Braves vs. Giants Odds
| Braves Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
-1.5 +116 | 9.5 -120o / -120u | -136 |
| Giants Odds | ||
|---|---|---|
| Spread | Total | Moneyline |
+1.5 -140 | 9.5 +120o / -122u | +116 |
The Atlanta Braves go for a road sweep of the San Francisco Giants on Sunday. It’s a lame-duck pitching matchup between Jared Shuster and Triston Beck.
There aren’t many standalone Sunday Night Baseball games left with the NFL season looming large upon the sports betting world’s consciousness.
Let’s enjoy these ESPN matchups while they last.
Read on for the best bet to make in Braves vs. Giants.
Atlanta Braves
You can do very little wrong when you hit the way Atlanta does.
Only the Mariners have a better wRC+ in August than the Braves (140 and 137, respectively). Only the Phillies have a better ISO (.247 and .222).
The Braves simply rake. They’ve scored 150 runs across 23 games this month (6.5 per game), winning 16 with a +70 run differential.
This team is not perfect. I sometimes worry about their rotation and bullpen, and the defense rates poorly by Outs Above Average (-6, 20th in MLB).
But no single hitter in the regular nine-man lineup has a below-average OPS. Orlando Arcia is the closest at 104.
They crush lefties and righties alike, and no high-leverage rotation arm is safe.
The current hottest Braves hitter? Marcell Ozuna, who checks in with a 384 wRC+ over the past week and a 230 over the past month.
Ozuna is a guy who goes under the radar thanks to all the other unbelievable hitters in the lineup. But we tend to look past how special he is as a hitter.
Marcell Ozuna is on the verge of breaking the rolling xwOBA line 😳 pic.twitter.com/IaEvdHtOSS
— Kevin Keneely (@KevinKeneely1) August 26, 2023
San Francisco Giants
Conversely, you can do much wrong when you hit the way the Giants have been.
The Giants check in with a .613 OPS and a 71 wRC+ against right-handed pitching over the past month. Those marks are the worst in baseball by a wide margin (Yankees are second-to-last in OPS at .655, Angels are second-to-last in wRC+ with 80).
The Giants have been closer to league average against southpaws, but that doesn’t help enough to fix the problem.
The main problem is that the Giants have shoved themselves into a platoon hole. Even if they get to Shuster tonight, the Braves will likely ride their right-handed arms for the duration of the game, leaving San Francisco at an offensive disadvantage in the later innings.
As for Beck, while he may not be a strict opener tonight, he's unlikely to go more than a few innings. Beck tossed an inning in relief on Wednesday and hasn't covered more than four innings in any appearance since the start of June.
What the Giants do after he leaves the game is anyone's guess, but Alex Wood tossed 52 pitches in relief on Friday, Sean Manaea threw 74 on Saturday and Jakob Junis threw 31 on Saturday. It might be a true one-inning-each effort out of some of San Fran's lesser relief arms to wrap this up.
Braves vs. Giants
Betting Pick & Prediction
Shuster isn't a pitcher you want to get behind too strongly, but his starting this game gives us a rare opportunity to back to the Braves at a shorter number than we're accustomed to.
Atlanta's offense is not something you want to fade right now, and it should have every opportunity to batter Beck and the litany of arms the Giants throw behind him.
Conversely, none of Atlanta's important arms is overworked at present, with Max Fried and Spencer Strider covering 13 of a possible 18 innings the last two days.
Back the Braves on the moneyline at -136. I would take this to -145.
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