Braves Top Prospect Eyed as Potential Spencer Strider Replacement

The Atlanta Braves have several starting pitching candidates in AAA Gwinnett that are biding their time until they can come up and pitch in the majors

Atlanta Braves starting pitcher AJ Smith-Shawver pitches in Grapefruit League action / Kim Klement Neitzel-USA TODAY Sports

The Atlanta Braves are currently dealing with some pretty significant injuries. 

The first one was to starting catcher Sean Murphy, a former Gold Glove winner who was an All-Star in 2023, who strained an oblique in Atlanta’s first game of the season and is taking it slow in his rehab. Added to that just recently was starting second baseman Ozzie Albies, who went on the IL prior to Wednesday’s season finale against the Houston Astros with a broken toe, suffered when he was hit by a pitch in Monday night’s victory. 

But the biggest injury loss for the Atlanta Braves has to be starting pitcher Spencer Strider, who tore his UCL in his throwing elbow and had surgery last week, which will cause him to miss at least the entire 2024 season plus some amount of time in 2025. 

And MLB.com thinks there’s an answer to help replace Spencer Strider’s innings - prospect righthander AJ Smith-Shawver, currently pitching in Triple-A Gwinnett. 

Writing a piece on “impact call-up candidates”, MLB Pipeline’s trio of analysts identified Smith-Shawver as the potential solution to the Braves’ need for high-quality innings both in the regular season and October. 

“After pitching his way from High-A to the big leagues last year, Smith-Shawver made it clear he’d be ready to contribute on a grander scale at some point this season. His first two starts this year were clunkers, but he allowed just one run over 4 2/3 innings in start No. 3 on Wednesday, topping out at 99 mph. With Spencer Strider out for the year, the Braves are going to need some helping hands, and it’s only a matter of time before Smith-Shawver gets another crack at being a member of the big league staff.” 

Smith-Shawver’s working on a pitch count of around 65 pitches in AAA Gwinnett; given that he threw only 87.1 regular season innings last season, projecting him for anything more than about 130 across the entirety of 2024 isn’t wise, and restricting the length of his outings is Atlanta's way of ensuring he has innings left on that tally when he's needed in the majors.

But Smith-Shawver, as the writeup mentioned, made good use of those 65 pitches in Gwinnett on Wednesday, making it through almost five full innings and allowing only one run on two hits and a walk. 

#Braves AAA affiliate @GoStripers picked up their 1,000th win in franchise history today with the 2-1 victory over Memphis.

AJ Smith-Shawver: 4.2 IP, 2H, 1R, 1BB to 3 Ks on 63 pitches (42 strikes)
Allan Winans (W): , 4.0 IP, 1H, 0R, 0BB to 2Ks on 36 pitches (29 strikes)

— Lindsay Crosby, big baseball guy (@CrosbyBaseball) April 17, 2024

And with several members of Atlanta’s rotation that need to have their innings managed - Reynaldo López, who converted from relief to starting, hasn’t exceeded more than seventy innings in any single season since 2019, while veterans Chris Sale (35) and Charlie Morton (40) have the dual concerns of age and previous injury history - Smith-Shawver will undoubtedly get an opportunity to not only pitch at the major league level, but potentially be one of the three or four arms that the Braves choose to give the ball to for a playoff start in October. 

And he intends to be ready.