ATLANTA – All of the Atlanta Braves’ top five prospects are right-handed pitchers who throw hard – in some cases extremely hard – and exhibit the type of athleticism that the team has prioritized at the position for years.
This crop of young, elite talent is particularly welcomed by the Braves. The team has just two healthy, proven starters (Spencer Strider, Bryce Elder) under contract control beyond 2024, and their injury-depleted rotation has been outscored in consecutive National League Division Series by the Philadelphia Phillies. The emergence of promising arms is a crucial development for an organization that hasn’t believed in building a pitching staff through big free-agent signings.
The Braves would still be wise to bolster the top of their rotation with one or two proven starters via a trade or free agency. The exact need will be determined by whether Charlie Morton continues to pitch at age 40 and whether the Braves exercise his 2024 option (teams have until Monday to decide whether to exercise options on players).
Regardless, the wave of young talent on the way should give the Braves and their supporters a better feel for the team’s pitching situation, knowing that there are not just one or two, but six or seven quality pitching candidates are in the pipeline.
At least two, AJ Smith-Shawver and Hurston Waldrep, could make the big leagues in 2024, and others, including Spencer Rumpfenbach, Cade Kuehler and Owen Murphy, might not be far behind. And there are talented 20-year-olds Cole Phillips and JR Ritchie, coming back from Tommy John surgery.
Hurston Waldrep, here at the College World Series, shows off an unusual split change that can make hitters look silly. (Steven Branscombe/USA Today)
So many potential frontline pitchers are on the move, and one of them has already arrived.
Smith-Shawver, who debuted at age 20 and impressed in most of his six games, including five starts in 2023, will compete for a rotation spot in spring training. Waldrep, a Georgia native and late 2023 first-round pick out of the University of Florida, could be ready by summer if needed.
The 21-year-old Waldrep made his professional debut in August. He sailed through the minor league system, making eight starts at four levels and compiling a 1.53 ERA with 41 strikeouts, 16 walks and one home run allowed in 29 1/3 innings. That included 4 1/3 scoreless innings in his only start for Triple-A Gwinnett, which was promoted at the end of the season to give him another start after other minor leagues folded.
Waldrep offers a stunning three-pitch mix with a 95-99 mph fastball, a hard slider and an unusual split-change that has carried hitters from the College World Series to all four levels of the Braves’ minor league system made it look silly.
“It’s a very good pitch that he taught himself a few years ago,” said Ben Sestanovich, the Braves’ assistant general manager in charge of player development. “We all saw clips of it during the College World Series and then saw it up close in the minor leagues – it’s a really good pitch.”
Waldrep’s confidence and intellect remind some of Strider, and team officials believe the mental factor has helped him rise quickly and that has a direct impact on what he does on the mound.
“We talked to AJ (Smith-Shawver) about that, about competitiveness and athleticism, and I think those two words could be applied to Waldrep as well,” Sestanovich said. “He’s a really good athlete and the competition on the mound is really good too. So yeah, the makeup – obviously our amateur scouting group does a great job getting to know these kids and figuring out what they’re about. And Hurston is no exception.”
Smith-Shawver and Waldrep will likely be ranked No. 1-2 on the Braves’ 2024 prospect lists, but a handful of other pitchers in the organization are also considered solid major league starters, including some with potential for a middle or top spot -the-rotation types.
Schlafenbach, 23, is a student who is two or three years older than the others in the group, but some believe his raw ability sets his ceiling higher. He was a shortstop at Nebraska for three years and didn’t play until he was a junior when he completed games, posting a 0.57 ERA and 10 saves in 18 appearances and winning the John Olerud Award as the nation’s top two-way player.
The Braves drafted him in the second round in 2021 as a pitcher, and Wechselbach had Tommy John surgery shortly after the draft. He didn’t make his professional debut until April 2023 and posted a 2.77 ERA in 16 starts at two Class A levels, allowing 55 strikeouts, 16 walks and three home runs in 65 innings. After building up his pitch count early in the season, Wechselbach went six innings in four of his last eight starts and had a 2.81 ERA and a .192 opponents’ OPS over that span.
He pitched in the All-Star Futures Game and was promoted to High-A Rome in mid-July, then landed back on the injured list and didn’t throw another pitch until August 23. But in his last two starts of the season for Rome, he pitched 11 scoreless innings with two hits, 11 strikeouts and no walks.
“He’s a great athlete,” Sestanovich said of Wechselbach. “Obviously Tommy John was there as soon as he got drafted. So Year 23 was actually his first pitching appearance of the entire season. He got into tight games as a shortstop at Nebraska, and then spent his first professional season rehabbing. I think it was a year for him where he learned what it’s like to be a pitcher and not a two-way guy. It was really exciting to see him pitch at two levels the way he did.”
Although he’s only been a starter for one season, Wechselbach’s three-pitch mix makes him a good fit for the role, and the Braves intend to keep him there. He has a mid-90s fastball that tops out at 99 mph, as well as a good slider and changeup. “Throws a lot of punches, multiple weapons – we really like what we saw,” Sestanovich said.
Kuehler was selected with a compensation pick in the second round of this year’s draft from Campbell University in North Carolina. He is similar to Elder in that he threw five or more pitches in college, but Kuehler throws harder (with a fastball in the mid-90s to 98). The hope is that reducing the pitch mix to three or four will help him throw strikes more consistently.
In an age where analytics influence everything in the game, Kuehler’s draft stock has been boosted by outstanding spin rates and the kind of ride on his fastball – which gives a fastball the appearance of a rise – that MLB teams look for. It’s a component that makes Strider’s fastball so dominant.
“(Kuehler) can absolutely turn a baseball,” Sestanovich said.
Kuehler made just two starts after the draft, but those Low-A outings were encouraging — seven scoreless innings of one-hit ball with four walks and eight strikeouts.
“We just liked the competition and stuff again,” Sestanovich said of adding another right-hander in the draft. “He has a pretty good mix of cutter, slider and fastball. We didn’t let him throw quite as much in pro ball, but we liked what we saw.”
Murphy, who just turned 20 in September, was the Braves’ top pick in the 2022 draft and came out of a high school in Illinois where he was a standout two-way player who was a high-round hitting infielder. Pick could have been. The Braves selected him in the first round as a pitcher, and in his first full season as a pro, Murphy had a modest 4.72 ERA in 21 starts at two Class A levels, but a solid 113 strikeouts and 32 walks in 89 two /3 innings.
“Murph posted wire-to-wire as a first-rounder out of the draft, which you don’t see very often,” Sestanovich said. “I think it was very exciting to see him receiving and throwing the ball effectively at both Augusta and Rome. Much like some of these other guys, we like the hitting ability. He has a fastball that really plays and two breaking balls. So we’re excited to see what’s coming next year in Murph’s second full season.”
He doesn’t throw as hard as some of the Braves’ top prospects, but Murphy’s low-90s fastball has that spin and good run, and it generated a lot of swing-and-miss.
“Again, it’s rare to see a high school student start and post 21 times in a five-month minor league season,” Sestanovich said. “Murph did that, and I think I learned a lot from that experience. He is very diligent in his work between starts and has done a really good job.”
Ritchie and Phillips could move to the top of the Braves’ talent list once they recover from Tommy John surgery. Both were 2022 draft picks, with Ritchie being selected as an extra pick in the first round and Phillips sliding to the second round after the hard-throwing Texan underwent TJ surgery four months before the draft.
Phillips has not yet made his Braves debut but looked strong in throwing sessions and could be ready this spring. Ritchie underwent Tommy John surgery in May 2023 and will miss the 2024 season. Before breaking his UCL win, Ritchie posted a Strider-like 25 strikeouts with three walks in 13 1/3 innings in four Low-A starts in 2023.
“The four starts he made at Augusta were really good,” Sestanovich said. “He struck out almost half the batters he faced, which is exceptional, and we look forward to getting him healthy and going from there.”
It’s hard to lose a top prospect for more than 1 1/2 seasons early in his career, especially when you see how dominant Ritchie can be.
“It never depends on what you want to see,” Sestanovich said. “Unfortunately it has become more common. It’s hard for any of our pitchers when they’re dealing with an injury, and that’s probably only going to get harder if they’re playing at a high level and getting off to a good start early in their careers.”
Now the hope is that Ritchie can use the lengthy rehab to his advantage, just as Strider did while recovering from Tommy John surgery at Clemson. Strider returned with a new fitness program and diet, stronger and with better mechanics.
“He’s definitely a great example for these guys,” Sestanovich said. “And I think that rehab is a period of time where men can make improvements, whether it’s in their preparation, in their bodies or in their deliveries. So once you get over the initial disappointment of no one feeling more than the boys themselves, I think it’s a real opportunity for the boys to get some time off that they wouldn’t have had otherwise and then on the other end of it to come out a better pitcher.”
Smith-Shawver cemented his position atop the Braves prospect rankings in 2023, a season that began with him moving from the High-A Rome to the major leagues in just seven starts. Although he returned to Triple A after four big league appearances, he showed such great improvement in a late season start for the Braves that he was named to the NLDS postseason roster.
“We moved him very quickly and he responded to every challenge we gave him,” Sestanovich said.
This would be a good time to remind everyone that Smith-Shawver, a former standout high school quarterback from Texas – he can throw a football more than 70 yards – has only been pitching regularly for a little over three years, since then Summer after his junior year of high school. The rise of the former seventh-round draft pick with the six-time NL East champions to the majors at the age of 20 was all the more astonishing.
“It’s obviously rare, and I think that’s a credit to his competitiveness and constitution, that he was able to move through the system so quickly at a young age and get to the big leagues,” Sestanovich said. “And then I think his athleticism certainly puts him in a position to do those things. I would say the combination of athleticism and competitiveness allowed him to move quickly and respond to a year where he threw in many different places. So, I give him credit.”
(Top photo of Smith-Shawver: Brett Davis / USA Today)