After last night’s victory, the Braves are shuffling their bench once again. Or, maybe, their not-quite-bench:
This will be Jim Jarvis’ second stint in Atlanta. The 25-year-old infielder made his MLB debut on the Braves’ West Coast trip to Seattle and Los Angeles earlier this season, where he made two starts and collected a single to go with two strikeouts in five PAs. Jarvis has a pretty silly 133 wRC+ at Triple-A Gwinnett this year, but if you put any stock in minor league xStats (not sure if I do or not, truly), he’s way outhitting his xwOBA down there.
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It’s unclear whether Jarvis will simply hang around for left-handed depth, or whether things will get more complicated. Ha-Seong Kim is pacing himself for a historically awful season, though he’ll probably improve or just flat-out stop getting playing time if it keeps up. Jorge Mateo was a fun story earlier, but has cratered while trying to play through a mild injury over the last few weeks. Mauricio Dubon, the only Brave to have an unequivocally good June offensively, would be a solution, except that he’s been needed to patch up the Braves’ outfield issues. And then there’s Austin Riley, who appears to be auditioning for a role in a local stage production of Frozen 2 (if you know, you know) moreso than effectively hitting baseballs, so there’s another infield question mark that perhaps Jarvis will be called upon to address in some way.
The roster casualty of Jarvis’ promotion is Rowdy Tellez, who ends this round of his Braves tenure with 11 PAs in which he singled, homered, and walked in 11 PAs. He actually put up a .500+ xwOBA in those 11 PAs, so hard to say he didn’t do his job, but the Braves don’t need two no-field DH guys who probably won’t hit better than league average on the roster.
Jarvis will presumably be around and in uniform as the Braves play a rubber game against the Redbirds later tonight. Will he grab a start somewhere? Stay tuned.
