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The Sunday baseball card often looks packed. Every team plays almost every Sunday, so you have a lot of games to choose from. As a sports bettor, that’s a good thing because you have opportunities for the books to make mistakes. However, it also takes longer for you to evaluate each game. Let me do the work for you and give you a risky, but fun, look at a game between the Braves and the Rockies.
The Braves come into the game with a strong record for the year, and the start that everyone hoped they would get off to after the rough last season. It is amazing what can happen when you don’t have constant injuries to your team. In fairness, there are still some missing pieces, but Atlanta has been able to navigate those better than it did last year. It is only the start of May, and the NL East looks like theirs to lose.
Atlanta Braves pitcher Spencer Strider delivers a pitch in the first inning against the Arizona Diamondbacks in Atlanta on April 5, 2024. (John Bazemore/AP)
To make matters worse for the teams chasing them, they are sending out a great starter to the mound, Spencer Strider. This will be the season debut for Strider, and I have to expect that the Braves will be rather cautious with him. Last season, he turned in 23 starts and accumulated 125.1 innings over the season. He didn’t have a great year, going 7-14 with a 4.45 ERA and a 1.40 WHIP. The good news for him is that he gets to come back against a soft-hitting Rockies team. However, they are 8-for-32 overall against him, but only have two RBIs and 14 strikeouts.
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The Colorado Rockies were expected to be the worst team in baseball by most analysts. That hasn’t proven to be the case, as it seems like they have some fight in them this year. Before we start printing playoff tickets, the team is still under .500 and won’t sniff the postseason. However, for a team that won 43 games last year and didn’t have 15 wins until June 16th, they are at least ahead of that pace.
Colorado Rockies pitcher Kyle Freeland delivers a pitch in the first inning against the Toronto Blue Jays at Coors Field. (Ron Chenoy/Imagn Images)
There are a number of reasons the team is performing better — pride, better hitting and better pitching, etc. To me, one guy specifically stands out who has had a good start to the season, and that is today’s starter, Kyle Freeland. For the year, Freeland is 1-2 with a 3.48 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. I’ve been a Freeland fan for many years and think he has been buried a bit with the Rockies. He was never likely to be an Ace with a club, but he probably could’ve been a reliable arm and even a postseason starter. He only has one start at home this year, but it was a very good one, going 6.1 innings and allowing just one run on three hits.
The bad news for the Rockies and Freeland is that the club has feasted on his pitching over the years. Collectively, the Braves are 45-for-137 against him, leading to a .328 average. Ozzie Albies is the guy I’m locked in on for 3+ total bases and may even do 4+ and 5+ as he is hitting 11-for-24 with four extra-base hits against Freeland.
Atlanta Braves’ Ozzie Albies and Eli White celebrate after scoring on a double by Matt Olson during the second inning against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Los Angeles on April 2, 2025. (Kevork Djansezian/AP)
Another one worth playing is Mauricio Dubon, who is 7-for-19 with four extra-base hits off of Freeland. Albies will be an official play, but I’m going to do a Same Game Parlay for a bit of Sunday fun with 2+ total bases from Albies (3+), Dubon, Mike Yastrzemski and Austin Rile. That pays out at 12:1.
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For more sports betting information and plays, follow David on X/Twitter: @futureprez2024