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The Braves haven't been swept this season and I'm sure would prefer not to be. Their offense has gone to sleep of late but I think wakes up some today vs. M's rookie Emerson Hancock. ATL's Chris Sale has been quite strong other than one start. One good thing about this series so far is that Atlanta has not used any of its high-leverage relievers so they are all ready to go today. Mariners closer Andres Munoz pitched 1.2 innings last night and thus surely is not available. Because of the state of the bullpens, I opted not to do first five.
14 innings, five hits and 17 strikeouts. That's the combined performance of the past two starting pitchers for the Seattle Mariners; rock solid stuff against one of the best teams in baseball. This Braves lineup now looks to feast on a much worse starting pitcher in Emerson Hancock, after being held to three runs in the first two games of this series. Hancock has been hit hard nearly half the time (almost 60% to righties) even when isolating just his recent "great" starts, and his 5.36 expected ERA points to him not being a great pitcher, despite recent success. Hancock has also failed to throw more than 88 pitches in any start, so I'm backing the Braves to send him packing before 5.2 innings pitched.