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Atlanta Braves to Host First-Place Nats This Week

By John Buhler

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The Atlanta Braves reluctantly welcome their rival the Washington Nationals to Turner Field for a three-game set this week.  Atlanta has struggled mightily versus the Nats this year, winning just one game against their NL East foe.  Washington is playing stellar baseball heading into this series, winning 8 of their last 10 ball games.  Atlanta hopes to change their luck against the DC baseball club after experiencing an awful sweep at Nationals Park last week.

-= Related: Manny Banuelos to Start in Place of Injured Williams Perez? =-

Tonight’s starters will be Shelby Miller (5-3, 1.94 ERA) for the Atlanta Braves and Jordan Zimmermann (5-5, 3.42 ERA) for the Washington Nationals.  I’m growing very tired of writing this but Shelby Miller still has not won a game for the Atlanta Braves since his near no-hit bid against the Miami Marlins down in South Beach on May 17th.  The lack of run support that Miller gets in his starts is astonishing to me, given that his ERA on the season has been at or below 2.00 for nearly the entire 2015 season.

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    • And of course, Miller will have to go against Atlanta’s favorite Nationals SP Jordan Zimmermann.  It seems like for every start that Zimmermann has against the Braves, he ends up making our hitters look like they belong in AAA Gwinnett.  He usually reserves his best games for when he faces the Nationals arch rival: the Atlanta Braves.

    Honestly, he is a terrific pitcher and I enjoy watching his starts.  That is until I realize his navy and red ball cap has a Curly W on it instead of the iconic Atlanta A.  Maybe he signs literally anywhere else this winter when he becomes a top-tier free agent starting pitcher and maybe I could then fully enjoy his starts.

    Wednesday’s start will feature Matt Wisler (1-1, 3.75 ERA) for the Braves and Doug Fister (3-3, 4.15 ERA).  This might be Atlanta’s best chance to win a game in this series at home.  Though Wisler fell back to Earth in his second career start last Thursday against the Washington Nationals, I believe that he will rebound at home and go a strong seven innings for the Atlanta Braves.  It will be a tight ball game but I think that Atlanta’s bats will come to live against Doug Fister in tomorrow night’s Game 2.

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    And in the series finale, Atlanta will try its luck against the best pitcher on Planet Earth Max Scherzer (9-5, 1.79 ERA).  Scherzer has completely dominated opponents in his last three starts, including a no-hitter against the Pittsburgh Pirates on June 20th.  Max has gone 3-0, allowing 2 earned runs in 26 innings during this three game stretch.  His strikeout to walk ratio is almost impossible to fathom (33 K’s to 1 BB).  He’s only allowed 6 hits in 3 games!  I would be completely shocked if the Atlanta Braves win this series finale given that Max Scherzer has been the best player in the MLB the last two plus weeks.

    Though it has not been officially announced, it is likely that Manny Banuelos will make his Atlanta Braves debut against Max Scherzer and the Washington Nationals Thursday night.  Banuelos came to the Atlanta Braves organization from the New York Yankees this winter in a deal that sent RP David Carpenter and LHP Chasen Shreve to the Bronx Bombers.

    After a very tough six-game road trip for the Atlanta Braves, why can’t we just face some lowly team instead of the Nationals when we get home?  Let’s hope that the Braves can at least take a game from Washington at home before the Ryan Sandberg-less Philadelphia Phillies come to town this weekend.  If Atlanta wants to make up ground in the National League East, now is the time to start beating up on the Washington Nationals.

    Next: Atlanta Braves: Who Makes The All-Star Team?

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