Jesse Chavez is headed back to the Braves. Again. Atlanta announced this morning that the veteran right-hander has been signed to a minor league contract. He’ll head to big league camp for the final few days of spring training. Chavez spent the majority of spring training with the White Sox but was cut loose over the weekend. The Apex Baseball client will now head back to the Braves organization for what’ll be a fourth straight season (and a fifth overall).
Chavez, 40, has been excellent with the Braves in each of the past three seasons but struggled through shorter stints with the Angels and Cubs. Even accounting for rough showings in Anaheim and Chicago, however, he’s notched a tidy 2.81 earned run average in 137 2/3 innings over the past three seasons. Along the way, he’s fanned 26.2% of his opponents, issued walks at a strong 7.6% clip and kept the ball on the ground at a roughly average 42.3% clip (including a 51.7% mark last year). Metrics like FIP (2.97) and SIERA (3.33) generally agree that Chavez has been a highly effective reliever — one who’s often worked in multi-inning roles.
It was a rough spring for Chavez with the ChiSox. He tossed seven official innings and was tagged for ten runs (nine earned) on a dozen hits and two walks with eight strikeouts. That comes out to an 11.57 ERA, albeit in a tiny sample of work. Chavez also posted quality strikeout, walk and ground-ball rates (22.2%, 5.6%, 56%, respectively) and only allowed one homer while serving up a .458 BABIP, so take the spring ERA — as always — with a grain of salt.
The Atlanta bullpen is quite full at the moment, with only one reliever — left-hander Dylan Lee — who can even be optioned to Triple-A. The Braves are set to roll out a heavily veteran ’pen including Raisel Iglesias, A.J. Minter, Joe Jimenez, Pierce Johnson, Tyler Matzek and Aaron Bummer. Right-hander Jackson Stephens is out of minor league options and thus stands as a favorite to win the final bullpen spot.
That could ticket Chavez for early-season work in Triple-A Gwinnett, where he’d presumably be one of the first men up in the event of an injury. It’s at least possible he’ll overtake Stephens for that final bullpen spot, as Stephens has a limited big league track record and has walked seven hitters in 7 1/3 frames this spring.