If you were one of the many Atlanta Braves fans who had already written off Reynaldo Lopez this season, you are forgiven. Having to get shifted to the bullpen after shoulder surgery and a velocity drop is never a good sign, and it wasn't like Lopez had pitched particularly well in that role. So, when word got out that Atlanta was shifting Lopez back to the rotation, there was some understandable skepticism. Thankfully, Lopez stepped up in a big way.
In the Braves' dominant 5-1 win over the Cardinals on Wednesday, Lopez looked surprisingly good. He went five strong innings on 69 pitches (nice) while giving up just one run on two hits and a walk and striking out six batters. He struck out his final batter and was still hitting 95-96 in that at-bat. If you didn't know any better, you would think that we were watching the 2024 version of Lopez that made the All-Star team.
Not only did Lopez look great, but he also made it to where the Braves can implement other potential fixes to their rotation.
The Braves are skipping Bryce Elder's (velo was down last outing) next turn. Rotation for the Mets series:
— Mark Bowman (@mlbbowman) July 2, 2026
Friday: Grant Holmes
Saturday: Chris Sale
Sunday: Martin Perez
Monday: Reynaldo Lopez
Reynaldo Lopez's strong start allowed the Braves to line their rotation up exactly how they wanted to
In the short term, Lopez going five innings without difficulty allowed them to preserve Hurston Waldrep. Lopez and Waldrep had a loose piggyback situation in place, and if Lopez hadn't been able to pitch deep on Wednesday, the Braves would have used Waldrep to cover innings. Instead, Atlanta is now able to start Waldrep on Thursday, and that was the first domino to fall.
By being able to start Waldrep on Thursday, that meant that Atlanta could skip Bryce Elder for this turn through the rotation. Elder has not looked good at all lately, and in his last start, he was showing clear signs of arm fatigue, including a velo drop. Had Waldrep been unable to make this start, figuring out how to skip Elder without completely torpedoing the rest of the Braves' rotation plans would have required some roster gymnastics.
As is often the case with Lopez or any pitcher coming off a shoulder injury, time will tell if he will be able to bounce back from Wednesday's strong effort and continue to keep it up. Lopez didn't really run his pitch count much at all, so this is pretty much the ideal test to see if he can stick around as a starter for a while. If he can, the Braves may finally be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel of all of these rotation issues.
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