The Braves are doing something with their bevy of long relievers and pseudo-starters, but what that something is, is unclear to me. Is it clear to you?
Grant Holmes was today’s scheduled starter. Martin Perez was “in the bullpen” but hasn’t made an appearance since his start eight days ago. Perez has a 54/111/108 line (ERA-/FIP-/xFIP-) across four starts and two relief appearances. He’s kind of a times-through-the-order-penalty weirdo, where he essentially has the same mediocre-or-worse stats no matter
how many times a batter has seen him on a given day. Holmes has made seven starts with a 105/125/113 line. He has a very dramatically pronounced “good first time through, nearly unplayable second and third time through” split for his career, which was mirrored in 2026 until his most recent start, where the Rockies thrashed him early but he recovered to stifle them the rest of the way.
Reynaldo Lopez is also hanging around in the bullpen. His line is 79/123/116. His stuff didn’t show any uptick from being reserved for a shorter stint. Didier Fuentes is at 102/81/88; he pitched two innings behind Perez last week and has made two shorter relief appearances since. It’s not clear what the plan is there, either.
Can you make sense of this? I’m not sure I can, but so long as the fielding and hitting are good, it probably doesn’t matter that much.
