ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) – A week ago, Dominic Smith didn’t know if he had made the Atlanta Braves opening day roster.
On Saturday, he was a hero.
After the Braves rallied in the ninth inning to tie Saturday’s game against the Kansas City Royals, Smith delivered a walk-off grand slam off right-hander Carlos Estevez, giving the team a 6-2 victory and a 2-0 start to the season.
After the game, Smith shared that his mother had passed away from cancer just two weeks earlier. The fan who caught his home run ball returned it, and Ronald Acuña Jr. signed a baseball for the fan in exchange for the keepsake.
Smith’s home run traveled 386 feet, sending the Truist Park crowd into a frenzy. The excitement came after a lackluster showing from the Braves’ bats for most of the game — up until the ninth inning, when they capitalized on Reynaldo López’s stellar season debut.
It was quite the return for López, who allowed just one run — a solo home run by Salvador Perez in the seventh inning — over six innings, after making only one start in 2025 before missing the rest of the season due to a shoulder injury.
López averaged 94.4 mph and topped 97.1 mph on his four-seam fastball, a rise in velocity after what seemed like a mechanical error in his last start of spring training.
Now two games into Walt Weiss’s tenure, the Braves are showing early signs of life. They trailed 2–0 entering the ninth, but RBI singles from Yastrzemski and Harris tied the game before Smith delivered the walk-off homer.
Up next
The Braves face the Royals on Sunday to cap the three-game series before hosting the Athletics for a three-game set starting Monday.
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