The Morning TiltThursday, September 24, 2026

Two Atlanta games tonight, an hour apart. Before either one: a manager who told his best player no, a national list with four Hawks on it, and a club getting better without going anywhere.

Braves

Ronald Acuña Jr. made his case by text message Wednesday morning. He lost.

He had fouled Brandon Williamson's cutter off his own left shin in the first inning Tuesday night, and did not bat again. X-rays and a CT scan showed no fracture, per MLB.com, and by the next morning Acuña was telling manager Walt Weiss he was ready to go. Weiss held him out anyway, then explained himself with more candor than late September usually gets: "He almost had me for a minute, but I just didn't feel right about it."

The cost was one game. Acuña spent Wednesday active on the bench and unused, and he is expected back in the lineup tonight, per MLB.com. Expected, not confirmed — the card belongs to the club.

Tonight is the last regular-season home game. The final three are in Miami, and Cincinnati is at Truist Park at 7:15 with Tyler Mahle against Brady Singer.

Ellis has Wednesday night — Chris Sale's 200th strikeout of the season, no walks in 5 2/3 innings, and the argument that the better decision of the evening was the one Atlanta declined to make.

A clinched division buys a manager one specific thing: the room to tell a healthy star no and have nothing come of it.

Falcons

The conditions were set days ago. Michael Penix Jr. makes his first start of the season, A.J. Terrell Jr. is on injured reserve, and Green Bay is favored by 4.5 with a total of 42.5 at DraftKings. What was missing was a kickoff, and it arrives at 8:15 at Lambeau Field on Prime Video.

Atlanta gets there 0-2 and tied for the bottom of the NFC South, carrying the division's worst point differential at minus 38. That is 16 points scored in two games.

Two of ours have the rest of it, and they are not making the same argument. Miles has the slate: if the league pulls Atlanta out of the October 11 Sunday night window, Baltimore still comes to Mercedes-Benz Stadium that afternoon. A flex costs the audience, not the fixture. Dex has the verdict: he thinks the window stays where it is, and he puts a number on it at 66%.

Terrell becomes eligible in Week 7. That is the injured-reserve minimum, not a club estimate of when he plays again.

Hawks

ESPN finished its NBA Rank countdown at seven o'clock this morning, which puts all 100 names on the table. Four of them are Hawks: Jalen Johnson at 22, Nickeil Alexander-Walker at 55, CJ McCollum at 87, Luguentz Dort at 100.

Dyson Daniels is not among the hundred. Neither is Onyeka Okongwu. Daniels led the NBA in steals in 2024-25.

The instruction to the voters did not change this year — rank each player on what he is predicted to contribute next season. The voters did. ESPN replaced a panel of more than 100 with a panel of seven.

Simone's read is that the list inherited the box score's blind spot: there are columns for what happens and none for what a defense talks the other team out of doing.

Seven people sorting 100 players is a smaller instrument than the number on the front of it suggests. It will still be the figure quoted at Atlanta all season.

Atlanta United

The number that actually moved this season is the rate. Atlanta United have 26 points from 26 matches, exactly one per match. Last season they finished on 28 points from 34, which is 0.82. Per match, this is a fifth better than the team everybody files under the worst version of this club.

It has bought them nothing in the table. They sit 14th in the Eastern Conference this morning, and they finished 14th last season.

Hold the current rate across the eight matches left and the pace points to 34 points — six more than 2025, and six short of the 40 that had them ninth in the Eastern Conference in 2024. That is a pace, not a forecast, and it is the honest shape of the year: better, measurably, and not yet better enough to be anywhere new.

Five of those eight are at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, starting Saturday at 7:30 against New York City FC on Apple TV. Tito's framing from Sunday is the one to carry into the run-in.

One more thing.

Sixty minutes is the whole distance between them. First pitch at 7:15, kickoff at 8:15, so the early innings at Truist Park run straight into the opening drive at Lambeau. One of those broadcasts is the last home night of a season that has already won something. The other is a team still looking for its first win of the year. Same city, same evening, same remote.