The Atlanta Braves played a top four offense in runs per game in their series and this series they get a top seven team in the Chicago White Sox.
The Atlanta Braves offense has taken a few blows in terms injuries with Drake Baldwin, Sean Murphy, and Michael Harris all missing time, but since the Baldwin injury the Braves have still managed to be in the top nine MLB teams in runs scored.
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Michael Harris the the hero in game three of the Pirates series, but he was a pinch hitter. He has not made a start since Friday, so the big question today was whether or not he would be back in the lineup today. If Harris would be back, that also means that there would be residual effects since Mauricio Dubón would shift away from CF, so today’s lineup was always going to be fun to find out what Weiss is going to do.
Michael Harris will indeed make his return to the starting lineup and will hit second while playing CF. This moves Mauricio Dubón to SS, and Mike Yastrzemski to LF. Other lineup spots of note are that the Braves are keeping Dominic Smith in the lineup at DH and Austin Wynns will be getting the start at catcher. It can be assumed that Weiss knows this game may require best available offense with Holmes on the mound and the White Sox being hot on offense themselves.
Contrary to what many sites were saying the Braves will actually be facing Brandon Eisert who is supposed to be followed by Erick Fedde. Since Fedde will likely get the Lion’s share of innings, let’s focus on him. Fedde struggled mightily for the Braves last season in limited action. Every player on the Braves active roster has faced Fedde at least once besides Kim and White. Michael Harris is likely looking forward to this matchup since in his nine at-bats he has a .667 average and 1.445 OPS against Fedde.
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Ronald Acuña and Austin Riley have larger sample sizes against Fedde and have been quite successful. Acuña has three HRs in his nineteen at-bats to include a .316 average. Austin Riley has twenty-two at-bats against Fedde and has a HR and an OPS of .982.
There are a few Braves that have struggled. Dominic Smith has not been able to figure Fedde out with an OPS of .329 in seventeen at-bats. Matt Olson has one HR against Fedde in nine at-bats, but has a .111 average.
As for Eisert he has been solid in his 14.0 innings this season with a 3.21 ERA with fifteen strikeouts to only five walks. Eisert did face the Braves last season twice as a reliever in back-to-back appearances where he held the Braves without a baserunner in 1.1 innings. The White Sox may want to stick with him for more than just an opening inning if their original plan was to follow him with Fedde.
The White Sox as a whole have a total of three at-bats against Holmes, so there is not much data to go off of, but it was fun wondering what the lineup card was going to look like because we got to see if Ronald Acuña’s brother Luisangel was going to make the start against his brother.
Braden Montgomery, the thirty-third ranked prospect according to Baseball America and drafted twelve overall in 2024, will be making his MLB debut this evening and will be playing RF. Fortunately for Braves fans and White Sox fans alike we will get to see the Acuña brothers play each other with Luisangel getting the start at SS.
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First pitch is at 7:40 EDT.
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