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Daysbel Hernandez

Braves Select Hurston Waldrep

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TODAY: The Braves officially announced the selection of Waldrep’s contract this morning. Right-hander Daysbel Hernandez was optioned to the minors and Acuna was placed on the 60-day injured list in corresponding moves.

June 8: The Braves are calling up top pitching prospect Hurston Waldrep, according to multiple reporters (including MLB.com’s Mark Bowman).  Waldrep will make his Major League debut on Sunday in a start against the Nationals, as Atlanta is giving Max Fried extra rest by pushing his next outing to Tuesday.  A 40-man roster space will have be opened to accommodate Waldrep, though that could be easily accomplished by moving Ronald Acuna Jr. or Spencer Strider to the 60-day IL.

The move represents another aggressive promotion from the Braves, as it was less than a year ago that Waldrep was selected with the 24th overall pick of the 2023 draft.  There was even some speculation that Waldrep was being considered for his MLB debut near the end of last season to give the Braves an extra high-powered bullpen arm for the playoffs, though the club opted against moving quite so quickly with the right-hander’s development.  Even still, Waldrep has only 84 2/3 pro innings under his belt, and just two starts at the Triple-A level.  Waldrep recorded 11 strikeouts over six innings with Triple-A Gwinnett last Sunday, allowing three earned runs on five hits and a walk in his first Triple-A outing of 2024.

This was enough to convince the Braves that Waldrep is ready for the Show, and the 22-year-old will now get an opportunity in what has become a revolving door of a fifth starter’s position.  Atlanta’s top four of Fried, Reynaldo Lopez, Charlie Morton, and Chris Sale has been very solid, but since Strider underwent season-ending elbow surgery, six other pitchers have gotten starts in Strider’s place.  None have achieved much success, so Waldrep might well get an extended look if he shows he can hang against big league hitters.

Waldrep was a consensus top-100 pick on preseason prospect rankings, with Baseball Prospectus (30th) and Baseball America (49th) the most bullish about his potential.  (He was ranked 77th by ESPN’s Kiley McDaniel, 80th by The Athletic’s Keith Law had him 80th, and 90th by MLB Pipeline, though Waldrep is now 72nd on Pipeline’s updated in-season list.)  There is universal acclaim for Waldrep’s splitter, which has upper-80s velocity and “completely falls off the table,” in the words of BA’s scouting report, leading to “ugly swings against hitters unable to hold back.”  Beyond this signature pitch is a fastball that regularly sits in the mid-90s and can hit as high as 99mph, and he also has a plus slider.

Controlling this arsenal has always been something of an adventure for Waldrep, so perhaps the most intriguing number on his 2024 stat line is his 7.56% walk rate over 55 1/3 total innings at the Double-A and Triple-A levels.  That is already a big upgrade from the 13% walk rate he posted in his first 29 1/3 pro innings in 2023, and if this improved command can continue in the majors, Waldrep has front-of-the-rotation potential.  At the very least, Waldrep might profile as an elite closer down the road if he can’t stick as a starter, but naturally Atlanta will give him plenty of looks in the rotation before deciding on that step.

The obvious comparison here is with the hard-throwing Strider, and Strider might well have matched Waldrep’s first-round pedigree if he hadn’t undergone a Tommy John surgery in college.  Of course, it would be asking an awful lot of Waldrep to match Strider’s meteoric rise to big league stardom, and if Waldrep is “only” a decent rotation arm in his first taste of the majors, that is still a huge achievement for a pitcher just a year removed from the University of Florida.

If Waldrep can stay on the Major League roster for this season and beyond, he’ll be in good position to earn an extra year of arbitration eligibility as a Super Two player.  As per the Prospect Promotion Incentive qualification system, Waldrep can earn a full year of MLB service time if he finishes first or second in NL Rookie of the Year voting, though Waldrep would have to be truly exceptional to overtake the likes of Shota Imanaga, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Jared Jones, or others who have excelled in the majors for the entire 2024 campaign.

Braves, Phillies Announce NLDS Rosters; Kyle Wright Placed On 60-Day Injured List

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With Game 1 just hours away, the Phillies and Braves announced the rosters for the NL Division Series.  The announcements come with some notable transactions, as Atlanta has placed Kyle Wright on the 60-day injured list due to a right shoulder strain.  In other moves, Max Fried was activated from the 15-day injured list as expected, and rookie Daysbel Hernandez was also activated from the 60-day IL and included on the NLDS roster.

The news brings a disappointing season to an end for Wright, as shoulder problems limited him to only 31 innings and  6.97 ERA.  After returning from the 60-day IL in September, Wright was hit hard in two starts before being moved into a multi-inning relief role, which would likely have been his role on a playoff roster.  With Charlie Morton’s finger injury keeping him off the NLDS roster, the speculated plan was for the Braves to use Bryce Elder as the Game 3 starter and perhaps Wright as either a piggyback starter or more of a true reliever.  AJ Smith-Shawver made the NLDS roster and now looks to likely step into that secondary starter role for Game 3.

Justin Toscano of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported some of the Braves’ roster plans yesterday, including the somewhat surprising inclusion of Hernandez.  The righty made his Major League debut on July 23, and threw 3 2/3 innings over four appearances before being sidelined due to forearm inflammation.  Eventually moved to the 60-day injured list in September, Hernandez could now make his return in the postseason spotlight.

An international signing out of Cuba in 2017, Hernandez just turned 27 last month, and he has a history of missing bats in the minor leagues.  With a 3.03 ERA over 157 2/3 innings in Atlanta’s farm system, Hernandez has a very impressive 30.35% strikeout rate, and his high-90s fastball could be an intriguing secret weapon for the Braves in the playoffs.  However, it is possible the Phillies might benefit if Hernandez can’t harness his pitches, as he has a 12.44% walk rate during his minor league career.

Philadelphia will return 25 of the players from the group who defeated the Marlins in the NL Wild Card Series.  The one change is Michael Lorenzen, as the Phillies will add an extra pitcher and remove a position player in Weston Wilson.  Lorenzen posted a 5.51 ERA over 47 1/3 innings and 11 appearances after being acquired from the Tigers at the trade deadlne, and the last four of those outings came out of the bullpen due to Lorenzen’s struggles.  Barring an emergency, Lorenzen will continue to work as a reliever during the NLDS.

There are three off-days during the series, so the unusual scheduling allows for extra rest for the top-choice starters.  Ranger Suarez and Spencer Strider are today’s scheduled starter, Fried and Zack Wheeler are slated to face off in Monday’s Game 2, and Aaron Nola takes the hill for Philadelphia in Game 3 against a Braves starter TBD (likely Elder).  Suarez and Strider figure to return in a potential Game 4, and then a Wheeler/Fried rematch awaits in a possible Game 5.

The full rosters…

Phillies

Braves

Braves Reinstate Kyle Wright

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Between games of today’s double-header, the Braves announced that right-hander Kyle Wright has been reinstated from the 60-day injured list. In corresponding moves, left-hander Dylan Lee was optioned to Triple-A Gwinnett while righty Daysbel Hernández was transferred to the 60-day IL.

Wright, now 27, had a huge breakout last year. He posted an earned run average of 3.19 over 30 starts for Atlanta, along with a 23.6% strikeout rate, 7.2% walk rate and 55.6% ground ball rate. Unfortunately, he hasn’t been able to build on that here in 2023. He made five starts with a 5.79 ERA before a shoulder strain sent him to the injured list, only returning today after missing about four months.

Now that he’s back, he will look to get back into good form and hopefully strengthen an Atlanta club that is already in a great spot. Their 94-49 record is the best in baseball, having already clinched them a playoff spot. They are 16 games up on the Phillies in the division, 6.5 on the Dodgers for the league lead and 3.5 over the Orioles for best in the majors. They’ve done all that while missing Wright and Max Fried for much of the year, though both are now healthy and in the rotation alongside Spencer Strider, Charlie Morton and Bryce Elder. On a personal level, Wright will qualify for arbitration for the first time this winter and a strong finish will help him in that regard.

As for Hernández, he was placed on the injured list August 1 due to right forearm inflammation. He’ll now be officially ineligible to return until 60 days from that initial IL placement, which effectively ends his regular season. He could theoretically join the club in the postseason but would have to both get healthy and seem like a better option than someone currently on the roster. He posted a 7.36 ERA in four outings this year and missed all of 2022 after undergoing Tommy John surgery in February of last year. He has struck out 30.3% of batters faced in the minors but has also walked 12.2%.

Braves Select Daysbel Hernandez

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The Braves announced a series of roster moves this morning as they selected right-hander Daysbel Hernandez to the active roster. In a corresponding move, right-hander Jesse Chavez was transferred to the 60-day injured list. Right-hander Allan Winans was optioned to Triple-A following last night’s game, so there was already space for Hernandez on the active roster.

Hernandez’s first appearance will be his big league debut. After playing in Cuba as a teenager, the right-hander began his affiliated career in 2018 as a reliever with a 4.50 ERA in 38 innings between Single-A and High-A with the Braves. He then returned to High-A in 2019 and dominated the level to the tune of a 1.71 ERA in 52 2/3 innings of work. In 2021, Hernandez reached the upper-minors with a strong performance at Double-A though he struggled badly in 9 2/3 innings at Triple-A to end the season, posting a 7.45 ERA. He missed the entire 2022 campaign due to injury but returned earlier this season and has posted 16 2/3 scoreless innings between the Double-A and Triple-A levels complete with a whopping 44% strikeout rate.

That phenomenal performance was enough for the club to add the 26-year-old hurler to a bullpen that sports an NL-best 3.53 ERA in 2023. While the club’s relief corps has certainly been impressive to this point, only five NL clubs have leaned on their bullpen more heavily to this point in the season than the Braves, who have gotten 352 innings out of their relievers so far. Between that workload and injuries to key players like Chavez, A.J. Minter, and Nick Anderson, it’s certainly feasible that Hernandez could provide a boost to the club’s bullpen going forward. Given his overpowering stuff and impressive numbers in the minors this year, there’s a chance he’ll factor into the club’s late inning mix alongside the likes of Kirby Yates and Collin McHugh ahead of closer Raisel Iglesias.

Making room for Hernandez on the 40-man roster is Chavez, who now won’t be eligible to return from the IL until mid-August. A veteran in his sixteenth big league season who will celebrate his 40th birthday next month, Chavez has managed to have a late-career renaissance out of the bullpen in recent years, with a 3.46 ERA that’s 33% better than league average by measure of ERA+ in 322 innings of work since the start of the 2018 season. He’s been particularly excellent with Atlanta over the past two seasons, with a sterling 2.30 ERA in 82 innings of work for the club.

As for Winans, the 27-year-old righty had a solid if uneven big league debut for the Braves last night. In 4 1/3 innings of work, Winans allowed two runs on five hits but struck out five while walking just one. Winans could be in the mix for a spot start alongside the likes of Dylan Dodd, Jared Shuster, and AJ Smith-Shawver the next time the club requires one, though with two off-days this week and left-hander Max Fried on a rehab assignment at Triple-A, the club may not need to deep into their rotation depth for some time.

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