Ozzie Albies leads off as Braves begin series with Pirates

Alex Verdugo is out of the lineup, which means that Ozzie Albies is stepping in as the leadoff hitter in his absence.

The lineups are out for tonight’s game between the Atlanta Braves and the Pittsburgh Pirates. We’ve got a couple of surprises to talk about when it comes to Atlanta, so let’s not waste any more time and hop right into it.

Let’s take a look at the lineups, starting with the Braves:

It appears that Alex Verdugo has gotten the day off and as such, we’ve seen a bit of an shuffling across the board. Stuart Fairchild is making a rare start, Eli White has moved over to left field and Ozzie Albies is leading off. I can’t say that I’m a fan of a guy who is currently sitting on 84 wRC+ and an on-base percentage below .300 being your leadoff hitter but hey, maybe this’ll be one of those times where Brian Snitker’s gut ends up being correct and Ozzie has a big breakout day at the plate this evening. We’ll see!

Here’s how the Pirates are looking:

The top four for the Pirates remain unchanged from their most recent contest. Matt Gorski and Jared Triolo are the new faces here, as both of them were on the bench as Enmanuel Valdez and Liover Peguero got the nod for their most recent game back on May 7. Other than that, this isn’t the most adventurous-looking lineup for the first game of the Don Kelly interim manager era.

This evening’s game is scheduled to start at 6:40 p.m. ET.