Atlanta’s not going to be favored in this one but they’ve played well at home and the Dodgers have struggled a bit on the road. Could they start this series with a win?
The Atlanta Braves are returning home after a successful trip out West to face off with the top dog out west: The Los Angeles Dodgers. After the Dodgers swept the Braves out of LA and dumped them out of the entire state of California without a single win, Atlanta will be trying to set the record straight as they continue to fight and claw their way back to the land above .500.
Despite their recent good form, the Braves will be heading into this series as the underdog on paper and tonight’s pitching matchup is probably going to have the biggest gulf in quality when it comes to each pitcher’s track record so far. The Dodgers will be sending Yoshinobu Yamamoto to the mound for tonight’s game and so far, he’s been LA’s best starter by quite some margin. He’s coming into this game with a baseball-leading ERA of 1.06 (26 ERA-) and a top-five FIP of 2.27 (57 FIP-). He’s striking out opposing batters at a pretty high clip (nearly 33 percent) and he’s walking batters at a somewhat minimal clip (8.3 percent) while also keeping the ball inside of the ballpark for the most part.
While his most recent outing against Pittsburgh wasn’t spectacular (and the Dodgers as a whole suffered a letdown at the hands of Paul Skenes and the Pirates), he’s been very effective outside of that and had gone into that against Pittsburgh on April 25 having gone three full starts (19 innings) without giving up an earned run. He’s still only given up four earned runs through 34 innings pitched so far this season. Yamamoto appears to be the real deal like Holyfield and if he’s on his game then this could be a long night at the plate for Braves hitters.
Meanwhile, Atlanta will be pinning their hopes on Grant Holmes being able to get the job done against Los Angeles. That definitely wasn’t the case back on March 31, which is when Grant Holmes went four innings and gave up four runs off of four hits and four walks — folks, that’s a lot of fours and none of them were particularly good. Either way, redemption and/or payback may be on the mind for Holmes in this one, as he’ll surely need an improved performance if the Braves are going to hang around in this one.
So while the Braves are definitely looking like the underdogs in this one, this might end up being a case where Atlanta’s home form could end up carrying them to victory. As a team, the Braves have finally reached the “promised land” of a collective 100 wRC+ — they’ve gotten there with a .245/.320/.396 team slash line with a wOBA of .319 and Isolated Power at .151. However, Atlanta’s hitting .289/.358/.463 as a team at home, with .174 in Isolated Power and a wRC+ mark of 127. Comparatively, the Dodgers on the Road are only hitting .219/.297/.410 with a .191 in Isolated Power and only 94 wRC+. So while the pop has travelled with the Dodgers on the road, the rest of their production and hitting has not, as their 94 wRC+ on the road is paltry compared to their incredible team wRC+ of 144 at home.
So, if things hold up to where the Braves keep on playing much better at home while the Dodgers continue playing much worse on the road, then it’s definitely feasible that the Braves could end up being the ones in the winners’ circle to start off this series. The Braves as a whole have been playing better recently — no matter what the venue happens to be. The clear and obvious hope is that the Braves can continue their good home form and put themselves in a position to potentially win this series. As usual, we’ll see what happens.
Game Info
Game Date/Time: Friday, May 2, 7:15 p.m. EDT
Location: Truist Park, Atlanta, GA
TV: FanDuel Sports South/Southeast, Gray TV, MLB Network (out-of-market only)
Streaming: MLB.tv
Radio: 680 AM / 93.7 FM The Fan