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Research

Atlanta Braves Foundation Snapshot

Zach Dubin

— 2 min read
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When a snapshot undersells the current impact.

The Atlanta Braves Foundation is a good case study of the limitations of looking historically using 990 data. Using this lens, they are middle of the pack in terms of IMPACT+. But upon a closer look, I see a Foundation with a focus and plan to grow their impact significantly.

My first question when looking at these numbers was about the major increase in net assets from 2023 to 2024. Was there a publicly announced gift or even that led to this? Was there a plan to deploy these assets or was this going to be another case of a team holding a growing asset base with no understandable reason?

It turns out we can make some educated guesses to answer these questions. First, when we isolate contributions, there is an almost 4x increase YoY from 2023, jumping from ~$2M to nearly $8M, and overall revenue doubled to over $9M. This all happened while grants and expenses declined over the same period.

One possible reason for this is the fact that the Braves hosted the 2025 All-Star Game, and as I've covered previously, this usually comes with increased community investment from the host club and MLB. And while we don't have the 990s to confirm these details, the Foundation's 2025 Impact Report discusses a number of Together Legacy projects:

  • Leila Valley Community Farm — MLB/Braves Foundation/Food Well Alliance conversion of a former apartment site into a 7-acre food farm, built during All-Star Week 2025
  • Cobb County Safety Village — new miniature Braves Park structure added to the safety-education campus
  • Warrior Fitness Trailer — new mobile fitness facility gifted to Camp Southern Ground, unveiled 2025.

That's not all. In November 2025, they announced the Hank Aaron Diamonds Initiative at Atlanta Public Schools.

💡
This major investment, through the Atlanta Braves Foundation’s Henry Louis Aaron Fund, will provide turf infields and upgrades to all APS high school baseball and softball fields, furthering Hank & Billye Aaron’s legacy supporting youth through sport and education.

According to the APS website, there are 11 high schools. How much each field costs to build or upgrade is unknown, but using some of the data I've collected and the scope of the work (baseball and softball fields), I would estimate the total cost to be potentially be somewhere in the range of $4-8M. This would align with the increase in assets in 2024 as they prepared for launching the Initiative and lining up partners (Southern Company Foundation, Major League Baseball, Truist, Delta Air Lines, Google, Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation, Gas South, MLB/Major League Baseball Players Association Youth Development Fund, Zeist Foundation, Comcast, and The Home Depot.)

I'm looking forward to seeing how this Initiative progresses and how it is reflected in the data in future years along with their 2025 Together Legacy projects.

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