The Braves are at a point where the roster decisions around the pitching staff are getting harder to ignore, and Danny Young is right in the middle of that conversation. This season, Young has an ERA over 8, a FIP over 7, and an xFIP over 6.
He has had stretches in his 5 season, 73.0 inning major league career where he has looked like a usable big league reliever, and his career numbers still reflect that he has been acceptable at times. But in 2026, he has not given the Braves a strong enough case to stay on the roster.
At the same time, the Braves are reportedly thinking through how to get AJ Smith-Shawver onto the roster. One proposed path is straightforward: move on from Young, use a stopgap arm for a few days, and then insert AJ Smith-Shawver into the rotation in place of Grant Holmes.
That would also create another possible benefit for Atlanta’s pitching mix. Holmes has handled the job of a back-end rotation starter well enough, but he could provide the most value to the Braves for the rest of the season out of the bullpen. He can be a good arm there, and the suggestion is that his impact would be stronger in relief than in the rotation.
Around the league, the Cardinals called up top prospect Joshua Baez, and he made the most of his first day in the majors. Baez homered in each of his first THREE MLB plate appearances on Saturday.
In Other News...
Braves Prospect Shakeup Puts A New Future Core In Focus
The Braves updated Top 30 prospect list offers a fresh snapshot of where the system stands after a busy stretch, and the changes are already starting to reshape the conversation around the organizations next wave. Eric Hartman now sits at the top after a strong run that earned him a promotion to Double-A, a notable marker for a player who has moved quickly enough to force his way into the clubs long-term thinking.
Atlanta also has seven players from the 2026 MLB Draft showing up on the list, a reminder that the front office is trying to build depth on multiple timelines at once. The rankings did not stay static, either, with Garrett Baumann sliding after performance issues, which underscores how fluid these evaluations can be as the season unfolds and the Braves sort out which young players are truly pushing toward the future core. [Read more 🡒]
Chris Sale Is Giving The Braves A Real Cy Young Buzz
Chris Sale kept adding to a season that has already started to look like something more than a rebound. Against the D-backs, he worked six innings and allowed one run, another sharp outing that dropped his ERA to 2.16 and kept him sitting near the top of the leagues earned-run leaderboard. He also struck out nine, pushing his season total to 160, and the broader historical company he is keeping is the kind that gets noticed in any Cy Young conversation.
For the Braves, the appeal goes beyond one strong start. Sale is doing it at an age when very few pitchers sustain this level for long, much less in the Live Ball Era company he has joined through his first 22 starts. The question now is less about whether he belongs in the discussion than how far this run can carry if he keeps pairing strikeouts with the kind of run prevention he showed again in Arizona. [Read more 🡒]
Braves Fans Have A New Pitching Turnaround To Watch In Columbus
Columbus has been getting a better look lately at the kind of pitching performance that can change a night, and Garrett Baumann was at the center of it in the latest round of minor league action. Across the Braves system, the Gwinnett Stripers, Columbus Clingstones and Rome Emperors all had games that featured a mix of power at the plate and starter-driven tempo on the mound, with Columbus especially giving local fans something to track beyond the box score.
The Clingstones backed that up with enough offense to keep the pressure on, and Jordan Groshans was a big part of the result with a homer and three RBIs. It was the sort of game that can make a club feel like it is finding some balance, even as the report also noted other standout moments around the affiliates, including Maverick Handleys first Triple-A home run for Gwinnett and a complete-game effort that stood out on the pitching side. [Read more 🡒]