The Week Ahead for Atlanta: Another showdown looms large for the Braves

It’s out of the frying pan and into the fire for the Atlanta Braves. Despite today being an off-day, they’ll have little time to come down from their big statement series-win in Los Angeles against the Dodgers. They’ll be coming home to welcome in the high-flying Cubs who have also gotten off to a very hot start, themselves.

Following their second high-caliber showdown in as many series, the Braves will enter into a stretch where it’s possible that they won’t be facing a team that’s over .500 until the weekend after Memorial Day. The Braves could have a direct say in that since they’ll be facing the Red Sox twice during that span — the first series of which will be taking place this weekend as the Braves end their brief six-game homestand against Boston. It’ll be a test nonetheless, as the Braves will be looking to keep on rolling with Memorial Day getting closer and closer.

Now it’s time to take a look at what lies ahead for Atlanta as far as the action this week is concerned.

Current Record: 27-14 Projected Record (via FanGraphs): 90-72

Thank goodness for today being an off day, since that means that Chris Sale will be able to pitch in the series finale against the Cubs on regular rest. That’ll be huge for the Braves considering that Grant Holmes, JR Ritchie and the rest of Atlanta’s pitching staff is going to have a serious test on their hands with this Cubs lineup. The good news is that we now know that they can indeed be stopped, as Chicago will be entering this game having dropped a series on the road against the Rangers where they got shut out twice in the final two games.

That only came after the Cubs rattled off their second 10-game winning streak of the season so far. It could just be that the Cubs are monsters at Wrigley Field while being somewhat normal away from home but up until their power outage in Arlington, the Cubs did have one of the best team wRC+ marks on the road. Obviously, we’re all hoping that the Braves can keep the Cubs mired in this current mini-slump that they’re on but it’ll still be a very tough task for this lineup to keep guys like Nico Hoener, Ian Happ, Seiya Suzuki, Pete Crow-Armstrong and old friend Dansby Swanson quiet over the course of this series. Hopefully these guys continue to slumber through their visit to Cobb County.

Meanwhile, Chicago’s pitching staff has done enough to make sure that whatever the offense does doesn’t go up in smoke on any given night. While they’re only just outside of the top 10 of all teams in ERA- and actually pretty low down baseball’s order in terms of FIP-, the Cubs are going to be sending some tough customers to the mound to start for them during this series. Shota Imanaga has mostly been very tough to deal with so far this season and his last outing in particular was a very impressive one where he went six innings with just one run allowed with 10 strikeouts. That was after he pitched seven innings of shutout ball against the Diamondbacks.

With that being said, he has had his occasional blow-ups. The Dodgers got him for five runs (four earned) over 5.1 innings on April 26 and then the Nationals tagged him for four runs over five innings all the way back on March 29. If the Braves can get to Imanaga then maybe that’ll be a good sign for them — even if Ben Brown could be frustratingly effective for the Cubs and Colin Rea could also deliver a solid performance of his own as well.

The Braves are going to have a lot on their plate to pull off another series win but at least this time, they’ll be playing in front of their home fans (though there will surely be plenty of folks clad in Cubbie Blue, like usual) in their own ballpark and maybe that’ll be enough to give the Braves the edge in what’ll surely be a hard-fought series.

Tuesday, May 12 at 7:15 p.m. ET (BravesVision, TBS (out-of-market only))Wednesday, May 13 at 7:15 p.m. ET (BravesVision)Thursday, May 14 at 7:15 p.m. ET (BravesVision)

May 15-17: Boston Red Sox

Current Record: 17-23 Projected Record: 79-83

Speaking of plenty of folks being clad in the other team’s colors, we’ll probably see that as well once the Red Sox come to town. They won’t be cheering for a team with a winning record once they do arrive, as Boston is currently stuck at the bottom of the AL East and looking to find some sort of way to get things going in the right direction. The good news for Boston is that they are very close to Toronto and Baltimore in the standings, so they could very well be in third place by the time they make it to Atlanta. The bad news for them is that they’re already way behind both the Yankees and the Rays who are currently duking it out at the top of the AL East, so they’ve got a long road to go before they become relevant in the division again this season.

Pitching-wise, the Red Sox have actually been performing at around the same level as the Cubs have — at least according to ERA- and FIP-. Ranger Suarez has been very solid for them so far and they’ve also gotten encouraging results from Payton Tolle and Connelly Early to start the season so far. Arodlis Chapman has once again continued to defy Father Time with his production out of the ‘pen as well, so the Braves will be doing well to make sure that they don’t have to see him too much during this series. This is a perfectly fine pitching staff that’ll be coming to town this weekend and while the Braves may be avoiding Suarez, whoever Boston puts out there won’t be a pushover.

The main problem for Boston has been their hitting (or lack therof). Heading into this week, the Red Sox have a grand total of four (4) regular contributors who have a wRC+ over 100 — Wilyer Abreu (133), Willson Contreras (134), Cedanne Rafaela (104) and Masataka Yoshida (109). That’s it. For comparison’s sake, the Braves have eight regulars with a wRC+ over 100 and if you count Jonah Heim and his 12 games of work while he was with the Braves, it’s nine. If this series turns into a situation where it comes down who can get the most consistent plate production then this should be a series that goes well for the Braves. If it comes down to pitching then things could be much tougher for Atlanta during this series. We’ll see what happens!

Friday, May 15 at 7:15 p.m. ET (BravesVision, Gray TV)Saturday, May 16 at 7:15 p.m. ET (BravesVision, Gray TV)Sunday, May 17 at 1:35 p.m. ET (BravesVision, Gray TV)