Braves pitcher Kyle Wright acknowledged that his start against the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night was his worst of the season. Wright gave up six runs in the second inning and finished with his first home loss in 2022. Still, the right-hander saw positives in the outing, including his ability to bounce back in the following innings and pitch through the top of the fifth.
Here’s what Wright and manager Brian Snitker had to say after Tuesday’s 9-4 loss:
- Wright on Rafael Devers’ grand slam: “To Devers, I felt like that was the guy I should have been more passive with. I went at him and he got a really good swing on it and obviously hit it out. I think there’s a lot of things that I didn’t navigate very well [and] can definitely learn from it.”
- Wright on pitching past the second inning: “For me, that’s huge. Just knowing that, mentally I feel like I was in a strong space to get out of that inning. I know a couple things I did wrong or felt a little bit off mechanically or execution-wise that I can work on this week and bring into the next start.”
- Wright on having his first rough start out of the way: “I feel like you never want to give up runs, but for me, I’m glad I did. Obviously I’m not glad the way it turned out, but you get stuck in the trap of, ‘I’ve got to put up a zero, I’ve got to put up a zero,’ that you lose focus of the very small goal, which is executing the pitch. I feel like those goals started getting too broad and then that’s what happened today.”
- Wright on reaching the fifth inning: “That was awesome. Trying to find a way, save the bullpen a little bit and ultimately give us a chance. I feel like I was able to do that for the most part, definitely feel like I could have been a little bit better in the fifth. ... I felt like I found my groove a little bit better after that second inning. I think it was important to cover a couple innings. Definitely something to build off of.”
- Wright on his growth: “In years past, I don’t get out of that second inning. I probably give up a couple more runs, for all I know. For me, continuing to push through and find a way to get a bit deeper into the game is really important. You’ve got to learn from the good ones but you’ve got to learn from the bad ones, so I’ll learn from this and try to be better going forward.”
- Snitker on his message to Wright: “I told him, I felt like, a year or two ago, you’d never have gotten out of the second and there would have been a lot more damage done. He hung in there and got us to the end of the fifth, which was good after giving up those runs. We had a chance to come back and just couldn’t mount anything to get back in it.”
- Snitker on Wright’s composure: “There’s still some positives to how he reacted to the whole thing and I don’t know how he was feeling in that inning, but I know he did regroup and got back on the attack and stretched the game a little. ... I never saw any panic in him. He might have been a little cautious and things like that that he said, but it wasn’t something I looked out there and saw. He didn’t execute some pitches and things like that but after that inning, he got back to work and got on the attack and got himself going again.”
- Snitker on Wright’s ability to handle adversity: “There are going to be setbacks and things aren’t going to just go as planned and you’re going to have to weather storms. I kind of feel like he did tonight. Maybe the experience of that will help him where he can control that inning even better and limit it down to three runs instead of six. ... I’m sure there are things he’s going to draw on that are going to help him down the road.”
