Hurston Waldrep Opens Up on His Return From Surgery

Hurston Waldrep waited three months to make his first start of the season, and it took just four batters for Jordan Walker to make him pay with a three-run homer in the first inning at Truist Park on Thursday.

The Braves right-hander was working back from February elbow surgery, and the blast put Atlanta in an early hole against the Cardinals.

For a pitcher who had not thrown more than 71 pitches in any rehab outing, it looked like a shaky welcome back to the majors.

Waldrep got through the rest of that 20-pitch first inning without more damage, then retired 12 of the final 14 batters he faced before exiting after a one-out walk in the sixth.

He finished with three runs allowed on five hits and a walk over 5⅓ innings, striking out four on 76 pitches, enough for manager Walt Weiss to like what he saw.

His splitter is the pitch that made him a first-round pick out of Florida, but it was not sharp Thursday, and he threw it just 10 times in 76 pitches, a steep drop from the 32 percent he used a year ago.

Instead of forcing it, he leaned on his sinker for quick outs on the ground.

"When the splitter is not working, like we saw tonight, it's like, if we're getting ahead, we don't have to rely on the splitter because we're going to get an early ground ball [with the sinker]," Waldrep said.

A pitcher with only one plan when his best pitch goes missing tends to get hurt, and Waldrep instead shortened at bats and kept the Braves in front with his signature pitch mostly unused the rest of the night.

The Braves needed a night like this, since the club has spent weeks piecing together a rotation behind Chris Sale, and Waldrep gives it a real option again after taking the spot of a struggling Bryce Elder.

Spencer Strider is still working back from elbow inflammation with no firm return date before the All-Star break, and Spencer Schwellenbach has not started a rehab assignment, so the Braves have leaned on their pitching depth chart, especially Grant Holmes and Reynaldo López, who moved from the bullpen into the rotation to help out.

The bullpen unraveled in the seventh and turned a 5-3 lead into an 11-5 loss, but that was not on Waldrep, who had already left the mound with the Braves still ahead.

Atlanta fell to 50-35, though it still leads the National League East by two and a half games over Philadelphia entering a four-game series with the Mets.

With the trade deadline a month away, a healthy Waldrep gives the Braves a power arm they already own instead of one they would have to find, and his 2.88 ERA over nine starts last season shows what he looked like before the elbow injury.