. He’s obviously not facing the same level of pitching he …

continue reading in source mlb.mlb.com