I have a toddler, and toddlers … are messy. They are the smallest living beings in the house, but they make, by far, the most mess. They’re at the perfect intersection of being able to do things for themselves, but they are also not good enough at any of them to be fully trusted. They knock things over. They spill things on the floor and themselves. It’s incredible.

Mark, seriously, where is this going?

Oh yeah, I need to go sweep.

And the Atlanta Braves need to avoid being swept.

AJ Smith-Shawver gets the unenviable task of stopping the season-opening three-game slide, and the Braves have been bad. They’re currently in the bottom 10 (22nd) in runs and the bottom 10 in ERA (21st), and the bullpen has been the 7th worst in baseball so far. And the eye test hasn’t been much better as they haven’t really seemed to threaten the Padres much, even though the Braves are back to being 2nd in average exit velocity with nothing to show for it.

Back to AJSS, he’ll get his seventh major-league start after a solid spring where he had a 20:5 K:BB ratio and a sub 4 (though just slightly) ERA over 16 innings. His last two seasons have been a bit up-and-down. He misses plenty of bats, but he also walks too many people. And while he’s been in the majors and on the doorstep of a full-time rotation spot, he’s never quite been able to put enough together to really solidify his hold. He’s in danger of being passed up by some other pitching prospects (and has already been by Spencer Schwellenbach), but a good spring will give him his shot in 2025.

AJ brings a fastball that sits around 96, and he adds a change-up and a curveball. The changeup is really the second pitch in his arsenal, and that’s the one he’ll go with to get a strikeout. He’s still playing around with the breaking pitch to give him a solid third weapon. The arm strength and the fact that he is … *checks notes* … 22 years old all season mean that he’s still considered an important piece of the Braves’ future. Development isn’t linear, but the Braves need him to start being a quality major-league starter.

Opposing him is Nick Pivetta, who the Braves aren’t wholly unfamiliar with as he pitched for the Phillies from 2017-2020. For the last 4+ seasons, he’s been in Boston producing league-average results. He pitched well enough that Boston gave him a qualifying offer, but it was also good enough that he had to wait until Spring Training to find a team to offer a contract and accept the loss of draft picks.

He pitches very differently from AJSS as he sits at a very league-average 94 mph and adds in a bevy of secondaries, including a sweeper, slider, curve, cutter, and a change. He leans heavier on the sweeper and curve, but he has a robust set of pitches. Pivetta misses bats and does a decent job of limiting walks, and the Padres are hoping Petco limits the home run issues that occasionally arise from his flyball-heavy ways.

The Braves could use a few of those home runs as they look to get away on Getaway Day with a victory.

Game Info

Game Date/Time: Sunday, March 30, 2025 at 7:10 PM EST

Location: Petco Park in San Diego, CA

TV: ESPN

Radio: 680 AM / 93.7 FM The Fan