An unlikely player leads a slow resurgence of the Braves bullpen

The season is officially up and rolling and we’re starting to get an idea of what to expect from this team. The bullpen is still the weakest link, but it seems like they’re beginning to solve this problem. Late last month, Alex Anthopolous noted that he heard the chants from Braves fans after yet another game that the bullpen literally threw away. He promised that he’d do something about it.

While it would have been an incredibly pleasant surprise to see the team go out and sign Craig Kimbrel, I think you and I both know that the Braves probably won’t even seriously attempt to bring him in until after the draft so that they won’t have to give up a compensatory draft pick. Even after that de-facto deadline passes, they probably wouldn’t be willing to shell out the cash to pay what it would require to bring Kimbrel in. It would be great, but I can’t see it happening.

So while Anthopolous likely won’t make a huge splash, he has been doing a fair share of tinkering with the bullpen. Shane Carle and Wes Parsons are down the interstate in Gwinnett. Jonny Venters, Chad Sobotka and Jesse Biddle just suddenly came down with injuries at the nadir of their most recent stint in the bigs. No matter how they made their exit, the point is that these are all guys who struggled mightily and are not pitching for the Braves at the moment.

In their place, we’ve seen guys like Grant Dayton, Jacob Webb, and Josh Tomlin become bullpen mainstays. Touki Toussaint has become the designated “emergency starter” and has flourished in that role as he prepares to eventually become part of the rotation at some point in the future. The Braves even made a signing! Sure, it was just Jerry Blevins, but it was better than nobody. The bullpen is actually starting to approach being trustworthy, and that’s a long way from where they started the season.

The biggest surprise in this mini-transformation that the bullpen has undergone has to be that even throughout the initial turmoil and struggles, one thing has remained constant — Luke Jackson has gotten it together.

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This is a bit of a stunning development, since I’m sure nobody really saw this coming. Last season, he seemed to fit right in with the rest of the relievers who were struggling and his performance during spring training didn’t offer much hope, either. That’s why it wasn’t a shock to see him get bombed by the Phillies. On that day, he gave up two hits, two walks, and he also committed an error that eventually led to him giving up the grand slam that broke Atlanta’s back.

It’s almost as if that grand slam from Rhys Hoskins set something off for him. As of right now, that appearance on Opening Day was the last time that we saw “The Old” Luke Jackson. Ever since then, he’s put up a 32.8 percent strikeout rate, a nice 6.9 percent walk rate and has a FIP of 1.41 and an ERA of 0.00 over 14 innings. His perfect ERA has been a point of discussion among Braves media for a while now, but it’s still impressive to see him put up those numbers — even if it’s only been 14 innings.

The book on Luke Jackson going back to his days as a prospect was that he had a big arm and could put the ball past a lot of bats. The only issue is that he needed to figure out how to command his pitches. Sure enough, he’s continued a trend from the late stages of 2018 where his slider has become his go-to pitch. Jackson using the slider more often has brought him some success up to this point and as a result, he’s become the most reliable pitcher in the bullpen at the moment.

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Now, this isn’t to say that the Braves should just wipe their hands and act like “Well, that’s that,” when it comes to the bullpen. Yes, it great to see that Luke Jackson is finally on the right track. It’s also nice to see that the bullpen is no longer a raging tire fire like they were for most of April. Still, they could do with a bit more improvement from the guys who are already here and there’s still a very, very slight chance that the powers that be could open up their wallet for Craig Kimbrel — especially since Kimbrel may be lowering his asking price as the season progresses.

With that being said, things are definitely on the right track for the bullpen. When it comes to any team, you’re only as strong as your weakest link and it appears Atlanta’s Achilles heel may finally be on the road to recovery. It’ll be a long and slow road at this rate, but any improvement is welcome after what they went through in April.