NORTH PORT, Fla. — The lone member of the Braves starting rotation yet to make a Grapefruit League appearance is Spencer Strider.
That will change at 1 p.m. Saturday when Strider takes the ball against the Orioles in Sarasota.
Strider has been throwing bullpen sessions at CoolToday Park since he arrived at the Braves’ spring training facility earlier this month, but he has not pitched in a game. He indicated earlier this month that his February and March would be a slow build until the start of the regular season.
“That’s the goal of spring, to get the body used to pitching at higher volume and recovering and start seeing mechanical things,” Strider told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Thursday. “Are there changes that occur when you’re consistently at high effort in games? Monitoring that stuff.”
Strider missed virtually all of 2024 with an elbow injury. A hamstring injury sidetracked the 2025 season. But Strider and the Braves are more than hopeful the 27-year-old can return to the form that saw him win 31 games and strike out 483 hitters between the 2022 and ’23 seasons.
The injuries are squarely in Strider’s rearview mirror but maybe not altogether out of his consciousness as he paces himself over the next month.
“You gotta keep in perspective just how long of a season it is,” Strider said at the start of spring training. “You can’t be what you wanna be at the end of the season if you’re not in a position to grow leaving spring training.
“No outing in spring training — or day, or whatever — no throw is gonna make or break the season. I think you’ve gotta keep the slow build in mind, learn from what things took more work in previous years, spend some more time on those and just keep track on the benchmarks of success throughout the season and where those are at. Don’t let anything get too off the tracks.”
When Strider does make his debut, the speed and location of his fastball will be of keen interest. The right-hander threw that pitch at a scorching 97.6 mph on average during the 2022-23 seasons. The average velocity on that fastball dipped to 95.5 mph over 23 starts in 2025.
On Saturday, it shouldn’t be expected that No. 99 comes out throwing fireballs. Those will come next month.
“I don’t expect to hit my record velocity in spring. I hope I don’t,” he said Thursday. “But that’s part of spring is getting, like I said, those high-intensity reps. You certainly wanna peak in the season and, I would argue, the second half of the season.
“With that in mind, finding a healthy balance between accommodating the increased volume you’re experiencing in the spring and then kind of monitoring, with the intensity in mind, how the mechanics are and finding ways to practice stuff given that you’re increasing your volume and fatiguing for the first in a while since last season.”
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