Back Braves to Beat Cardinals

Braves vs. Cardinals, 7:45 ET

My one loss yesterday was on the Dodgers and Diamondbacks. Baseball is one of those sports that allows any team to win on any given day. Yesterday the Dodgers just couldn't get a hit off of their opponent when they needed and ultimately we fell. Now we get a different opportunity as I think the Braves have a good chance to win this one.

The Braves ended up dropping their last game against the Nationals, but looked very good in the first two games of the series. Matt Olson has looked great to start the year and put up two home runs to go along with a .364 average. Charlie Morton has been a great addition for the Braves since he came to them two years ago. Morton wasn't phenomenal last season, he only had one appearance for them in the postseason and it also wasn't a pretty one. But, overall last year, the team is better with Morton on the mound than they are without him on the squad. Last year he posted a 4.34 ERA and was still able to strike out 205 hitters. Most Cardinals hitters haven't had much success against Morton. The two best hitter are the guys you'd expect: Nolan Arenado and Paul Goldscmidt. He did have one start against the Cardinals in St. Louis last year and allowed four earned runs over five innings.

The Cardinals dropped their season opener and came back with two convincing wins. The season-opening loss was a game they had under control too. They ultimately had a bullpen meltdown and lost the game. But, over three games, they have put up 22 runs and are batting .373 as a team. I can't say they faced bad pitching or anything either, it was the Blue Jays, a team with a decent enough rotation. Their pitching hasn't looked great though as they allowed 15 runs over the three games. They are putting Jake Woodford out today and he was mostly a reliever last season with 27 appearances and just one start on the year. He was able to post a 2.23 ERA during the season. As you'd expect from a reliever, there were limited number of opportunities against him from the Braves hitters. They are 2-for-8 against him, but only Kevin Pillar has seen him more than once.

Both of these teams have very high hopes for the season and this should be an interesting series to see where both of them are at to start the year. I'm going to back the Braves in this game as Morton is a significantly better pitcher than Woodford. I think we are getting a good value on him at -125 in the game and will take the Braves to win the game.

For more sports betting information and plays, follow David on Twitter: @futureprez2024