The Braves recently signed left-hander Nick Margevicius to a minor league contract, as noted by Chris Hilburn-Trenkle of Baseball America. He’s been assigned to the club’s Florida complex, per the transactions tracker at MLB.com.
That’ll presumably be a temporary stop for Margevicius to build into game shape before eventually reporting to Triple-A Gwinnett. From there, he’ll look to work his way back to the majors for the first time in two years. Margevicius pitched at the big league level between 2019-21, suiting up with the Padres and Mariners. The former 7th round draftee has started 22 of 32 big league outings, posting a 6.12 ERA over 110 1/3 innings.
Margevicius doesn’t throw hard. His fastball generally sits a little below 90 MPH. He’s shown excellent control in his minor league career, walking a mere 4.4% of opposing hitters. His 8.1% walk rate at the major league level is closer to average, but the lack of free passes has helped him manage a decent 4.04 ERA across 301 minor league innings.
Much of that success came earlier in his career. Margevicius was diagnosed with thoracic outlet syndrome in May 2021, ending his season after just 12 appearances. He lost his spot on Seattle’s 40-man roster last May and went unclaimed on waivers. Sent outright to Triple-A Tacoma, he struggled to a 7.53 ERA across 49 innings. His 20.3% strikeout rate and 7.6% walk percentage weren’t too far from average but a massive .422 batting average on balls in play against him led to plenty of runs crossing the plate.
Seattle released the Rider product early in Spring Training. After a few weeks on the open market, he joins the third organization of his professional career. He’ll add some rotation and/or long relief depth to the upper levels of the Atlanta system once he’s built into game shape.
I thought the Padres brought him up a little too early. Good to see him land with a club. Hope to see him in the bigs again.
Kennedy to miss the year and Wright a question mark at best. Injuries all over the Diamond
Aaron Nola looking a lot like 2021 Nola and Wheeler falling back into bad habits. Suarez out. Painter out.
Lol Mets? Ok. I will place a bet. Scherzer and Verlander have better ERAs than Nola and Wright at year end. Serious inquiries only.
Grow up kiddos. Every team has injuries. Expecting Nola and Wheeler to magically regain prior form is no better than “relying on old guys” like Max And Verlander to perform like the back of their respective baseball cards. Both are way better than either and to think Strider or Morton will match them is silly. Phil’s can hit but can’t field or pitch. Braves can do everything ok but a bad hitting streak away from .500. Mets are old. Anyone that can’t see that 162 games matter is out of touch and the new stupid play everyone schedule will just set us all up for disappointment in October. Only one gets to win. So far, I would guess it won’t be from the NL East fellas
My drinking and posting doesn’t change that Ian “Anderson” – not Kennedy – changed nothing about my point
Drinking is the only way to explain that drivel.
No, not even drinking is an excuse for whatever it is.
The fact that he’s making a comparison with Strider/Morton v Max & Verlander tells me everything I need to know.
I hope Margevicius is vicious.
His name is great, it sounds like someone from the Roman Army or a name like Maximus Decimus Meridius or Marcus Aurelius.
While his name sounds great, I’m not all that thrilled after reading his scouting report.
Either way, the Braves are going to need some help in the pen at some point down the line.
Luetge isn’t fooling anyone, Yates just doesn’t seem to have nearly the same command he used to, Jimenez is hit or miss, and they’re desperately currently missing Matzek, McHugh, and Iglesias.
Matzek is out for the year, Chavez is reliable yet old and could turn back into a pumpkin at any point, Tonkin looks good but who knows if he can keep it up, AJ Minter looses control once every four or five appearances, but so far, thankfully, Nick Anderson and Dylan Lee at least continue to both look pretty dang good.
Maybe Vodnik and Muñoz from the farm might be able to provide them with some relief but who knows. Looks like AA is going to have to hit the market sooner or later to help fill in a couple spots back there.
When healthy, with McHugh and Iglesias back, those two alongside Lee, Chavez, Minter, Anderson, Tonkin, and Jimenez don’t make me nearly as worried about their pen, but they’re just another one or two injuries away from their bullpen being a real issue. Then again, I guess that most teams would fall under that category, so the Braves should be okay..
Also, I am stoked that Soroka is looking good, hopefully on his way back, and had another excellent start in AAA. That could be a HUGE pickup for the Braves, as when he’s on, he’s a more than capable top of the rotation pitcher. Even still though, with all his injuries recently, you’d be hard pressed to truly think the Braves could rely on him for the entire season as a starter.
Misnomer.
If his fastball sits below 90mph, then he needs to hie it to the county courthouse and change that surname to Margevictim.
@RichardC
When McHugh & Iglesias are back, that pen looks good. The way Tonkin and Anderson are throwing it, as long as they stay healthy it’s a good pen. Kirby Yates is starting to look a bit better. Jimenez has had one bad appearance. Luetge did a hell of a job today.
Well, they definitely made me feel a bit better after today, especially Yates…
I still don’t know about Luetge, he just gives me that, “here we go again” feeling everytime he comes in and someone almost immediately gets on base…lol
I do find it MIGHTY interesting that after only one start in AA this season, which wasn’t even a good one, that the Braves chose to promote Roddery Munoz to AAA.
The timing of it all really makes me think they are trying to ultimately add Munoz to the bullpen at some point. Not to mention, he came out of the pen in his first AAA appearance, and he did quite well.
Munoz has some tantalizing stuff, and with his stellar two-pitch mix I think he could ultimately flourish in a set-up role.
If he’s indeed been permanently moved to the bullpen, now Munoz can just attack and go after batters without having to worry about facing batters a second time, nor having to worry about trying to extend himself, and he can just use his high octane fastball and excellent off-speed pitch to make batters look silly.
Blake Burkhalter, a college reliever/closer, possibly could have helped out at the ML level at some point this season as well. If not for him going down and needing surgery, and if the Braves didn’t try to stretch him out as a starter, he likely would have been able to.make a positive impact this season for the Braves.
From all reports I’ve read, he already has ML ready stuff, but now it might be a couple seasons before he ever gets the call up. Hopefully he can recover, bounceback, and maybe it won’t take him very long to get back on track.
Yep 10 games in and the Braves are 2 games ahead in first place even dealing with their fair share of adversity so far. I know there is still 150 games left to play but my take is just as good as Bryan’s. Still not worried the Braves got this.
I like this pick up with Margevicius. He will basically take Ian’s spot as starting depth at AAA. He has 4 years of cheap control. Sounds like he doesn’t walk a ton of guys with decent control. Maybe the Braves can unlock something with this guy and get some good value out of him. Even if they don’t it’s just a AAA roster spot. Low risk.
Thats exactly what I feel the signing is as well. AAA guy who has MLB experience. Can probably spot start incase something crazy happens
Idk, I’d still MUCH rather have Soroka, Elder, Dodd, Shuster, or even Vines get a shot before this guy ever gets called up. (Actually, I think Vines might be hurt at the moment, so, for now, scratch him off the list.)
Honestly, I might even give their 21 year old lefty Luis De Avila a shot before Margevicius…Then again, I do actually really like De Avila, and with a promising season at AA, it won’t be too long before he’s knocking on Atlanta’s door.
Maybe I’m just seeing him with rose colored glasses, but he looks like a future solid middle of the rotation type of SP to me.
Low velocity/good control? Maybe they picked him up to be a player-mentor to Shuster and Dodd.
Both Shuster and Dodd can run it up to the mid 90s. Aren’t necessarily low velocity guys.
Last year, Shuster’s fastball averaged around 91, and Dodd’s averaged 92. They can both go higher occasionally when necessary. Nowaday’s, that is low velocity.
This…^^^ That’s why both pitchers rely so heavily on their command and being able to locate their pitches, especially their fastballs.
Neither starter has the luxury of being able to blow it by hitters when they make a mistake, and this leads to them getting hit and typically hit hard whenever they have trouble locating their fastball.
They can learn to become more consistent in their mechanics, which will help them, but they just need more experience at the AAA level learning how to pitch, make adjustments, and get outs whenever they don’t have their best stuff..
At first glance I saw Nick markakis