Happy Friday, folks.
Your Braves are 12-7, hitting well and pitching even better, while the rest of the National League East swims in sub-.500 seas.
Good news all around … except for one little thing.
LOSING THE BATTLE
By Chad Bishop
After 19 games of the regular season with the Automated Ball-Strike challenge system in place, the Braves have been, um, not great.
Does it matter? Probably not very much in April.
But it will definitely become a factor as games become more meaningful in the coming months. And even though the Braves haven’t done very well with the system overall, one of Ozzie Albies’ challenges in a game against the Diamondbacks did directly lead to a victory.
🤖 As the batting team, the Braves have only won four of their 16 challenges. Only the Nationals have won fewer. The mighty Dodgers have also only won four but have done it at a 44% success rate. Atlanta’s 25% success rate is dead last in MLB.
🤖 In the field, i.e. challenges by pitchers and catchers (only Braves catchers have challenged so far), the Braves are a bit better. They’ve gone 11-for-22, but that mark still puts the team toward the lower end of the ABS standings.
- As of Thursday afternoon, the Reds (69%) are the best challenging team at the plate. The Tigers (86%) are out in front on defensive challenges.
- Catcher Iván Herrera of the Cardinals is already 5-for-6 as a hitter challenging pitches while catchers Salvador Perez (Royals) and Will Smith (Dodgers) have both won 13 challenges from behind the plate.
Braves hitters who have challenged thus far include Albies, Ronald Acuña Jr., Michael Harris II, Matt Olson, Dominic Smith, Mauricio Dubón and Jorge Mateo. Dubón is 0-for-3 and Acuña’s quick trigger has him 2-for-6.
Jonah Heim has been pretty solid in his challenges behind the plate, going 8-for-13. Drake Baldwin has missed on five of his eight challenges.
🤖 Addendum from Tyler: There’s another interesting angle in this inning-by-inning chart of Braves challenges, crafted by AJC data man Rahul Deshpande.
Decent results in crunch time, I suppose. But they’re also using plenty of them early in games … and should probably just leave things be in the fourth.
Can’t win ‘em all, but a slightly better batting average wouldn’t hurt.
📲 Y’all make sure to follow Chad at @MrChadBishop.
THE LEGEND OF WALT WEISS
We (probably) won’t spend every week talking about how cool Walt Weiss is. But I can’t help but plug our friend Gabe Burns’ latest story — which is ostensibly about how Weiss was always the right man for the job but also includes quotes like this:
- “You can’t hide the fighter’s ears — you see a guy like that, you know that’s somebody you don’t want to mess with.”
- “Just the physical appearance — he’s got, like, two softballs that sit right there by his elbow. His forearms are so big.”
He also knows Bill Goldberg. Happy reading!
FROM ROME WITH LOVE
✅ Spencer Strider got his first rehab start last night with High-A Rome, throwing 50 pitches (27 strikes) over 3 ⅓ scoreless innings. He surrendered just one hit while walking two and striking out three.
“The goal with these things is just to get to the pitch count and just try to build back up the stamina,” Strider told reporters afterward (video here). “That’s goal No. 1 and that’s what we did.”
Barring setbacks with his injured oblique, Strider figures to need at least two more starts before returning to the big league rotation.
✅ Sean Murphy caught Strider on Thursday, his second rehab game with Rome, as he continues working back from hip surgery. He charted two hitless at-bats and has now caught nine total innings.
He could return to Atlanta before Strider does.
PHILLIES AND NATIONALS ON DECK
A road trip to Philadelphia (and then Washington D.C.) begins with three different start times and channels. What a time to be alive.
- Friday: 6:40 p.m. on BravesVision.
- Saturday: 7:15 p.m. on Fox.
- Sunday: 7:20 p.m. on Peacock.
🤔 What to know: The Phillies won last year’s season series with the Braves, 8-5 … and took the National League East crown, too.
And while they had a similar offseason to the home team (no big-name additions), it’s not working out particularly well for them so far. Sitting at 8-10, Philly’s team ERA of 4.92 ranked 26th out of 30 MLB squads before Thursday’s action.
The Braves, meanwhile, are still baseball’s best (paced by … Bryce Elder?!).
Here are this weekend’s planned matchups, in chronological order:
- Martín Pérez (0-1, 3.14) vs. Taijuan Walker (1-2, 7.36)
- Chris Sale (3-1,3.27) vs. Cristopher Sanchez (2-1, 2.01)
- Grant Holmes (1-1,3.32) vs. Andrew Painter (1-0, 3.77)
👀 Also worth watching: Austin Riley hit his first home run of the season Wednesday … and his 20 career homers off Phillies pitching are his most against any opponent.
BRAVES AT NATIONALS
📺 Game times: Monday through Wednesday’s games all start at 6:45 p.m. on BravesVision. First pitch of Thursday’s series finale arrives at 1:05 p.m.
🤔 What to know: Like the Phillies, the Nats and 33-year-old manager Blake Butera are off to a suboptimal start. But don’t tell that to shortstop CJ Abrams or outfielder James Wood.
- Abrams, before Thursday’s action: Six homers, 19 RBIs, .367 average, 1.175 OPS.
- Wood: Five homers, 14 RBIs, .250 average, .921 OPS.
Wood has also played well against the Braves in his young career. He hit four homers and drove in nine in 11 games last year — with three of those dingers coming in the teams’ last two September clashes.
👀 Also worth watching: All Acuña did against Washington in 2025 was go 11-for-25 with three homers.
QUICK, SOME OTHER NEWS!
💪 Don’t look now, but Ozzie Albies is hitting .288 with four homers — including three from the left side. Columnist Michael Cunningham suspects the second baseman might be finding his old form.
🏆 Mr. Acuña won the Win Column’s tournament of joy-inducing Atlanta athletes. Now it’s time for the Braves to think about extending him.
😬 Columnist Ken Sugiura took a look back at the preseason concerns about the Braves pitching. Long way to go yet but … a tad overblown, perhaps?
😮 Matt Olson: Still playing in every game, still streaking past icons.
👶 Michael Harris II is a dad. Mom and Michael Harris III are doing great.
🙌 Raisel Iglesias now has 100 saves (and counting) in his Braves career.
PHOTO OF THE WEEK
Dom Smith — and baseball — forever.
Thanks for reading Braves Report. Tell a friend — and maybe give the Win Column newsletter a shot, too.
Until next time.
About the Author
Tyler Estep hosts the AJC Win Column, Atlanta's new weekly destination for all things sports. He also shepherds the Sports Daily and Braves Report newsletters to your inbox.
