For the first time in 424 days, Spencer Strider graced the Truist Park mound in front of the Braves’ home crowd. However, his outing did not exactly go as planned.
Strider surrendered five runs across five innings of Tuesday night’s 8-3 loss to the Diamondbacks. The defeat was the Braves’ ninth in their past 12 games, three of which Strider toed the rubber for.
“I don’t have the ability to be patient, honestly,” Strider said. “We’ve got to win games, and when it’s my turn to pitch, I’ve got to give us a chance to win. If I can’t do that, then I don’t know what value I’m providing, besides reps.”
Three pitches from Strider turned a potentially solid outing into one of his worst appearances of the season, statistically. The first was a changeup he left over the upper-outside of the plate. The other two were fastballs he threw right down the middle.
Fastball command has been one of Strider’s biggest struggles since returning from injury April 16. The other is his velocity, which is down from the 97.2 mph he averaged during his last full season in 2023.
Both are normal for pitchers returning from the internal brace procedure that Strider underwent, but it does not make the struggles any easier to stomach. Strider shared that he cannot expect improvement if he does not deliberately intervene, meaning working on his mechanics in a way that will provide repetitions without jeopardizing his next start.
That includes spending time in both the weight room and the bullpen, mimicking the movement patterns he needs to be consistent.
“Command without stuff is batting practice,” Strider said. “So that’s about what I offered up today.”
Although Strider’s outing ended with an early exit, the Braves used a three-run fourth inning to keep the score close. Drake Baldwin broke up Zac Gallen’s perfect game with a solo home run, and three of the next four Braves reached base.
Baldwin’s hit, one of the Braves’ six on the evening, marked the rookie’s 35th in 37 games this season. He also impressed with his glove, picking off a baserunner and catching another one trying to steal second.
The latter of which included a perfect throw that led Nick Allen off the bag and right in front of the Diamondback trying to steal.
Other than the fourth inning, the Braves’ offensive remained quiet, scoring less than five runs for the seventh time in its past 10 games.
“We’ve gotta do better. That’s all,” Snitker said. “There’s no blame to anybody, but as a team, we just have to do better overall with all aspects. We’re in a position where we don’t have any margin for error, so we have to play a solid, clean game in order to win right now.”
The Braves only trailed 5-3 entering the ninth inning, but Snitker opted to leave Rafael Montero, who has a 5.14 ERA, in the game. The Diamondbacks then scored three — all with two outs — on Corbin Carroll’s second home run of the game.
Snitker said he gave Montero the opportunity because the team cannot afford to burn its high-leverage relievers in an effort to chase wins.
“That’s his job, is to get through that inning,” Snitker said. “Because we start chasing wins, then we’ll kill the guys that we use when we do have a win. We’re not going to burn (Raisel Iglesias) and all those guys behind because if we do that — you can’t do that. You can’t sustain a bullpen.”
The Braves, who are now 27-32 on the season, will face the Diamondbacks again on Wednesday at 7:15 p.m. Reigning Cy Young Award winner Chris Sale will take the mound opposite of Arizona’s Merrill Kelly.
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