Robert Suarez arrived in Atlanta last winter as the other half of a late-inning plan. On Sunday night, after nearly three months away from the mound, he looked like the answer to a far more urgent October question.
| Reliever | Situation | Line | Key result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Robert Suarez | NLDS Game 2, fifth inning | 1 inning, 0 runs | Retired Dodgers’ 3-4-5 hitters with two aboard and none out |
| Didier Fuentes | After Suarez | 3 2/3 scoreless innings | Carried Atlanta through the middle and late innings |
| Raisel Iglesias | Final out | Save situation | Closed the door for Atlanta |
The Braves held a one-run lead in the bottom of the fifth when manager Walt Weiss went to Suarez against Will Smith, Freddie Freeman and Teoscar Hernández. It was a severe assignment for a pitcher whose postseason readiness had remained uncertain until recently.
Suarez opened with a 100.1 mph fastball that Smith lifted for an out. Freeman, who had gone deep an inning earlier, then flew out on a changeup. Suarez finished the escape by striking out Hernández on a 101.4 mph heater.
That final fastball was Suarez’s hardest pitch of the season and the quickest thrown by a Braves pitcher in more than four years. Spencer Strider’s 102.4 mph offering on July 2, 2022, was the last Atlanta pitch to register higher.
A winter bullpen plan interrupted
Atlanta had signed Suarez for three years and $45 million shortly after Edwin Díaz landed a three-year, $69 million agreement with the Dodgers last December. The club already had Iglesias under contract on a one-year deal, but the intention was clear: pair Suarez and Iglesias in the back end and give opponents very little room in the late innings.
For a while, the plan was on schedule. Suarez owned a 0.56 ERA over his first 31 appearances. On June 19 against Milwaukee, he worked 1 1/3 scoreless innings after Atlanta scratched out a lead against Cy Young contender Jacob Misiorowski, handing the ball to Iglesias for the save.
Then came the issue that changed his season. Suarez felt discomfort in his right arm after that game and was shut down without a clear schedule for a return.
He did not pitch again until Game 158, when he allowed one run in an inning against Cincinnati. Three days later, he gave up another run over one inning versus Miami. Including a Minor League rehab outing, Sunday marked only his fifth appearance across 107 days.
“We did not really know what we would have,” Weiss said, noting Suarez’s talent and history but also the difficulty of missing three months and then entering October after only two regular-season innings. Still, the manager said the potential reward was too great to leave Suarez off the postseason roster.
Velocity and conviction
Suarez had previously gotten two outs in the sixth inning of the winner-take-all Wild Card Series Game 3 against Philadelphia, though Atlanta held a five-run advantage when he entered. The Dodgers presented a different kind of examination.
“I’m glad I could get a clean inning there and help the club,” Suarez said through interpreter Franco García.
Weiss saw a familiar version of his veteran right-hander, saying Suarez was back to looking like his old self and throwing with exceptional force. He called the fifth-inning escape a possible turning point in the game.
Chris Sale, scheduled to start Game 3, went even further. Sale said Suarez’s stuff appeared sharper than it had during the season’s opening months, praising a changeup that resembled a splitter, a cutter with the quality of many pitchers’ fastballs, and added life on the heater.
Suarez was not required to cover the workload Atlanta envisioned when it signed him. Fuentes instead handled 3 2/3 outstanding innings before Iglesias recorded the final out. But the Braves now have the deeper bullpen shape they hoped to build, even if it took a far different route to get there.
Weiss said the relief corps has changed personnel throughout the season but continued to deliver, adding that the group may be at its strongest point now that Suarez is back. Atlanta will take that confidence into Tuesday’s NLDS Game 3 against the Dodgers, scheduled for 6 p.m. ET.
