Atlanta Braves: Kyle Wright seeks to take advantage of opportunity

Kyle Wright suddenly has an open door to prove himself in a shortened 2020 season with the Atlanta Braves.

When the Atlanta Braves drafted Kyle Wright out of Vanderbilt with the fifth overall pick in the 2017 MLB Draft, they knew this time would come.

Of course, the Braves did not foresee the bizarre set of circumstances in which it would unfold, but it’s happening nonetheless.

Amid the coronavirus pandemic that has greatly tempered the usual fervor of baseball season, it’s important to know there is still the opportunity for optimism; both in life and in the game we love.

Kyle Wright has the chance – in baseball’s greatly modified 60-game regular season – to turn something negative into a positive.

The recent combination of a couple of his rotation-mates either battling injuries in summer camp (Cole Hamels) or opting out for safety concerns (Felix Hernandez) has swung the door of opportunity wide-open for Wright.

The 6’4″ right-handed starting pitcher – who grew up firmly entrenched in die-hard Braves country of northern Alabama – has proven himself worthy of this shot.

With three years of college experience and success under his belt, Wright moved quickly through the low minors within the Atlanta Braves organization after being drafted, putting up a strong 2.65 ERA in nine total starts between rookie league and A-Advanced.

That success continued over into Double-A Mississippi, where Wright began the 2018 campaign and totaled 20 starts with a 3.70 ERA (and a 3.34 FIP).

What really energized the Wright hype was when he was promoted to Triple-A Gwinnett in late 2018.

In seven total appearances (four of which as a starter) with the Gwinnett Stripers, Kyle Wright flashed a 2.51 ERA, while also seeing his strikeout numbers increase from his time in Mississippi.

He was impressive enough, in fact, to earn his first cup-of-coffee experience in the majors as a September callup in 2018, seeing four appearances of game action.

It was at this juncture, exiting 2018 and entering the 2019 season, that Wright’s buildup – in terms of prospect rankings – reached its peak.

MLB Pipeline tagged Kyle Wright as the Braves’ second-best prospect going into 2019, behind only Mike Soroka, and ahead of the likes of Ian Anderson and Cristian Pache.

In 2019, unfortunately, Wright fell victim to developmental growing pains, and perhaps a bit of prospect fatigue as a result of not living up to the substantial preseason accolades.

But make no mistake, there’s still enough evidence from his troublesome 2019 to suggest that Kyle Wright still has all the potential in the world to be a successful major-league pitcher in the very near future.