Atlanta brings a 4-game NL East cushion into Philadelphia for the first of 7 meetings this month, and Friday's opener could go a long way toward deciding who's playing October baseball as the division champ.
Sale hasn't allowed an earned run over his last outing and is throwing as well as anyone in baseball right now, and Atlanta still controls the division. That's enough to lean toward the Braves in a game priced this evenly, even walking into a hostile Philadelphia crowd.
+still within striking distance with 6 more meetings left
−Lost their last game before this series
−Banks and Keller both out for the season
−Kilian also down, bullpen margin thin
Chris Sale (13-9, 2.06 ERA) takes the ball for Atlanta, Cristopher Sánchez (16-4, 2.52 ERA) for Philadelphia, and both are squarely in the NL Cy Young conversation heading into the 6:40 PM ET first pitch at Citizens Bank Park. It's as good a pitching matchup as September offers — two lefties who've both been nearly untouchable the last month, opening a set that runs 7 games between these two clubs before the year is out.
Both rotations are deeper than just their aces, but both bullpens are running thin behind them. Atlanta has already lost Robert Suarez and Joe Jimenez for the year, with Reynaldo Lopez still working his way back from a knee issue. Philadelphia is missing Tanner Banks and Brad Keller to season-ending elbow procedures, with Caleb Kilian also down. Neither manager wants this one turning into a bullpen game, and the market's priced it that way — this is close to a coin flip on the moneyline with Philadelphia catching a spread number built for a low-scoring, tight finish.
There's a bigger backdrop here too. Ronald Acuña Jr. became the fastest player to reach 200 home runs and 200 stolen bases during Atlanta's most recent series, and the Braves are still holding first place in a division they've controlled most of the summer. Philadelphia has clawed back to within 4 games without much separation left to make up before the calendar turns — and 6 more meetings against this exact opponent are still on the schedule after Friday.
Atlanta is missing more than its bullpen pieces — Spencer Strider and Spencer Schwellenbach are both done for the season, and Jurickson Profar's suspension has cost the outfield a bat all year, so the position-player depth chart is thinner than the record suggests. Philadelphia's lineup, by contrast, has stayed mostly intact aside from its own bullpen losses, which is part of why Sánchez has been able to lean on a deep, competent group behind him even on nights his own stuff isn't perfect.
Whichever way Friday goes, it's the first domino in a set that could functionally decide the NL East before September is over — and with both of these arms going, neither side should expect it to get out of hand early.
