The Atlanta Braves have made several roster moves heading into their weekend series against the Toronto Blue Jays, including the reinstatement of Sean Newcomb.
We’ve been waiting for what seems like forever for the return of Sean Newcomb to the Atlanta Braves.
He was just starting to get into a groove back in a bullpen role, but now he hasn’t pitched in two weeks after going through health and safety protocols.
On the season Newcomb has a 1.69 ERA in 5.1 innings with 12 strikeouts and 4 walks. He was really huge for the bullpen in those first two weeks of the season when the other backend arms weren’t getting it done.
Hopefully Newcomb continues to embrace that bullpen role where he’s thrived in the past, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there is some rest coming back.
I also hope Snitker starts to use him more in Josh Hader type role allowing him to go multiple innings. He’s only done that once so far this year.
Braves: Mike Soroka transferred to 60-day IL
In order to open up a spot on the 40-man roster, the Braves moved Mike Soroka to the 60-day IL. This isn’t much of a shock considering he just started throwing again and is basically right back where he was at the beginning of Spring Training.
He’ll have to build up arm strength again before rejoining the team, and that will at least take a month. While the team hasn’t announced anything, it’s most likely going to be mid-June before we see Soroka.
Braves Option Bryse Wilson and Johan Camargo
Again, not much of a surprise here, but Bryse Wilson and Johan Camargo were both optioned back to the Alternate Training Site. They’ll both join the Triple-A team in Gwinnett next week when their games began.
Bryse has been unable to recapture the magic he produced in game 4 of the NLCS last year. Although, running him out there on short rest for Thursday’s game was just dumb and didn’t do anything to help his confidence or progression.
Hopefully Bryse can get on a regular schedule in Triple-A instead of constantly being jerked around at the big league level. Maybe that will help him regain focus and pitch like we know he’s capable.
Camargo is just lost and needs a change of scenery. It would be a surprise if he’s still with the Braves at the end of this season.
Braves: Edgar Santana Added to the Roster
I’ll be honest, I completely forgot all about Edgar Santana — and I’m the one who wrote this article when the Braves traded for him!
With Atlanta desperately needing some help in the bullpen — mainly in the right-handed variety — it looks like Santana will be the next in line to get a chance.
Nate Jones has been awful and can be cut at any minute.
Chris Martin should be back soon, which will be a big help.
But Santana is someone that has a ton of upside if he can stay healthy. He hasn’t pitched in the big leagues since 2018 when he was with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Through 84.1 big league seasons, he’s posted a 3.31 ERA with 74 strikeouts and a WHIP of 1.20. What I love is that his 4.1 percent walk-rate in 2018 was among the best in all of baseball.
Back in 2018, he was predominantly a sinker-slider pitcher and he had big Whiff-rates on that slider. But he also threw a pretty hard fastball that reached in the mid-to-upper 90s.
We’ll have to see if that velocity still remains high and just how good his slider is when he makes his Braves debut.