The Braves are exiting a June that was absolutely miserable, but they finally hit a handful of homers on Friday night, hosting the Mets. They’ve got another favorable matchup here, with Chris Sale on the mound and facing the imminently hittable Sean Manaea for New York. We’ve got a national TV matchup on the 250th anniversary of this great country’s founding. The Braves have lived up to expectations, despite their horrid June, but FOX will be a bit disappointed in the Mets, relative to what they expected
before the season when this matchup was scheduled.
Chris Sale has been brilliant of late, and really all year, but the struggles of Atlanta’s offense have prevented the team from capitalizing on that in the form of wins since May. One would think that this would be a game that the Braves could put some runs up against Manaea at home, perhaps building on the power they showed Friday, but this is the type of game they have frequently been losing lately. Sale may figure out a way to score a run off the pitching mound out of pure fury if he doesn’t get any run support today
Manaea has been ever so slightly above average in most things other than ERA this year, getting the opener treatment frequently and starting only 4 games. His elite extension props up a pretty uninspiring arsenal of primarily a four-seamer, sinker, and sweeper, with a cutter and changeup sprinkled in. His four-seamer and sinker have a lot of arm-side run, while the rest of his pitches have quite average movement with well-below-average velocity. He’s perhaps been getting some HR/FB rate luck this season, so hopefully he gets some regression in favor of Atlanta’s bats.
Game Info
Game Date/Time: Saturday, July 4, 8:08 p.m. ET
Location: Truist Park, Atlanta, GA
TV: FOX
Streaming: MLB.tv
Radio: 680 AM / 93.7 FM The Fan
