Hurston Waldrep Gives Braves Solid Showing in First Rehab Start

Hurston Waldrep’s first rehab assignment is in the books. The Atlanta Braves right-hander took the mound down at the complex in North Port on Monday for the FCL team and got the job done.

He pitched two scoreless innings against the FCL Orioles, allowing two walks and no hits, while tallying zero strikeouts. He threw 26 pitches, of which 14 were strikes.

Another important note is that he's touching 97 mph on his four-seamer and his sinker.

Electric or dazzling wouldn’t be the right words for his day. However, he didn’t have to be at that level out of the gate. It's about evaluating his first start in the context of where he is during his recovery.

For positive notes, he got mostly quick outs, and hitters were swinging over pitchers for soft contact. Even when some hitters elevated the ball to put it in play, they weren't hitting it hard.

When it comes to evaluating what needs to be ironed out, there were certainly some pitches over the plate he got away with. Once he's pitching at a higher level of the minor leagues during his rehab assignment, that probably won't be the case.

The splitter, which was a notable pitch of his last season, was virtually absent. There could be an emphasis on working on some other complementary pitches first, and then we may see more of the splitter over time.

His breaking pitches, mainly his slider, were mostly out of the zone, and weren't spots where hitters would be inclined to reach for them. He had the command of a pitcher who is coming back from elbow surgery.

Those are the moments where it's important to keep in mind that Waldrep's rehab assignment will essentially be a spring training for him. He got hurt a few days into pitchers and catchers reporting. He's entirely at square one. There will be things to fine-tune beyond just getting stretched out.

Command is an obvious one. Fourteen strikes on 26 pitches is about 53%, with most of those strikes coming on his fastballs (four-seam, sinker, splitter, cutter). You'd like to see that get somewhere above 60%, and missing bats with the breaking stuff will be necessary to get there.

As long as there is progression over a larger sample size, there shouldn't be much to worry about.

Waldrep will ideally provide the Braves with another option in the rotation once he gets back. Last season, he emerged as an important arm to both stabilize the rotation and provide quality innings during the final two months of the season.

Entering last season, he was one of their top prospects. It took some time for him to get major league ready. Once he did, it was like a switch flipped.

General manager Alex Anthopoulos looked to a long stretch of games without breaks in the latter half of this month as a time when the Braves could need more innings. It was in the context of giving injury updates on starters, such as Waldrep.

That could mean that the ideal timeline is that he is ready within the next couple of weeks. If he pitches on regular rest, he could get about four rehab starts in by the latter half of June, so this lines up pretty well. However, we'll have to see. There is the ideal timeline and what actually happens.

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