Wednesday is getaway day in the Queen City, and as a result, we get a chance to see the Cincinnati Reds and the Atlanta Braves on national television in a rare appearance for both outfits.
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ODDS ANALYSIS
It's tough to say anything nice about these two teams this year. The Braves are out 10.96 units on the campaign and are already 24 games out of the lead in the NL East. The Reds are -14.15 units and 21.5 games down to the Cubs in the NL Central.
If there is a positive though, it's the fact that Atlanta has been better on the road (18-24) than at home (14-36), while the Reds won their 20th game of the season at the Great American Ball Park on Sunday to wrap up their series with the Brewers.
PITCHING MATCHUP
The Reds haven't had a ton of bright spots this year, but Anthony DeSclafani has been chief amongst them. He's had five straight quality starts dating back to the middle of June, and in that mix, he beat the Rangers and Cubs on the road and had the Reds in a spot to beat the Nationals in D.C. as well.
The season is still relatively young for DeSclafani, as he's only thrown 42.1 innings. However, his 2.55 ERA and 37/9 K/BB ratio are definitely signs that he's the future ace this staff badly needs.
Journeyman Lucas Harrell is getting the ball for the Braves on Wednesday afternoon. He's making just his fourth big league start since 2014 when he was in the Astros organization, and he's hoping that it goes better than his last start did against the Rockies. The righty surrendered seven hits and seven runs (five earned) over just 3.2 innings of work, and he needed 83 pitches to do so. Even against a bad team like Cincinnati though, that just isn't going to cut it.
LIVE BETTING
The bad news for DeSclafani is that he was blown to bits when he last faced the Braves in June, allowing four runs over just 2.2 innings of work. When the righty is demonstrating great control, he's really tough to hit. However, against Atlanta, he threw just over 55 percent of his pitches for strikes, and his stuff was incredibly hittable as a result.
The Braves don't have a great lineup, but any set of big leaguers will be able to take any pitcher for a ride who can't locate his simple fastball or changeup. DeSclafani has been good about it in his last two starts, amassing 14 strikeouts without issuing a walk in a total of 12 frames, but he's still throwing too many balls and getting behind in too many counts for our liking.
QUICK PICK
This game really is a matter of the blind leading the blind, and handicappers are probably going to have a real tough time figuring out what to do, especially with Harrell.
Even though Harrell is a journeyman, we still don't see all that much of a difference between these two arms, especially when you consider the fact that DeSclafani is going to end up being a favorite and probably a relatively big one at that in this game. Even though DeSclafani has pitched well of late and has kept his Reds in the mix in a lot of games, we think this is the day he's going to end up getting beaten because his offense just doesn't do the job. It isn't a mistake that this team enters this series having scored a total of just 13 runs in its last six games.
MLB Odds: Atlanta 3, Cincinnati 2
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