The Braves have acquired right-hander Davis Daniel from the Angels, per announcements from both clubs. The Halos designated Daniel for assignment earlier this week. Left-hander Mitch Farris heads the other way.
Daniel, 28 in June, has a small amount of major league experience thus far. Between last year and this year, he has tossed 42 2/3 innings for the Angels, allowing 5.06 earned runs per nine. His 8.1% walk rate is right around average but his 19.9% strikeout rate and 39.1% ground ball rate are both a few ticks worse than par.
Atlanta is probably more interested in the Triple-A season that Daniel just had. He made 21 starts and one relief appearance at the Sale Lake Bees, logging 118 innings. His 5.42 ERA in that time is obviously not impressive, but the Bees play in the hitter-friendly Pacific Coast League. Daniel struck out 23.3% of batters faced and only gave out walks at a 6.5% clip. His 4.41 FIP was almost exactly a run better than his ERA.
Daniel still has an option remaining, so he can give Atlanta a bit of extra rotation depth without taking up an active roster spot. Atlanta projects to have a rotation fronted by Chris Sale, Reynaldo López and Spencer Schwellenbach. They will eventually get Spencer Strider back into that mix at some point, once he’s recovered from his April internal brace surgery. Until then, options for the back end include Grant Holmes, Ian Anderson, AJ Smith-Shawver, Hurston Waldrep, Bryce Elder and others. Daniel will jump into that group, who will presumably battle each other for positions on the depth chart.
Farris, 24 in February, was selected by Atlanta in the 14th round of the 2023 draft. Since then, he has thrown 124 2/3 innings over 21 starts and nine relief appearances in the minors. In that time, he has a 2.96 ERA, 30% strikeout rate and 9.7% walk rate. He spent most of 2024 at High-A and will backfill some of the pitching depth that the Angels just lost by cutting Daniel from the roster. Farris isn’t Rule 5 eligible until December of 2026, so he won’t need a roster spot for quite a while.
