Braves star Dansby Swanson finally feels at home in Atlanta

By Jake Mintz
FOX Sports MLB Writer

Something is different about Dansby Swanson.

This season, the former No. 1 overall pick, the golden shortstop who helped guide his childhood club to October glory and the longest-tenured Atlanta Brave has, for the first time in his MLB career, been the best player on his team. With the season halfway gone, Swanson has smashed 14 homers and is slugging nearly .500 while providing superb defense at one of the game's most demanding positions.

FanGraphs has Swanson as the fifth-most valuable player in baseball, behind only Manny Machado, Paul Goldschmidt, Rafael Devers and Nolan Arenado. At 3.4 WAR right now, Swanson has a chance to be the first shortstop since hopped-up-on-the-good-stuff A-Rod to post an 8.0-WAR season.

It has been an enormous leap forward for a player who'd always been more good than elite, more of a dependable franchise cornerstone than an All-Star-level contributor. And for Swanson, the jump could not have come at a more perfect time, as the 28-year-old is set to hit the free-agent market this winter.

Ask Swanson about his breakout season, and he'll tell you it's part mental, part physical. He says that he feels more serene, more tranquil, more clear-eyed about who he is as a person and as a ballplayer, but he also made some notable changes to his training regimen in the offseason.

"I feel like over the last few years, I've really grown and gained a true feeling of calmness and peace," Swanson shared with FOX Sports before a recent Braves game in Philadelphia. "I understand what actually matters and what doesn't now."

Drafted first overall by Arizona in 2015, Swanson was dealt to the Braves months later in what's now considered one of the most lopsided trades of the 21st century. Born and raised outside of Atlanta, Swanson and his family were predictably elated about him getting sent to his favorite childhood club.

But with that excitement came expectation; expectation that Swanson now admits weighed on him.

Upon his arrival in 2016, Atlanta was still emerging from an ugly rebuild. The Braves hadn't made the playoffs since 2013 and hadn't won a playoff series since 2001. Freddie Freeman had survived the teardown and remained the face of the franchise, but Swanson, still just 23 and two years removed from college ball, was expected to contribute immediately to help return the team to contention.

Instead, he struggled.

"The hardest part was when I first got up to Atlanta," Swanson admitted. "Because I think there were some unfair expectations, and I had super-high expectations for myself. That combination was tough. It took me a while to really understand how to handle that."

In his first full season with the Braves in 2017, Swanson fell flat on his face, hitting .232 with just six home runs and an abysmal 68 OPS+. The team went 72-90, finishing 25 games behind the division champion Nationals.

"You know when you go to an event, like a gala or something," Swanson said, "and you feel like you have to be on your game because there are cameras everywhere and tons of people watching you? That idea that you need to be your best self? It's exhausting, right? 

"I was essentially putting that type of pressure on myself every night."

Despite the pressure, Swanson settled into his role and raised his game over the next few seasons, going from borderline unplayable offensively to an average hitter with a great glove at shortstop. 

More importantly, the Braves started winning. Ronald Acuña Jr. debuted and set the world on fire. Freeman won an MVP. The spotlight moved off Swanson. It was no longer his weight to carry alone.

If you watch back footage from the Braves' championship parade, you'll see a whole lot of Dansby Swanson. Clad in a custom ATLiens OutKast jersey, his hair peeking out the back of a World Series beanie, Swanson was front and center. He snagged a beer one-handed from a moving bus and delivered a rousing speech from the podium at Truist Park, urging management to re-sign Freeman.

But Swanson had little time to cherish the title. The day after the parade, he flew from Atlanta to Chicago to cheer on his now-fiancée, Mallory Pugh, one of the best soccer players in the world and a star forward for the U.S. Women's National Team and the NWSL's Chicago Red Stars.

"We went from my playoffs right to her playoffs," Swanson recalled. "It went from trying to win a championship to all of a sudden, now I'm in the mode of being an incredibly supportive spouse for her during her playoff run."

Swanson and Pugh met in 2017 by way of former Atlanta teammate Jace Peterson, who is married to Mallory's sister, Brianna. Swanson admits that having someone who understands the pressure and lifestyle of an elite athlete is an incredibly unique privilege that most ballplayers don't have.

When asked how their relationship has impacted him as a ballplayer, Swanson laughed.

"Do we push each other? Yes and no. I think we inspire one another, but people have a misunderstanding about athlete dating athlete. Like, she doesn't get in my grill or anything, but she keeps it very real. In every aspect of my life, she's supportive and has the ability to get the most out of me. You know? She can push those buttons that nobody else can."

This past offseason, Swanson and Pugh hired Mark Kovacs, a renowned sports scientist and movement expert, to be their full-time personal trainer. Each day, Kovacs would drive to the Pugh-Swanson household, where the two have a personal gym. Kovacs would work out with Pugh, she'd go do soccer work, then he'd work out with Swanson, and he'd go do baseball work.

Swanson credits some of his offensive improvement this season to that offseason work with Kovacs. Instead of focusing on lifting heavy, Swanson and Kovacs zeroed in on improving his single-leg strength.

"Hitting is really a one-legged thing, twice. Each individual leg working on its own," Swanson said. "Your back hip explosiveness is obviously important, but you can only generate as much force as your front leg can physically handle."

Hitting-wise, Swanson spent significant time in the cage with teammate Austin Riley and former Braves hitting coordinator Mike Brumley. Swanson made multiple trips from Atlanta to Dallas to train with Riley and Brumley, with the intention of cleaning up his bat path to allow his barrel to stay in the zone longer. That has paid major dividends so far this season, as Swanson's .299 batting average and .488 slugging would both be career highs.

Over the winter, Swanson also continued practicing a modern form of talk therapy called "brainspotting" that he started after the 2019 season. Brainspotting involves listening to bilateral music through noise-canceling headphones while a therapist points to different objects in the room. Eventually, as Swanson explains it, a certain object triggers old memories or traumatic events and leads to a therapeutic stream of consciousness and a clearer mind. That, along with a rejuvenated commitment to his faith, has contributed to a more grounded version of Swanson.

But a huge chunk of Swanson's mental growth can also be attributed to, well, simply growing up. Most people mature between the ages of 24 and 28; Swanson just had to do it in front of a crowd. And now, just as his tenure as an Atlanta Brave could be drawing to a close, he feels secure in himself.

That security is about to lead to financial security, as Swanson's career year is sure to earn him a hefty payday this winter. Whether his sensational first half is the result of a clear mind, a stronger lower half, a revamped swing, a renewed trust in a higher being, a combination of all those or just luck and chance, Swanson has finally become one of the best shortstops in the bigs. 

For years, chasing expectations wore him down. It turns out that finally letting go of what other people wanted him to be allowed Swanson to reach his true potential.

"Back in 2019, I started to realize that I was trying to be this certain person because I wanted people to look at me a certain way," he said. "But I didn't fully understand myself. Now I know I don't have to do it all for those people. I can just go be myself. 

"And that's what's happening now."

Jake Mintz is the louder half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He’s an Orioles fan living in New York City, and thus, he leads a lonely existence most Octobers. If he’s not watching baseball, he’s almost certainly riding his bike. You can follow him on Twitter @Jake_Mintz.