Braves set to receive their rings as Kyle Wright starts against the Reds

Unsung World Series hero Kyle Wright will make his 2022 debut in Atlanta’s rotation as the Braves continue their home opening series against the Reds.

This is also a pretty exciting day since the Atlanta Braves who were around for the aforementioned World Series will be receiving their championship rings tonight as well. It’s hard to put into words how exciting this is going to be. While the rest of the season isn’t going to be like this, this is why this early part of the season is a perfect time to enjoy the latter phase of the honeymoon period. No matter if the Braves win or lose tonight, it’s going to be a cool night just because of the ring ceremony.

With that being said, it would be way, way cooler if the Braves also picked up a win. They’d be over .500 as well, which is something that last year’s team famously waited until August to accomplish. Tonight, they’re going to have Kyle Wright making his first start since June of last season. Now, if you look at Kyle Wright’s stats from last season, then it would be kind of hard to envision seeing Wright going from that to what he did in the World Series to being the third man up in the rotation in the following season. Yet, here he is. It’s clear that whatever he had going on in Triple-A to end the 2021 season had something real to it since he did what he did during the Fall Classic. Now, the obvious hope is that Wright can bring that into his role as a starter here in 2022.

Meanwhile, Vladimir Gutierrez is beginning his second season as a big league starter for the Reds and similar to Wright, there’s nothing really special going on when you look at his stat sheet. With that being said, he’s also similar in that he does occasionally show flashes of being a solid starter for Cincinnati going forward. As a matter of fact, he showed one of those flashes against the Braves last year, which is when he came to Cobb County and tossed six innings while only allowing one run in a game that the Reds dominated. Again, nothing about Gutierrez is going to jump out at you when you look at his on-paper credentials, but there’s definitely more to him as a pitcher than meets the eye and the Braves lineup could have a somewhat tough customer to deal with if all goes well for him tonight.

This is a very intriguing pitching matchup because we really don’t know quite what to expect. If both hurlers pitch up to their potential then this could be a good one. On the flip side, this could easily go belly-up for both starters. Anything is possible, really, but this should be fun to watch. Again, I highly suggest that either you tune in early or get to your seats early since the ring ceremony is tonight. Again, this is going to be a special night just due to the ring ceremony alone. Hopefully we get a really good start from Kyle Wright to go along with it!

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Game Info

Game Date/Time: Saturday, April 9, 7:20 p.m. ET

Location: Truist Park, Atlanta, Georgia

TV: Bally Sports South, MLB Network (Out-of-market only)

Streaming: MLB.tv

Radio: 680 The Fan / 93.7 FM The Fan