Mariners welcome Jarred Kelenic and the Braves to town for battle of division leaders

Mariners vs Braves: Pitching Matchups

Monday, April 29th @ 6:40PM - Bryce Miller vs Max Fried
Tuesday, April 30th @ 6:40 PM - Luis Castillo vs Reynaldo Lopez
Wednesday, May 1st @ 12:40 PM - Emerson Hancock vs Chris Sale

After a rough start to the season, Fried has turned it around in his last few outings. He's coming off not just his best start of the season, but one of the best outings we've seen in the majors this year. His 87 game score was the 3rd best start by any pitcher this season, trailing Ronel Blanco's no-hitter and Tanner Houck's nearly identical outing to Frieds, where Houck struck out 3 more batters.

Reynaldo Lopez is actually the pitcher that we need to be worried about most this series, as he has been one of the best in baseball this season. We've talked about the Mariners pitching a lot over the last few weeks, and rightfully so. Lopez has actually done better than all of them, allowing just two earned runs through his four outings this year. He's gone 6+ IP in all of them, with just 14 hits allowed.

The Braves will throw Chris Sale in the series finale, who is starting to look like the Sale of old. He's gone 7 IP in each of his last three outings, just chewing up and spitting out hitters as he's averaged 95 pitchers per outing over that stretch. He's throwing a ton of strikes (71%), which is something that the Mariners need to be wary of to not fall behind in the count early.