Look, we completely understand if there are Atlanta Braves fans that have no interest in the team continuing to tempt fate with Bryce Elder. Elder has earned a fair bit of skepticism with the number of his starts that were either unnecessary adventure or outright disasters. However, there is no denying that Elder was great in the Braves’ win over the Dodgers on Sunday and it is worth understanding why.

Elder’s improvement actually goes back through his last three starts where he has posted a 3.18 ERA and 3.66 FIP and the Braves won all three of them. Striking out 12 batters over 17 innings of work isn’t great, but Elder only giving up one homer in those three starts is a welcome change.

So what is the deal? Has Elder just gotten a bit lucky or is there something in the background that has changed? Well, there is always going to be a certain amount of good fortune when a guy is playing well, but the numbers suggest that a big reason why Elder is finding success now is that he figured out how to throw his slider again.

Bryce Elder’s slider may be the difference making pitch for him again this season

Since making it to the big leagues, Elder has been good at two things: getting ground balls and throwing his slider. He isn’t a flamethrower nor is he going to put up eye-popping strikeout numbers. When he is good, he is getting weak contact and being confident in throwing his slider in any count for a strike.

That formula is what got him to the All-Star Game in 2023. His sinker was not particularly good and his changeup and four-seam fastball were decent to good in the case of his changeup, but weren’t thrown nearly as much. His slider however, which he threw 35.3% of the time, had hitters with only a .210 batting average and put hitters away almost 20% of the time. In short, it was arguably his best pitch and he threw it a ton.

In 2024, he still threw his slider a bunch, but opposing hitters hit .283 and slugged .604 against it. That tracks with what the eye test saw and is a big reason why the Braves were not clamoring to play him last year. This season, Elder has thrown his slider more than any of his other pitches for the first time in his career and hitters are back to struggling against it with a .200 average and .364 slugging.

Will the good times continues? If we are being honest with ourselves, history suggests that it will not as Elder has a tendency to regress to the mean in a hurry. However, there are at least some reasons to suggest that his recent performance is at least somewhat real. What no one can argue is that the Braves really need this good version of Elder right now as the options at their disposal after him are definitely not ideal.