Atlanta Braves superstar Ronald Acuna Jr. is done for the season after tearing his right ACL, but he's trying to keep his spirits high. The outfielder vowed to return “stronger than ever” during a Zoom call over the weekend.
Via ESPN's Bradford Doolittle:
“The only thing I can say is that I'm obviously going to put maximum effort to come back stronger than ever,” Acuna said via Braves interpreter Franco Garcia during a Zoom call on Sunday. “If was giving 500 percent before, I'm about to start giving 1,000 percent.”
Acuna suffered the devastating injury on Saturday in a victory over the Miami Marlins. The Braves star was chasing a ball off the bat of Jazz Chisholm Jr. when he went down awkwardly in a lot of pain on the warning track. Chisholm wound up with an inside-the-park home run on the play as Acuna stayed down on the ground.
The game was delayed for more than 10 minutes. Acuna tried to leave the field on his own power but ultimately was carted off the field in tears. The Braves star knew something was wrong but didn't realize just how bad it was at first:
“I knew something was wrong,” Acuna said. “I guess I didn't understand the severity of it, until the doctor told me about it later on. Nothing I can do about it now. I can't control things I can't control.”
Acuna admitted he was “really sad” when he finally found out it was a torn ACL.
The 23-year-old phenom was supposed to start for the National League in Tuesday's All-Star Game, and he actually still plans to go to Colorado to be there for the festivities. Acuna had been playing like an MVP candidate for a Braves team that has needed his heroics to stay alive in the mediocre NL East. Atlanta is 44-45 at the All-Star break, which is 4.5 games back of the first-place New York Mets.
There's currently no timetable for Acuna's return. His season is over, so the hope is he'll be good to go for the start of the 2022 season.
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