As the Atlanta Braves have found out repeatedly this season, injuries do not care about one's aspirations or the timing in a given season. Case in point, Sean Murphy getting hurt last night against the Rockies while he is in the middle of a career best season and helping the Braves to the National League's best record is far from ideal. However, Charlie Culberson just got a sad reminder that injuries don't just impact the injured players sometimes.
We have all heard stories of guys in the minor leagues getting called in the wee hours of the morning to be told to get on a flight immediately and get to the big league squad at a breakneck pace before not even playing in a game and getting sent back down immediately and other stories like that. However, Charlie was already on the big league roster and isn't a catcher, so how he could be impacted by Murphy's injury wasn't readily apparent until the Braves made a roster move this morning that sent Culberson down to Gwinnett and brought up Chadwick Tromp.
The Braves' reasoning here is fairly straightforward. They don't think that Murph's hamstring injury will keep him out long enough for an injured list stint which would keep him out for a set amount of time. Given how valuable he is to the team, making a roster move for a catcher (in this case Tromp) while also keeping Murphy off the injured list allows Murphy to return in a few days (especially with an off day tomorrow) without any roster issues. Unfortunately, Culberson is the only guy on the roster that is particularly expendable, so he was the odd man out in this odd situation.
However, that doesn't make what happened today suck any less. See, today is Father's Day and the Braves were planning on having Charlie Culberson's dad throw out the first pitch of today's game against the Rockies. Those plans have obviously changed.
Charlie Culberson's dad was scheduled to throw today's first pitch. Michael Harris II's dad will now take this honor on Father's Day.
— Mark Bowman (@mlbbowman) June 18, 2023
Culberson's fans are, at times, a bit ridiculous and Charlie is the subject of plenty of social media silliness, but this just sucks. What would have a great moment for Charlie's family got completely upended by things completely outside of his control. While the Harris family gets a nice surprise on Father's Day, it is hard not to feel bad for the Culberson family.