Today's the final day of August, which means that we're knocking on the door of the crucial month of September. Every team in baseball will get an opportunity to add two players to their roster for the final month of the season and as such, the Braves have decided to go with a balance of veteran presence and young talent that could potentially make a big impact.
Friend of the site Grant McAuley is reporting that the Braves have decided that their two September callups will be RHP Blake Burkhalter and INF Kyle Farmer.
As Grant mentioned in the post above, Burkhalter has been doing a very good job down on the farm this season, with the vast majority of those 35.2 innings coming at the Triple-A level with the Gwinnett Stripers. He's sitting on a 1.48 ERA (31 ERA-) and a 2.77 FIP (58 FIP-) across 24.1 Triple-A innings. As evidenced by the impending call-up, it sure seems like the Braves have decided that Burkhalter deserves a shot in the bigs and he could certainly help out a bullpen that has continued to get the job done throughout the season. Burkhalter's first appearance will be his big league debut, so that's exciting to think about.
Advertisement
Burkhalter made our Battery Power prospects list of players who'd likely be called up to the bigs in 2026
, so there's that. It also would behoove you to look out for his cutter
, which our crew deemed as the best on the farm.
Meanwhile, the Braves have clearly decided to shore up their depth at the big league level by bringing Farmer back into the fold. Farmer (who was actually part of the Opening Day roster, believe it or not) had actually been released back in July but the Braves brought him back on a minor league deal on July 28 and his numbers in the minors (.227/.289/.255, .270 wOBA, 50 wRC+) have been very similar to what he produced across 12 games and 16 plate appearances with the Braves in the bigs (.267/.250/.333, .238 wOBA, 52 wRC+).
Basically, I'd imagine that Farmer will be stashed directly on the bench and he'll get occasional pinch hitting/running duties and could possibly get a start if the injury bug gets bad or the Braves put out a Day After Clinching lineup if all goes well and they hold on to the divisional lead.
