The 30-year-old free agent signed a one-year, $20 million contract with the Braves on Monday, and he will remain the team’s starting shortstop, according to Atlanta’s president of baseball operations, Alex Anthopoulos.
By turning down a $16 million contract option last month, Kim wound up getting an additional $4 million.
Atlanta claimed Kim off waivers from the Tampa Bay Rays on Sept. 1, and beginning the next day, he started all but one of the Braves’ remaining games.
Kim hit .309 with a .372 on-base percentage, three homers and 12 RBIs in his first 19 games for Atlanta. He closed the season by going 1-for-19 with no RBIs over the last five games.
Anthopoulos said of Kim’s decision to stay with the Braves, according to MLB.com, “I do know he liked the experience. It was just a comfort, like anything, when you’re around someone and you get to know him and how well he fit in.”
The recovery from a shoulder injury kept Kim sidelined for the first half of the 2025 season with Tampa Bay, and his brief time with the Rays was marked by other injuries. He wound up playing just 24 games for Tampa Bay and hitting .214 with a .290 on-base percentage, two homers and five RBIs.
A Gold Glove winner for the Padres in 2023, Kim spent the first four seasons of his major league career in San Diego. He hit .242 with a .326 on-base percentage, 47 homers, 200 RBIs and 78 stolen bases in 540 games as a Padre from 2021-24.
In 588 career major league games, Kim has a .242 average, a .324 on-base percentage, 52 home runs, 217 RBIs and 84 stolen bases.
“We think there’s some more power there,” Anthopoulos said, according to MLB.com. “We think the speed is going to continue to come back to where it was, the stolen bases, the baserunning, the defense and so on. So I think we’ve got a very good chance to get the guy he was those years with San Diego. That could be a 3- to 4-WAR player.”
