Left-handed pitcher Austin Cox bounced on and off the Atlanta Braves roster for much of the summer of 2025, but his most memorable performance was also one of the most bizarre games in all of MLB this past season. A forgettable number of games ended his run in the big league in 2025, although he still had strangely good peripherals.
A native of Macon, GA, Cox was a fifth-round draft pick by the Kansas City Royals out of Mercer University in 2018. He made his major league debut with the Royals in 2023 and after bouncing around the minor league system for a few years, Cox signed with Atlanta on May 5, a day after the Royals let him go.
What were the expectations?
Cox went straight to Triple-A when he signed; at the time, he looked more like speculative, organizational bullpen depth than the guy who would serve as very real bullpen depth for much of the summer.
Cox had 0.5 fWAR in 35 2/3 innings for the Royals in 2023, but that came with a 103/87/111 line (ERA-/FIP/xFIP-), so they didn’t see a need to give him another chance. That made sense, as Cox was really digging into Triple-A, with an xFIP above 5.00 at that level in 2024, and then good peripherals but an insane home run percentage before being released in 2025. In short, expectations for a replacement-level swingman at best.
All in all, Cox had a bit of a strange season. He made one start and 19 relief appearances for the Stripers after Atlanta signed him, with a 4.45 FIP but 5.25 xFIP, as he struggled to strike anyone with his new team but still left out quite a few guys.
With Atlanta, however, he posted decent strikeout and walk rates, but was absolutely crushed by the longball, with a third of the catches against him leaving the field. The result was that in 21 1/3 innings, Cox posted a bizarre 210 ERA, 184 FIP, and… an excellent-for-a-low-leverage reliever 97 xFIP. In total, he gave up nine home runs while recording 64 outs while pitching, which is a very, very bad number of home runs that could happen to anyone. He also finished with -0.6 fWAR in just those 21 1/3 innings. Weft.
That total came over what felt like a bazillion roster moves. He was called back to the big league team four times, and three of those stints lasted eleven days or less. He ended up staying awake for much of August, but that didn’t go so well and we’ll get to that in a moment.
Overall, the peripherals were good. Furthermore, Cox even excelled through his first nine outings, posting a 15/3 K/BB ratio and allowing just one homer in 11 2/3 innings. (That’s a 73/61/59 line!) That stretch included a situation where Spencer Strider was dropped from the Bristol Motor Speedway meet on August 2, giving Cox his only start of the year.
In conditions that would not normally have been played, Cox only got through a third of an inning before the downpour finally reached a level that led to the match being suspended. When play resumed on Sunday, Hurston Waldrep, making his season debut, threw 5.2 innings of fantastic relief.
Big league peripherals aside, it’s also possible to say at least some nice things about his arsenal. His non-fastball pitches (slider, curve, split) were quite effective, and even his fastball (along with his slider/cutter thing, and maybe his split) has nice, or at least decent, shape.
His best outing of the season came on August 6, when he was asked to pitch the eighth with a two-run lead against the Marlins, and had a 1-2-3 inning with a groundout and then back-to-back strikeouts. Here’s Cox striking out Colton Cowser to tie the game on an earlier outing when he was dealing in what was his highest WPA game of the season.
Something really funny about the season Cox had was that his highest WPA game came during the game where he lost the most WPA overall. I wonder how often that happens…
The thing is, the reason most arms bounce around the waiver wire and ride the Triple-A shuttle generally tends to be command, and Cox…didn’t show good command. It became especially dire in his final four appearances of the season, where Cox was basically just asked to eat innings, and was lit up like the facade of a suburban house that was actually… Real on Halloween. In his final 9 2/3 innings of the season, he had a poor 7/4 K/BB ratio, but more importantly, he somehow gave up eight home runs. Five of those came on his four-seamer, which ended the season with an atrocious .458 xwOBA-against.
This is such a weirdly sad way to play your worst WPA game of the season, it’s a necessary addition here:
Cox is still on Atlanta’s 40-man roster, but there’s a good chance he loses his spot as the Braves try to transform their roster this season. Maybe he sticks around, or maybe he gets fired at the same time other teams are trimming their rosters, clearing waivers and sticking with a minor league deal to serve as depth again.
Still, Cox had good Major League peripherals despite not being a high-strikeout guy. It’s just that those eight home runs in his last four games sank his season. He looks pretty replacement right now, but that’s not much of a barrier to the Braves or anyone else giving him an invite to spring training anyway. He could also go overseas, although that might happen after he runs out of option years and no longer has the always-desirable roster flexibility that an option year allows.
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