When you have the number of injuries in your pitching staff that the Atlanta Braves have had to deal with, you have to get a little lucky to weather it. The Braves lost 2025 standout Hurston Waldrep as well as Spencer Schwellenbach before the season even started, and now they are having to absorb the loss (again) of Spencer Strider. One of the things that had gone right for the Braves in their rotation had been the play of Bryce Elder, but it seems like the tide may be turning against him and Atlanta.
There was understandable skepticism about Elder coming into the 2026 season. He has never been a pitcher that consistently missed bats, and his stuff just didn't pass the eye test of a guy that should have a prominent role in the rotation of a good baseball team. However, an uptick in Elder's stuff and some changes to his pitch usage paid real dividends for him early in the season.
Unfortunately, following a brutal start against the Brewers on Sunday, where he gave up eight runs in the second inning, it looks like Elder may have turned back into a pumpkin.
Bryce Elder's resurgence with Braves may already be over, and it is the last thing they need
Elder looked so good through his first 11 starts with a sub-2 ERA and some genuinely dominant starts mixed in. While his 3.31 FIP did portend SOME regression was coming, it has still been jarring to see just how much Elder has fallen since that hot start.
Over his last five starts, Elder has an 8.31 ERA with declining peripherals pretty much across the board. Sure, there has been some bad batted ball luck along the way, but the bigger issue is that the gains the Elder had seen in his stuff have basically disappeared. Elder had been occasionally touching 94-95 mph with his fastball late last season and earlier this season. Now, he is back to being in the 92 mph range mostly, and his arsenal is a lot less interesting when opposing hitters basically can't be ambushed by his heater.
Unfortunately, Elder falling back to earth now is pretty terrible timing for the Braves. Waldrep is slowly stretching out while making his way back from elbow surgery, but he has yet to throw five innings down in the minors this season. At this point, neither Schwellenbach nor Strider are likely at all to return until sometime in the second half. Atlanta does have a couple of other levers involving young arms that they can still pull this season, but the pressure is really on the front office with Elder crashing and burning to figure out how to stop the bleeding.
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