We’re just a week into the 2023 season, but the Atlanta Braves have to be absolutely excited with what they’ve seen from Ronald Acuña Jr. thus far. The Braves star is back to looking like himself after he was somewhat limited in 2022 as he returned from ACL surgery.
And even off the field, Acuña managed to surprise Braves fans when he conducted a full interview in English.
Now, it’s difficult enough to play professional baseball at a high level without having to learn a new language. So, throughout Acuña’s MLB career, he had been joined in interviews by player relations manager Franco Garcia for translating duties. Tuesday’s win over the Cardinals was no different. That was until Acuña decided to answer the questions in English.
Just look at Garcia’s reaction.
"I'm happy to be healthy again and compete every day with my teammates."@ronaldacunajr24 is back and enjoying every minute of it. pic.twitter.com/7gQBY0KrQn
— Bally Sports: Braves (@BravesOnBally) April 5, 2023
You can tell that he was incredibly proud.
Acuña deserves a ton of credit too for giving a live English interview a try. Imagine learning a new language and practicing it on live TV — that couldn’t have been easy. He absolutely didn’t need to learn English (or do interviews in English) to be a successful ballplayer. But it was so cool to see Acuña give it a go.
MLB fans were also excited about their new bilingual superstar.