Its a winner-take-all Match Wednesday for a Place in the NLCS as the St. Louis Cardinals visit the Atlanta Braves in Game 5 of the NLDS.
In case you followed our recommendation, then you are ahead about the MLB betting this week as we chose St. Louis to beat visiting Atlanta in Game 4 of the NLDS to force this Sport 5. Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina — a Hall of Famer — added to his status.
With his team down 4-3 at the bottom of the eighth with two outs, Molina muscled a single into right field out of second. Then he struck on a one-out sacrifice fly to left field to score Kolten Wong for the victory.
Wednesday is a night of baseball on this game and in the LA Dodgers in their Sport 5. Clearly the 2 winners will meet at the NLCS. Its since dropping the 2012 Wild-Card Game to these 16, Atlantas initial winner-take-all game.
It is the Braves first because dropping the 2004 NLDS to Houston in five in a series. Its the very first St. Louis winner-take all game because beating the Pirates in Game 5 of those 2013 NLDS.
St. Louis has its own genius on the mound and possibly the best young pitcher in baseball at Jack Flaherty (11-8, 2.75). He had a historically good second half of this year, going 7-2 with a microscopic 0.91 ERA in 15 starts because the All-Star break having an opponents batting average of .142 along with 124 strikeouts in 99.1 innings.
Even the 23-year-old took the loss in Atlanta, however, it was a quality start because he allowed three runs and eight hits.
Atlanta scored a run at the bottom of the first to a Josh Donaldson RBI only — this could be his final match with the Braves should they shed with Donaldson set for free agency — and then two in the bottom of the seventh on a two-run homer by Adam Duvall. Flaherty was a bit worse over the street this year (3.31 ERA) than at home (2.37).
Will supervisor Mike Shildt trust nearer Carlos Martinez, if the Cardinals have an direct heading to the base of the ninth? Hes pitched 3.1 innings in this series with an ERA of all both 16.20 and was hammered by the Braves in the regular time also.
Martinez did get three major outs in the ninth inning on Monday even though allowing a leadoff double to Ronald Acuna Jr..
Clearly all hands will be on deck to the Braves, who are thrilled since they used six of the eight relievers on their own NLDS roster in Game 4 that Tuesday was an off day.
The men who did not pitch were Mark Melancon and Max Fried. Fried had pitched the first three games of this collection. He was a high school teammate of Flahertys.
Atlanta needs more offense from Donaldson (2-for-15) along with Freddie Freeman (2-for-16). They have united to proceed 1-for-8 with runners in scoring position. The Braves have won 79 games in the postseason and regular season in their final at-bat, most in the majors since Brian Snitker took over on May 17, 2016.
It is Mike Foltynewicz (8-6, 4.54) on the bump here. He became the first Braves pitcher to throw seven innings of scoreless ball since Tom Glavine of their 2001 NLDS and outdueled Flaherty at Game 2 allowing only three hits with seven strikeouts.
Foltynewicz had a 1.73 ERA over the past seven regular-season starts. Flaherty has been the only NL pitcher with a better ERA (0.96) during that interval. Wednesday will mark the fourth postseason beginning of Foltys career. The Braves lost his starts Games 4 and 1 of the NLDS season.
Free MLB picks:
Love, enjoy the below of 8 at BetOnline (and jump onto that before it falls to 7.5, which it likely will). Prior to the playoffs began, we chose a Nationals-Cardinals NLCS so we have to back St. Louis about the moneyline.