{"id":805738,"date":"2026-09-15T15:48:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T15:48:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/805738\/"},"modified":"2026-09-15T15:48:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T15:48:22","slug":"braves-place-reynaldo-lopez-on-injured-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/805738\/","title":{"rendered":"Braves Place Reynaldo L\u00f3pez On Injured List"},"content":{"rendered":"

September 15: L\u00f3pez has indeed been placed on the injured list. Ritchie was recalled in the corresponding move. Atlanta also announced that reliever\u00a0Joe Jim\u00e9nez<\/a> is reporting to Gwinnett for a rehab assignment \u2014 his first official game action since the 2024 postseason. It\u2019s still a long shot that Jim\u00e9nez will pitch his way into consideration for the playoff roster.<\/p>\n

September 14: The Braves are considering placing\u00a0Reynaldo L\u00f3pez<\/a> on the 15-day injured list due to shoulder discomfort, manager Walt Weiss told reporters (including Jes\u00fas Cano of The Athletic<\/a>). The skipper added that righty\u00a0JR Ritchie<\/a> will be recalled from Triple-A Gwinnett on Wednesday to start the series finale at Wrigley Field.\u00a0Mart\u00edn P\u00e9rez<\/a> is scheduled to start tomorrow opposite\u00a0Kevin Gausman<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the latest shuffle in Atlanta\u2019s rotation, which has been in flux all year.\u00a0Chris Sale<\/a> and Grant Holmes<\/a> have been the only constants. P\u00e9rez has been a steady hand since drawing into the rotation for good in early May, while\u00a0Tyler Mahle<\/a> has had an excellent seven-start run since being acquired at the deadline. That briefly looked like it\u2019d provide some stability until\u00a0Bryce Elder<\/a> underwent surgery<\/a> to remove bone fragments from his right knee last week.<\/p>\n

L\u00f3pez missed all of August with a left knee issue. He returned to the rotation last Wednesday. The Rays knocked him around for six runs across 4 2\/3 innings in that start. He didn\u2019t fare any better tonight, surrendering five runs across three innings to take the loss to the Cubs.\u00a0AJ Smith-Shawver<\/a>, who\u2019d started his first five MLB outings this season, pitched five innings of mop-up relief to finish the game.<\/p>\n

Tonight\u2019s ugly outing pushed L\u00f3pez\u2019s earned run average to 4.54 on the season. He was limited to one start last year before undergoing shoulder surgery. L\u00f3pez\u2019s stuff was way down in Spring Training, and while it picked up in April, the Braves moved him to the bullpen by the end of that month. He has seemingly worn down a bit as the season has progressed. He averaged 92 mph on his fastball in his final start of July before going on the IL for the knee injury. That was back up to 93.5 mph last week and mostly in the 92-93 range tonight. The heater had sat close to 96 mph during L\u00f3pez\u2019s career-best 2024 campaign.<\/p>\n

An injured list stint would end L\u00f3pez\u2019s regular season and rule him out for the Wild Card Series, which begins on September 29. Atlanta still holds a fairly comfortable 4.5 game lead on the Phillies for the division lead, but they\u2019re now 3.5 games behind the Dodgers for the #2 seed. It looks increasingly likely that they\u2019ll finish as the #3 seed and host the NL\u2019s final playoff team in the Wild Card Series.<\/p>\n

L\u00f3pez wasn\u2019t likely to pitch in that series regardless. Unless they have a chance to secure the first-round bye in the final weekend of the regular season, they\u2019re likely to hold Sale back to start Game 1 of the Wild Card Series. Mahle seems the obvious choice for Game 2, which would probably leave Holmes as a Game 3 starter if necessary.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ll have a quick hook in any games not started by Sale, but the bullpen also feels shakier than it did early in the season. Robert Suarez<\/a> hasn\u2019t pitched in a game since late June. He\u2019s throwing bullpen sessions and will hopefully be ready for the postseason, yet it\u2019s fair to expect some rust. Dylan Lee<\/a> has an excellent track record but hasn\u2019t pitched well for the better part of two months. 21-year-old\u00a0Didier Fuentes<\/a>, an electric rookie who\u2019ll be pitching in the postseason for the first time, may be their most reliable bridge to Raisel Iglesias<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ritchie, Smith-Shawver and Owen Murphy<\/a> are candidates to take the final couple turns through the fifth spot in the rotation. Atlanta could also reselect<\/a>\u00a0Elieser Hern\u00e1ndez<\/a>, whom they brought back on a minor league deal. The Braves finish the regular season with series against the Astros, Reds, and Marlins.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 15: L\u00f3pez has indeed been placed on the injured list. Ritchie was recalled in the corresponding move.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":805739,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1266,5,10367,28293,4,5171],"class_list":["post-805738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-aj-smith-shawver","tag-baseball","tag-joe-jimenez","tag-jr-ritchie","tag-mlb","tag-reynaldo-lopez"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/117275846501348586","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=805738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/805738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/805739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=805738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=805738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=805738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}