The opening day for the Atlanta Braves affiliates featured several prospects returning from injury, including Drue Hackenberg, Luke Sinnard, and Ethan Bagwell. The highlight was Owen Murphy's return from Tommy John surgery, marking his first appearance of the season. In the Gwinnett Stripers game against the Memphis Redbirds, Didier Fuentes struggled initially but recovered somewhat. He allowed a home run and several hits in the early innings but improved later, achieving strikeouts. His command issues with fastball and breaking balls need focus for future performance improvements.
Didier Fuentes had a rough start to his outing but was able to put it together in the final two innings to salvage a bit of good energy for the first time in a few starts.
Fuentes got tagged in the first inning for a home run by Cardinals top prospect JJ Wetherholt, then in the second allowed three hits, two on hard hit balls, scoring two runs to put the Stripers in an early hole.
Fuentes threw plenty of strikes in this game but his fastball locations were poor and too often drifted down belt high where hitters were able to hit him hard.
Fuentes has been struggling with his command and while it doesn't always show up with walks he is going to have to get back to landing his sweeper better on his glove side and elevating his fastball.
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