Ronald Acuña Jr. was finally back in the lineup for the first time in 12 months, but somehow Friday night still felt like the same old story for the 2025 Atlanta Braves. Despite Acuña sending the first pitch he saw this season out to left-center for an instantly iconic leadoff homer, the rest of the offense once again struggled. And in a tie game in the top of the ninth, manager Brian Snitker once again went to veteran closer Raisel Iglesias — to disastrous results.
Iglesias hung an awful slider to Manny Machado, who promptly took it deep to left for what would stand as the game-winning homer in a 2-1 San Diego Padres win. It's just more of the same for the struggling right-hander: He's given up at least one run in five of her last seven outings, raising his ERA on the year to an ugly 5.75.
In just about every way, Iglesias doesn't look like the All-Star he's been in Atlanta: His velocity and K rate are both way down, and he's getting hit harder than he ever has before. That decline is costing the Braves games time and time again, games they can't afford to lose with the Philadelphia Phillies and New York Mets setting the pace in the rugged NL East. But despite that urgency, Snitker still has no plans on changing up his bullpen hierarchy — a stubborn commitment to his veteran that could cost his team a playoff spot.
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Brian Snitker can't afford to keep ignoring Raisel Iglesias' decline
Snitker is putting it mildly with his assessment of Iglesias' slider: Hitters are slugging an eye-watering 1.833 off of the pitch so far this season. But this isn't as simple as making a tweak to get an established star back on track. Iglesias is 35 now, and his arm isn't what it used to be; his average four-seam fastball is down to just 94.5 mph, and it's no surprise that hitters have a healthy .499 expected slugging percentage on it this year.
That's huge for Iglesias, because it changes everything about how he goes about his business — especially to right-handed batters. His changeup remains a lefty-neutralizing weapon, but if he can't reliably beat righties with his fastball, he needs to rely more on his slider. And if that slider isn't good enough to get the job done, then suddenly he doesn't have many (if any) answers.
At this point, Atlanta has no reason to think a fix is imminent. And it can't afford to keep lighting potential wins on fire. It's well past time to let Iglesias have a phantom IL stint to figure things out, or at least put him in lower-leverage spots while someone like Daysbel Hernandez handles the ninth inning for the time being. But that's never been who Snitker is: He'll show faith in his guys, come hell or high water. That's an admirable quality at times; right now, though, it's not what this Braves team needs ahead of a make-or-break stretch.