PHOENIX – Left-hander Donnie Veal was designated for assignment Monday by the Braves, who recalled rookie right-hander Cody Martin from Triple-A Gwinnett to take his place in the bullpen.
Martin, who spent the first six weeks of the season with the Braves, flew from Atlanta Monday morning and rejoined the team in for Monday night’s series opener against the Diamondbacks.
Manager Fredi Gonzalez said he would use Martin in the middle-relief role he began the season in, rather than the eighth-inning setup role he was thrust into during mid-May due to injuries to other pitchers.
“We’ll use him where he was supposed to be used,” said Gonzalez, who believed that Martin’s rough outings late in his first stint with the team were due, at least in part, to being used in a role for which he wasn’t ready.
Martin was 2-2 with a 4.12 ERA and .278 opponents’ average in 17 appearances for the Braves, including .182 (4-for-22) by left-handed batters, before being optioned to Triple-A on May 19.
His overall statistics aren’t indicative of how well he pitched overall. He had a 2.16 ERA and .220 opponents’ average in his first 14 appearances, with 21 strikeouts, four walks and two homers allowed in 16 2/3 innings.
Martin, 25, appeared to show some fatigue after that and was roughed up for a 15.00 ERA and .538 opponents’ average in in his last three appearances May 9-15.
He was optioned to Gwinnett on May 19, and posted an 0.96 ERA in two starts and one relief appearance in Triple-A while allowing just four hits and one run with no walks and 13 strikeouts in 9 1/3 innings. The Braves wanted him to start so he could tune up his four-pitch repertoire again in multi-inning appearances with regular rest.
“It was rest, but also just kind of throwing all my pitches,” he said of his time at Gwinnett. “Just getting the work in, getting back stretched out a little bit, it was nice…. You kind of have to go with what’s working when you’re up here throwing one inning. My four-pitch mix doesn’t really play up when I’m only using two of them. I’ve got to use all four. I think getting back to throwing a couple of innings at a time helped me get back to what I was doing well at the beginning of the year.”
The move with Veal was expected, coming a day after the journeyman reliever gave up a game-tying single and two-run homer in the seventh inning at San Francisco. He has a 14.54 ERA and .400 opponents’ average in five appearances in two major league stints this season, allowing seven runs and three homers in 4 1/3 innings.
Left-handed batters were 4-for-8 with two doubles and a homer against Veal, 30, who allowed at least one earned run in every appearance.
The Braves came back from the two-run deficit Sunday by scoring four runs in the ninth inning for a 7-5 win to earn a four-game series split against the Giants.
