'It's good to be home': Fan-favorite Chavez back with Braves

NORTH PORT, Fla. -- Jesse Chavez had to hold back some tears as he discussed what it meant for him to be back with the Braves.

“It’s good to be home,” Chavez said.

Chavez arrived in Braves camp on Monday morning, shortly before the team announced he had signed a Minor League contract. The 40-year-old reliever has become an Atlanta fan favorite over the past few years. This will be his fifth stint with the organization and his fourth since the start of 2021.

“The [fan] support goes far beyond what you think, trust me,” Chavez said. “Words can’t express how I feel right now. There are so many emotions going on right now with how I feel about Braves Country that it’s really tough.”

Chavez will throw in a Minor League game on Tuesday. The Braves may wait until then to determine whether he’ll be on the Opening Day roster. But the expectation is he will be with the club when the season opens in Philadelphia on Thursday.

This reunion became possible on Friday, when Chavez learned he was being released by the White Sox. Chavez went home to celebrate his daughter’s ninth birthday and then received word the Braves wanted him back.

“[My family] says they knew this would happen, but what they knew was they wanted me to be comfortable in a spot where if this is the last year, this would be a place where I’d want to be,” Chavez said.

Chavez says this will be the final year of his long MLB career. As long as everything goes well on Tuesday, he will likely fill the long-relief role that had been earmarked for Jackson Stephens. This, of course, is the same role Chavez successfully filled in Atlanta over the past few years.

There’s certainly reason for Chavez to be happy he’s still pitching after his left shin was fractured by a Miguel Cabrera comebacker last June. He missed nearly three full months before returning to the Braves in late September. His late efforts weren’t enough to gain a postseason roster spot.

But the past few weeks have given Chavez confidence he is back to where he was before the injury. He threw 41 pitches and allowed six runs in just one inning when he made his spring debut on Feb. 23, but he surrendered just three earned runs over the six appearances (six innings) that followed.

“I’m 100 percent back,” Chavez said. “It took me a couple times to get going during the spring just to feel it out. I was kind of feeling for the landing [during my delivery] last year because of the impact it had on my leg. Now that it’s landing the way it should be landing, that’s the biggest thing I had to get over this spring.”

Braves fans were introduced to Chavez when he was a rookie reliever sharing a bullpen with Billy Wagner and Takashi Saito in 2010. They were reintroduced to him midway through the ‘21 season, when he helped spark the late-season surge that ended with a World Series victory. They bid adieu when he signed with the Cubs the following winter. But this was the start of a pattern. He struggled with Chicago, got traded to Atlanta three weeks into the season and was very reliable for the Braves.

This same fanbase regretfully said goodbye to Chavez when he was traded to the Angels at the 2022 Trade Deadline. But he was back in Atlanta’s bullpen a few weeks later, after another rough stretch led Los Angeles to release him.

Chavez has posted a 2.23 ERA over 121 1/3 innings with the Braves since the 2021 season. He produced a 7.16 ERA in his 16 1/3 innings with the Cubs and Angels within this same span.

These numbers provide a better understanding as to why Chavez feels at home while playing for the Braves and manager Brian Snitker, who was Atlanta’s third-base coach when Chavez debuted in 2010. That club featured many strong clubhouse figures who helped make manager Bobby Cox’s final season a memorable one.

“I wouldn’t be here without that group,” Chavez said. “Being able to see how Bobby Cox went about his business and being able to see how everybody else went about their business, that’s where it all started.”