Will the the visiting New Yorkers ignite Atlanta’s second half?
The Atlanta Braves start the second-half of the 2025 baseball season with a six-game home-stand, first welcoming the New York Yankees and then the San Francisco Giants.
The Braves enter play on Friday 11 games under .500 with less than two weeks until the trade deadline. Atlanta made a minor, middle-of-the-night deal with the Texas Rangers to add a potential starting option, but bigger moves may be in the forecast depending now how the Braves end these initial six games after the All-Star break.
Famously, the 1991 Atlanta Braves exited the All-Star game break 9.5 games the division-leading Dodgers and won 8-out-of-9 games to pull with in three games of the division lead. That Braves team was only one game below .500 exiting the All-Star break, but a similar hot streak could get this incarnation of the Braves back in the thick of the Wild Card standings and change the team’s calculus on the trade deadline.
The Braves can’t get hot without first beating those damn Yankees, so Spencer Strider will take the mound hoping to lead Atlanta on a march up the standings. Joey Wentz will make his second Atlanta appearance as the starter in game two, but as of early Friday morning, that was all that was know about either of the team’s starts for the series.
As for the Yankees, they are 53-43 – two games behind the Toronto Blue Jays for the AL East division lead. Aaron Judge – the best player in the American League and reigning AL MVP – leads the Yankees offense while old-friend Max Fried leads New York’s pitching staff. Fried’s status is uncertain due to issues with his pitching hand (he’s had blister issues plague him throughout his career).
It should be an exciting series with the Yankees in town and a chance to see two of the game’s biggest superstars in Judge and Atlanta’s Ronald Acuña, Jr. face-off for three games.
Here are the start times for each of this weekend’s games against the Yankees.
- Friday, July 18 – 7:15 PM EDT
- Saturday, July 19 – 7:15 PM EDT
- Sunday, July 20 – 1:35 PM EDT
Broadcast options for these games include:
- Friday: FanDuel Sports Network South, FanDuel Sports Network Southeast, Gray TV, MLB Network (out-of-market), YES
- Saturday: FanDuel Sports Network South, FanDuel Sports Network Southeast, YES
- Sunday: FanDuel Sports Network South, FanDuel Sports Network Southeast, YES
The Braves games can be heard on the Braves Radio Network. Games are also available to stream on MLB.tv (blackout restrictions apply) and the FanDuel Sports Network (restrictions apply).