A diminished version of Sandy Alcantara stands in the Braves’ way. Hopefully Elder’s performance doesn’t as well.
There was a point, during the fevered stretch run of the 2022 season, when the Braves saw what they believed was an opportunity: to possibly prevent their key starters from wearing down, Bryce Elder could take some starts against weaker offenses and buy everyone some breathing room. To that point, Elder’s up-and-down debut season had gone terribly (135 ERA-, 150 FIP-, 143 xFIP-), but the Braves’ gambit paid off in a sense: Elder’s remaining five starts, three of which came against the Marlins (and two against Washington) saw him bamboozle the light-hitting opposition to a 41/62/79 line.
A lot has happened since the tail end of that 2022 season, but where it comes down to at this point is that, on the heels of Chris Sale’s rib injury, the Braves need Bryce Elder to step up against the Marlins, again. The reasoning isn’t the same — this isn’t breathing room but a desperate attempt to claw back enough wins to rediscover relevance in the playoff race — but either way, it’s up to Elder to not falter, or else the Braves will have lost a series against the last-place Marlins, something they don’t have much room to do at this point.
The Elder situation is also more… complex than just a backend rotation guy doing backend starter things. In 11 starts so far this year, Elder has a 108/117/92 line — he’s basically been a man accursed by the bane of an elevated HR/FB. In May, Elder had three nice starts — 77/84/68 — but the Braves lost two of them and he temporarily lost his rotation spot. He came back in June, was meh against the Red Sox, and then seemingly out of nowhere, delivered a career game with a 12/0 K/BB mark against the Giants. The Braves lost both, anyway. You’d think that maybe that dominating outing would be something to build off of, or at least not deviate too far from, when Elder next faced the Rockies… but… nope. Instead, he had one of his worst outings ever against a pretty horribad team, managing just a 2/3 K/BB ratio and giving up a homer while only getting ten outs. (This one, though, the Braves won in blowout fashion. Go figure.)
So, where does that leave Elder now? I don’t think anyone knows. The Marlins aren’t the 2022 Marlins that he could be set loose on — they’re a much better offensive team than that. But the Braves need him to find something akin to what he’s done to Miami for much of his career anyway, because if he doesn’t, things will get problematic in a hurry.
Speaking of problematic: that’s probably how the Marlins would describe Sandy Alcantara’s 2025 so far in his return from Tommy John Surgery. Alcantara’s career saw him transition from a workhorse with poor peripherals to basically the platonic ideal of the starting pitcher of yesteryear: a dominant arm pitching 200-plus innings in 2021-2022. He took a bit of a step back in 2023 but was still a very good pitcher until, blam, elbow trouble time. Since his return, he’s had a rough go of it: 165/121/111, with the HR/FB and strand rate really kicking his comeback attempt in the proverbial nards. While he’s been much better lately (51/84/84 in three June starts), two of those outings came against the Pirates and Rockies, and the Phillies popped two homers off him. His issues have been more in the vein of “randomly horrible in a start” than “consistently poor,” so there’s a lot in play here: Elder’s effectiveness, Alcantara’s effectiveness, the Braves really only having like half a lineup, and so on and so forth.
The Braves could really use another series win, but this season hasn’t been about them getting what they want or could use. Stay tuned.
Game Info
Game Date/Time: Sunday, June 22, 1:40 p.m. EDT
Location: Stupid Capitalization Park, Miami, FL
TV: FanDuel Sports Network South / Southeast
Streaming: MLB.tv
Radio: 680 AM / 93.7 FM The Fan