Something that has developed into quite the storyline recently – despite the Braves being on a tear of late – is whether or not closer Raisel Iglesias is cooked. Once again, on Saturday night, Iglesias surrendered a home run – dinger no. 4 of the game for Arizona’s Eugenio Suarez.
Fortunately, the veteran reliever settled in after that homer and three batters later induced an inning-ending double-play to keep the score tied. And double fortunately, the Braves were able to squeak by with the 8-7 win in 10 innings. But good grief – what’s going on with Iglesias?
The most obvious issue is of course the home runs, something Raisel Iglesias has always been great at preventing (1.06 HR/9 for his career). Eugenio’s big fly on Saturday is already the fifth(!) allowed by the Braves closer in just 10 appearances so far in 2025. For context, last season he didn’t allow his first home run until May 11, his 16th appearance. This, of course, has Iglesias’ homer rate bloated to a crazy 4.5 HR/9.
A bit of decline in fastball velocity for Iglesias was something a lot of us picked up on pretty early on this season. Right now, he’s averaging 94.6 MPH with the four-seamer, a pitch he’s always kept over 95 during his big league career. However, despite this, Iglesias’ four-seam is doing fine so far this season in terms of results, as opposing batters have only recorded one hit (.083 AVG) against it. And his sinker (his other fastball) – also down in velocity – has been even better (.059 AVG). So yes, Iglesias isn’t currently throwing as hard as he normally does. But that doesn’t appear to be the culprit behind his struggles. The fastballs are just fine.
What does seem to be an issue, though, is Iglesias’ slider. A pitch he throws roughly 20% of the time, it’s responsible for three of the five home runs he’s allowed this season, to go with a .667 AVG for opposing batters. A pitch Iglesias dominated with last season (generating a ridiculous whiff-rate of 41.9%) is getting absolutely pummeled (11.0 Whiff% in ’25) right now.
So far in 2025 (albeit just 30 pitches), he just isn’t getting the location right. Too many of them are hanging around near the middle of the strike zone and even on the inside part of the plate to righties, which clearly explains why the pitch is getting crushed.
At first you’d think perhaps Iglesias’ slider just isn’t moving like it’s supposed to. But that’s not the case: per Statcast, both the vertical drop (35.3”) and horizontal break (10.8”) are right in line with last season (35” & 10.8”). This appears to be simply a command issue. Iglesias just isn’t hitting his spots with the slider; and unfortunately, when he’s missed, it’s caught more zone instead of less.
While this maybe explains Iglesias’ issues, the real question is whether or not the Braves will continue to depend on him for the ninth inning. I believe the answer is yes. There’s just no way he’ll continue to pitch like this (6.30 ERA). Whether it’s because he starts commanding the slider better or throttling up his fastball velocity, it’s way more likely Iglesias improves than continues to regress. But at least his problem right now is seemingly fixable, assuming nothing injury-related is going on. Raisel Iglesias has been a shut-down arm in Atlanta for 3.5 seasons now, so hopefully this is just a slow start. The Braves should be patient – he’ll get it figured out.
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Rich von Biberstein/Icon Sportswire
