The North Port Report: Spencer Strider Feels Good About His First Appearance of Spring

Here's everything you need to know from Braves Spring Training in North Port, FL from Saturday

Welcome to The North Port Report, your nightly notebook from Braves spring training. Each evening, we’ll run through the biggest developments from camp: roster battles, injury updates, standout performances, and the small details that matter more than they seem in February. The games may not count yet, but the information does.

Here’s what stood out today

Making his spring training debut, Spencer Strider pitched two innings in Sarasota with one run allowed on two hits, striking out two. Despite averaging 93.1 with his four-seam fastball, he put up over 17 inches of induced vertical break and was okay with his results as he starts his ramp-up here in spring.

“Goal was to try and be in the zone. I felt like everything was coming out of my hand right, the slider was really good, curveball’s good - I got a strikeout with the curveball, laid one in for a strike, changeups out of the hand were good. That was really the goal for the day – try to narrow it in, kind of set the bar in the zone.”

Strider reinforced what he told the AJC’s Chad Bishop on Thursday: That he’s taking his time with his ramp-up, but the fastball shape and everything else is just as important as his velocity. “It’s (the IVB) been a lot better. […] If that’s eighty or ninety percent, then I think I can (still) get some outs there.”

The contact was hard - of the six batted balls against Strider, three were officially hard-hit balls - but he still got whiffs and was able to land everything for strikes, so I’m not as concerned as some others. Being at one inch more induced vertical break than he was last year at this velocity lends itself well towards Strider being back to 2023 numbers at full strength, which I imagine we’ll see by the end of spring.

Outside of Strider, Martin Pérez and José Suarez both pitched two innings today, with Pérez allowing one run on a solo shot to Adley Rutschman and Suarez getting out of his two innings clean, albeit with no strikeouts.

On the offensive side, Kyle Farmer had a pair of hits, both Brett Wisely and Luke Waddell had doubles, and Chadwick Tromp drove in three. Three Braves hit homers consecutively in the 8th: John Gil, Cal Conley, and Tromp.

Quick Hits

• Reynaldo López and Grant Holmes will pitch on Sunday versus the Rays at home. No word on the starting pitcher for the split-squad matchup against the Twins.

• Elaborating on a point from yesterday, Friend of the Newsletter Ken Sugiura of the AJC has confirmed some new and tweaked pitches among the back of Atlanta’s rotation. Joey Wentz has added both a two-seamer and a changeup, while Grant Holmes has been working to both improve his four-seam fastball and get more confident in the kick-change he added last winter.

• For being one of the team’s top shortstop prospects, the Braves are seemingly averse to playing John Gil at shortstop. He got into the game at third base today and has rarely had a chance to man his natural position in Grapefruit League play. It’s my hope that he’s one of the two starting shortstops for tomorrow’s split-squad matchup, but I’m guessing Mauricio Dubón gets one lineup and Jorge Mateo gets the other.

Roster Battle Tracker

Stock UP

Luke Waddell. I’ve criticized the lack of impact from the prospect, who has mostly fallen far down prospect lists for the Braves, but he had some quality contact on Saturday against some of Baltimore’s major league pitchers. His ceiling is still probably a light-hitting utilityman, but his being in the starting lineup means he might be closer than I expected.

Stock DOWN

I know it’s still spring and the ramp-up period looks different for everyone, but I’m still waiting to be impressed by Martin Pérez. He averaged 87 on his fastball today and went changeup-heavy to Baltimore’s lineup, and I know that changeup-dominant starters are a weakness of mine, so maybe it’d work out for a spot start? Not convinced just yet, despite what the FanGraphs projections say.

Observation of the Day

Despite my concerns with Pérez, the Braves held a mostly major league lineup of Baltimore’s to two runs on three hits on the day while walking only one. Adley Rutschman had two of the hits, including a solo shot, while Ryan Mountcastle had the other. There have been very few times this spring when I’ve felt like the Braves’ pitching was overmatched in a game, and today was no exception.

(I know the Braves gave up a walk and two homers in the 9th, but the final innings of a road game in spring training are like Sunday afternoon in a non-conference college baseball matchup: something that barely resembles actual baseball.)

Tomorrow’s watch list

The only split-squad matchup of the spring training schedule means we should have an opportunity to see several backups get extended run in a lineup, as well as several prospects get playing time.