The Braves announced Wednesday morning that they’ve recalled right-hander Didier Fuentes from Triple-A Gwinnett. Fellow righty Ian Hamilton was designated for assignment to open a spot on the active roster. Fuentes will start tonight’s game against the Nationals.
Hamilton’s contract was just selected to the big league roster last week. He made only one appearance with Atlanta and was tagged for three runs in an inning of work. He’ll now be traded or placed on waivers within the next five days.
With his latest appearance, the 30-year-old Hamilton has now pitched 151 1/3 major league innings between the White Sox, Twins, Yankees and Braves. He’s worked to a solid 3.75 ERA overall, although a terrific 2023 season (2.64 ERA, 58 innings) disproportionately affects that career-long mark; Hamilton had a 4.91 ERA in 14 2/3 innings prior to that season and has a 4.35 earned run average in 78 2/3 frames since.
Hamilton has fanned just over one quarter of his major league opponents (25.4%) but also carries a bloated 11.3% walk rate that’s nearly three percentage points north of the league average. He’s shown above-average grounder tendencies (45.9%) and has done a nice job of avoiding homers and hard contact in general. The right-hander sat 96 mph with his heater for the 2024-25 Yankees but averaged 94.4 mph in his lone Braves appearance. His sinker velocity dipped similarly. Hamilton’s primary breaking pitch is a slider that he’s typically thrown at a near 50% clip.
Fuentes, 10 years younger than Hamilton, won’t turn 21 until mid-June. Despite that youth, he’s auditioning for a role in the Atlanta rotation. The right-hander struggled in a four-start cup of coffee last summer but had a big spring showing and has been excellent in Gwinnett thus far. Through his first 16 2/3 frames, Fuentes sports a tidy 2.16 ERA with a 31.7% strikeout rate and a 9.5% walk rate. He made one long relief appearance with the Braves early this season before being sent down and shined there as well, holding the Royals to a run on two hits and a walk with four punchouts in four innings.
Atlanta’s pitching injuries have been chronicled at length. Spencer Schwellenbach and Hurston Waldrep had surgery to remove loose bodies from their elbows before the season started. Joey Wentz tore his ACL during spring training. Spencer Strider opened the season on the injured list due to an oblique strain and has yet to return.
The Braves have been left with a group of Chris Sale, Reynaldo López, Grant Holmes, Bryce Elder and Martín Pérez to shoulder the rotation load thus far. To call Elder (1.50 ERA in 30 innings) and Pérez (2.21 ERA, 20 1/3 innings) “pleasant surprises” thus far would be an understatement. Pérez has pitched like a fifth starter when healthy for the bulk of the past five seasons. Elder was one of the least-effective pitchers in baseball in 2024-25.
It’s not reasonable to expect either Elder or Pérez to sustain this level of production, but there’s no taking away what’s already in the books; these impeccably timed hot streaks have helped the Braves weather a storm of early injuries that threatened to dig them in a massive hole for a second straight season. Instead, Atlanta has an NL-best 2.98 ERA from the rotation and sits at 16-8 with a five-game cushion in a disappointing NL East division. With Strider on a minor league rehab assignment, Fuentes now in the majors, top prospect JR Ritchie performing well and injured arms like Schwellenbach, Waldrep and AJ Smith-Shawver (Tommy John surgery last year) all progressing through their rehab windows, Atlanta could be on the cusp of escaping those early health setbacks with an improbable division lead, which would set the Braves up incredibly well for the remainder of the season.
