Atlanta Braves To Face Tough Guardians Team This Weekend.
The Atlanta Braves host the Cleveland Guardians to Truist Park for a three-game series beginning Friday night.
The Atlanta Braves need a test.
Atlanta presently owns baseball’s best winning percentage, sitting at.739 after sweeping the Miami Marlins at home this week. But there’s a problem: the Braves have already played four series against clubs with losing records, including some of the poorest in baseball.
The Chicago White Sox are lowest in baseball at 3-22, while the Miami Marlins (with whom Atlanta has already played six games across two series) are 6-20 and the Houston Astros are 7-19, with a combined winning percentage of just 207.
However, the Braves begin a three-game home series tonight against the Cleveland Guardians, who not only top the AL Central but also have an MLB-best 18 wins in the 2024 season.
As a result, the Braves will be able to see how they fare against a competitive club.
Scoring runs
If we were betting folks, we’d recommend taking the over in this series. Atlanta and Cleveland are two of the greatest teams in scoring runs in 2024, with Atlanta in first position with 5.96 runs per game and Cleveland (surprise) close behind at 5.36, good for fourth place.
(We say surprisingly because the Guardians’ offense struggled last season, coming in 27th at just 4.09 runs per game.)
A lot of the improvement is down to hot starts from some of the non-José Ramírez hitters on the squad. First baseman Josh Naylor has been red-hot this season, currently sitting on a .295/.336/.557 slash with six homers and 20 RBIs, leading the team in homers and second to Ramírez in RBIs. Outfielder Steven Kwan, who won a Gold Glove in left field last season, is sporting career highs in all three components of the slash line with a .346/.382/.452, as well as leading the AL in runs with 22 and already 1/3rd of the way to his season high in homers (6, in 2022) with two bombs in just his first 110 plate appearances.
Only three lineup regulars have batting averages below .250, with catcher Bo Naylor (.186), SS Brayan Rocchio (.205) and CF Tyler Freeman (.221) providing quality defense but not much offensive support to the lineup.
Preventing runs
As long-time readers of Braves Today know, there’s more than one way to get a good run differential. The only team currently higher than Atlanta’s +44 is Cleveland at +49, and that’s due to not only their prolific offense but the quality pitching the Guardians have brought to bear across the season’s first 25 games.
The Guardians’ pitching staff has a top-five ERA, currently at 3.19, with the team’s bullpen paving the way here. While the starters aren’t bad for Cleveland – 10-5, 3.90 ERA – the relievers have been dominant, putting up an 8-2 record and a 2.31 ERA while converting nine of their 12 save opportunities.
Emmanuel Clase is one of baseball’s most dominant relievers right now, both in results and pure stuff. Clase has a minuscule 0.69 ERA with eight saves and a win, while his cutter has the 2nd highest average velocity in all of baseball at 98.5 mph. Of the 137 cutters Clase has thrown so far in 2024, only five have resulted in base hits.
Clase is supported by Hunter Gaddis (1-0, 0.00 ERA in 12.1 IP) and Tim Herrin (1-0, 0.77 ERA in 11.2 IP), while veteran Scott Barlow is available for ancillary save duties when Clase is unavailable (1-2, 3.75 ERA and 1 save).
Pitching Rotation for the Weekend
Here’s how the two teams will configure their rotations for the weekend series:
Friday (7:20 PM ET): LHP Chris Sale (2-1, 4.38 ERA) vs LHP Logan Allen (3-0, 5.06 ERA)
Saturday (7:20 PM ET): RHP Charlie Morton (2-0, 4.70 ERA) vs RHP Tanner Bibee (2-0, 4.44 ERA)
Sunday (1:35 PM ET): RHP Bryce Elder (1-0, 0.00 ERA) vs RHP Ben Lively (0-1, 2.38 ERA)
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