Dominic Smith delivers big moments for the Braves in April

ATLANTA, GA - APRIL 14: Dominic Smith #8 of the Atlanta Braves celebrates hitting a two-RBI double in the eighth inning during the game against the Miami Marlins at Truist Park on April 14, 2026 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Jack Casey/Atlanta Braves/Getty Images) | Getty Images

If you do it once, it’s a fun (and in this particular case, heartwarming) story that we get to enjoy in the moment before moving on to the next thing. If you do it twice, then we’ve gotta talk about it. That’s what Dominic Smith has forced us to do after he did the daggone thing once again.

The Braves mounted a furious comeback in the bottom of the eighth at Truist Park in order to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. It’s a familiar scenario that we’ve seen play out a bunch of times in the past but now we’re all getting used to a new face doing the damage instead of one of the core group of Braves players that’s usually doing the damage. Dominic Smith has already written two exciting pages of the book that is the 2026 Braves season as he followed up his walk-off grand slam on March 28 with a bases-clearing opposite-field gapper with two outs in order to turn what was shaping up to be a disappointing series loss to the Marlins into a big-time turnaround.

It’d be one thing if it was just those two moments for Dominic Smith so far. That’d be cool but I’d imagine that folks would want more production in-between those two bits of brilliance at the plate. As it turns out, Smith has been delivering on a consistent basis here in the early goings for the Braves. He’s currently sporting a .395/.415/684 slash line with a .474 wOBA, .289 Isolated Power, three homers and 201 wRC+. While he’s likely going to cool down at some point, that’s some mighty-fine production through 41 plate appearances and 14 games!

The obvious hope is that once he does cool down, the plate production will be enough to where he’ll be able to deliver some solid production as one of the main designated hitters for the Braves. If his production last season across 63 games for the San Francisco Giants is any indication, he could very well be in line for a solid season. He hit .284/.333/.417 with a .325 wOBA (outperforming his xwOBA of .306) with five homers and 111 wRC+ across 225 plate appearances. For that to be happening in San Francisco, that’s not bad at all! So far, he’s managed to build upon that and get off to a scalding-hot start in a better environment for hitting here in Cobb County.

As it turns out, Dominic Smith has been making very good use of his time in both San Francisco and Atlanta by utilizing the resources that’s available to him in both locations — and by “resources,” I mean the former legends who used to ply their craft both here and there.

During his appearance in front of the media following Tuesday night’s game, Smith mentioned that he had had conversations about hitting with Barry Bonds while he was with the Giants and then he followed that up by quickly getting in touch with Braves legend Chipper Jones once he became part of the big league roster here. I’d say that whatever advice those two have been giving him has been stuff that he’s been taking to heart and applying to his game because he’s been putting up plate numbers that we haven’t seen from him since the seats were empty back in 2020.

That 2020 season was the last time when Dominic Smith was seen as a serious threat across the baseball world, as he slugged his way to a 166 wRC+ season with the New York Mets. Accruing 1.4 fWAR across just 50 games is a pretty solid achievement but unfortunately, he had’t even come close to that level of production since then. In fact, he scuffled mightily at the plate during his final two seasons with the Mets and he also spent some time in the wilderness in 2023 and 2024 as he bounced around with the Nationals, Red Sox and Reds. Based on that track record, it’s no wonder that we really didn’t get too hyped up about him around here once he was signed as a non-roster invitee — outside of the idea that he’d provide depth for Matt Olson at first base and an occasional option at DH.

Instead, he had himself a solid spring, played himself onto the big league roster for Opening Day and has proceeded to come up huge for the Braves in some big moments early on in the season. Despite all of that bouncing around that Dominic Smith did over the past few seasons, he still garnered respect from his opposition. Walt Weiss admitted as much during his post-game press conference following the win on Tuesday.

“I’ve watched him a lot from the other side — he was in the division with the Mets and the Nationals and it never felt good when he was in the box in a big spot,” said Weiss. “I knew he was going to be a tough out. He’s not going to chase and the ball’s probably going to be put in play.” Weiss also complimented Weiss on being willing to continue to improve his game. “Regardless of where [he’s] at in [his] career, [he’s] always looking to get better every day [he] shows up. Dom’s certainly that guy. All these guys are like that. Good for Dom — those are a couple of pretty good resources in Bonds and Chipper so he’s a smart guy too, going to the right people.”

Throughout all the scuffling, that determination to get better has finally started to pay off some dividends for Dominic Smith and the Braves appear to be the early beneficiaries of it so far. Again, it’s still very early days for both Smith and the Braves here in the 2026 season but so far, the early results have been encouraging. The Braves are off to a very solid start, Dominic Smith is hitting a hot bat and providing production at a spot that was a very big question mark for this lineup heading into the season.

There’s no telling what the future of any given long and winding baseball season will hold but for now, both Smith and the Braves are off to a very auspicious start. We’ll see if everybody can keep it up so that this team can finally get back to where they were in the past and if Dominic Smith can reach back and find some of that success that made him such an exciting talent back in 2020.