All eyes should be on Spencer Strider on Wednesday. Baseball's No. 1 strikeout artist is back.
Just over a year after internal brace elbow surgery ended his 2024 season, Strider will make his 2025 debut for the Braves. His start against the Blue Jays in Toronto will be MLB.TV's Free Game of the Day (1:07 p.m. ET).
At his best, Strider mows down hitters like nobody else. His 483 K's from 2022-23 were the most in MLB. His 281 K's in 2023 are the most by any pitcher in a single season in the last five years.
But will Strider be the same overpowering force he was before?
All signs point to "Yes." Strider has been absolutely dominating hitters in the Minors as he builds up to his Major League return. He's pitched three games for Triple-A Gwinnett. He has 27 strikeouts in 13 2/3 innings.
So бн Strider is ready for the big leagues. And his stuff looks nasty. Let's break down just how nasty.
Here are three reasons to be excited for Strider's return to the Braves.
1) His fastball is still explosive
Strider's raw velocity hasn't quite reached its old level yet -- that's to be expected coming back from the second major elbow surgery of his pitching career. But he is still throwing hard. And velocity isn't the only thing that makes Strider's fastball overpowering.
Strider averaged 95.7 mph on his four-seamer at Triple-A. Sure, that's not as hard as he was throwing in 2023 (97.2 mph) or 2024 before his injury (96.3 mph). It's still 2 mph harder than the average big league starter in 2025.
More importantly, Strider's fastball still has the rising movement that makes it a swing-and-miss pitch at the top of the zone, where he loves to throw it. In his 2025 Minor League outings, Strider's four-seamer has gotten a superb 32% swing-and-miss rate, with seven K's in 18 plate appearances decided on his fastball.
Strider's four-seamer has averaged about 18 inches of induced vertical break in those games -- that's the amount of "rise" his fastball generates from how he throws the pitch. The average MLB starter only gets 16 inches of rise on their fastball. That's a big difference.
Strider's fastballs also seem even faster to the hitter because of how he drives down the mound. Strider is only six feet tall, but he releases his heaters from almost seven feet in front of the rubber. That means the hitter has less time to react, and helps him blow fastballs by them.
That combination of rise and release extension is a big reason why Strider is such a good power pitcher. And his Minor League data suggests he's still great at both.
Strider's 4-seamer by season
- 2022 Majors: 98.2 mph / 18" induced rise / 5" run / 6.9 ft. extension
- 2023 Majors: 97.2 mph / 18" induced rise / 6" run / 7.0 ft. extension
- 2024 Majors: 96.3 mph / 17" induced rise / 11" run / 6.9 ft. extension
- 2025 Minors: 95.7 mph / 18" induced rise / 9" run / 6.9 ft. extension
Which means his fastball -- which totaled 244 K's from 2022-23, second only to Gerrit Cole -- will still be great when Strider arrives back in the Majors.
2) His slider is missing bats like crazy
But let's not forget the other half of what might be the best two-pitch combo of any starting pitcher.
Strider's slider produced 139 strikeouts all by itself in his last healthy season -- the most K's by any pitcher on any pitch type in 2023.
And if there was any question whether his slider is still an elite pitch бн just look at what he's been doing with it at Triple-A.
Strider has induced a 62% swing-and-miss rate on his slider, and an equally ridiculous 58% strikeout rate. Hitters have whiffed on 14 of their 24 swings against it and have struck out in 14 of their 24 plate appearances against it.
That's just what he's always done in the Majors, where his slider has a 54% whiff rate and 50% strikeout rate over his career. He should be able to keep doing it in 2025.
3) He has new-look secondaries
Strider has always been basically a two-pitch pitcher, which is very rare for a starter, but his fastball-slider combo was so overpowering that he could do it. Strider's four-seamer and slider have made up 94% of the pitches he's thrown in the Majors and accounted for 467 of his 495 strikeouts.
He's always mixed in a changeup, but as far as a third pitch, it's been a distant third pitch. That prompted Strider to add a curveball last year in the hopes it could supplant the changeup in that third-pitch role.
Which makes Strider's 2025 pitch mix in the Minors particularly interesting.
He's kept the curveball, first of all -- and added three inches of horizontal break to it, compared to his two-start sample from 2024.
Strider's curveball, 2024 vs. 2025
- 2024 Majors: 12% usage / 79.6 mph / 2,589 rpm / 48" drop / 9" break
- 2025 Minors: 6% usage / 79.2 mph / 2,589 rpm / 48" drop / 12" break
But the changeup is the one to keep an eye on. The one he's throwing right now doesn't look like the previous versions he's thrown in the Majors as he's tinkered with it.
Strider's changeup, season by season
- 2022 Majors: 5% usage / 88.9 mph / 2,126 rpm / 25" drop / 15" run
- 2023 Majors: 7% usage / 87.0 mph / 2,257 rpm / 24" drop / 15" run
- 2024 Majors: 5% usage / 85.3 mph / 2,164 rpm / 27" drop / 19" run
- 2025 Minors: 11% usage / 86.1 mph / 1,877 rpm / 32" drop / 14" run
The thing that should jump out is: Strider has killed some of the spin on his changeup, and now it's dropping more. It's not the side-to-side running changeup he had a year ago, nor the "show-me" pitch of 2022-23 that worked mainly as an unexpected offering after a diet of fastballs and sliders.
Strider's 2025 changeup looks like a better pitch, stuff-wise, than it's been before. In his three Minor League outings, opposing hitters whiffed on nine of their 12 swings against it, and struck out in five of their seven plate appearances decided by his changeup.
And if Strider is going to throw both that and the curveball in the Majors, he essentially doubles his pitch arsenal from a two-pitch pitcher to a four-pitch pitcher. A more diverse pitch mix could help Strider make up for the dip in his velocity as he returns from his surgery.
Just judging by the stuff he's been throwing in the Minors, Strider looks like he has all the weapons he needs to be great again for Atlanta this season.