The Atlanta Braves were so close to being at full strength again. They had activated Sean Murphy from the IL after he had recovered from hip surgery, and both Spencer Strider and Ha-Seong Kim are back from their ailments. Hell, even Raisel Iglesias is back from the IL after he (checks notes) slept wrong and messed up his shoulder. Realistically, fans were only waiting for Ronald Acuña Jr. to come back before the latest injury threw another wrench in the plans.
We knew that there was a chance that Murphy would have to go on the IL this week. While the initial X-rays were negative, the Braves were unwilling to commit one way or the other afterwards when Murphy got hit on the hand by Hyeseong Kim's bat on a catcher's interference call, which certainly left the IL door open.
Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened as Murphy was placed on the injured list with a fractured middle finger. The move required Atlanta to bring back Sandy Leon (again) because they had already traded Jonah Heim away once Murphy returned. In addition, the Braves also called up the recently re-signed Jose Azocar and sent Jim Jarvis back down to Triple-A Gwinnett ahead of a tough series against the Cubs this week.
The #Braves today signed free agent C Sandy León to a major league contract and placed C Sean Murphy on the 10-day injured list, backdated to May 11, with a fractured left middle finger. Atlanta today also selected OF José Azócar to the major league roster after optioning INF Jim…
— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) May 12, 2026
Braves lose Sean Murphy to the injured list again after they traded away his replacement, and that feels bad
We'll start with the other roster moves first. It was a little curious that the Braves went out and brought back Azocar when they did, given that centerfielder Michael Harris II has been dealing with a quad injury. For now, it is best to think of him as an insurance policy for an important series, and it is probably true that Jarvis was pretty redundant on the roster at this point.
As for Murphy, this is a bummer and also a lesson that you can never trust initial X-rays with hand/finger injuries because the bones are so small and hard to see. It is at least somewhat encouraging that we didn't immediately get news of Murphy needing surgery or something like that, but we'll need more information before we can even hazard a guess as to when Murphy could return again.
The Braves are extremely fortunate that they were able to snag a catcher with whom they were familiar in Leon. Losing Heim may have been inevitable, but losing him from the team altogether after that trade created a very real third-catcher problem. For now, it looks like Drake Baldwin is going to have to hold things down at catcher most of the time (again) while Murphy is out, with Leon chipping in here and there.
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