Atlanta made it official: Tyler Kinley has been designated for assignment. The move came alongside the recall of right-hander AJ Smith-Shawver from Triple-A Gwinnett, a corresponding swap that gives the Braves a fresh arm as they navigate the final weeks of the season.
Kinley, 35, was a trade-deadline pickup from the Rockies back in 2025 and he made himself useful enough down the stretch that Atlanta brought him back on a 1-year, $4.25M deal in January, with a $3M salary for 2026 and a $1.25M buyout on a $5.5M club option for 2027. It was a modest bet on a bullpen piece who'd shown he could get outs late in games.
For a while, that bet looked smart. Through June, Kinley was sitting on a 3.00 ERA with a 25.8% strikeout rate and just an 8.1% walk rate — the kind of quietly effective ratio work that keeps a reliever in a contender's good graces without making headlines. Then July hit.
Since July 3, Kinley's ERA ballooned to 6.39 over 12 2/3 innings, and the root issue was obvious: he was serving up home runs at a career-worst clip, allowing 1.9 homers per nine with 15.5% of his fly balls leaving the yard. That's not a small-sample blip for a reliever whose job is to hold leads — it's a trend that gets you DFA'd in a pennant race.
The corresponding move tells its own story. Smith-Shawver, back from UCL surgery, hadn't pitched in the majors since May of last year before returning to Atlanta's rotation mix in late July. After two sharp Triple-A tune-up starts, the Braves clearly like what they're seeing enough to make room for him now rather than let a struggling veteran bullpen arm eat innings while Atlanta tries to stay in the playoff picture.
Kinley still has 10 days to be traded, claimed off waivers, or outrighted, and given the buyout money already attached to that 2027 option, there's a decent chance another team gambles on a bounce-back at the right price. For the Braves, though, this is stretch-run math: the numbers stopped working, so the roster spot went to the arm with more upside.