​The Braves open a series in St. Louis on Friday night, and they’ve moved Mike Yastrzemski up to sixth in the order following his grand slam in Thursday’s win over the Pirates. He began the season hitting fifth but quickly slid down the lineup as April’s struggles mounted. The last time he reached as high as sixth was May 4. It hasn’t been a banner year for Yastrzemski, as he posted sub-.300 wOBAs and xwOBAs in both April and June. May was better for him, producing a .338 xwOBA and an inflated .414 wOBA due to favorable outcomes, but June brought a team-wide slump that also affected him. Nonetheless, he’s been heating up in July with a .409 wOBA and a .442 xwOBA, so elevating him in the lineup makes sense as the Braves try to navigate ongoing struggles from Austin Riley and Dominic Smith. Consequently, Atlanta has rolled out a fresh lineup for the game—the Braves’ 93rd lineup in 76 games.
On the other side, the Cardinals have not yet released their lineup publicly, with their media staff likely busy preparing to cover the anticipated JJ Wetherholt extension. Wetherholt is still batting leadoff in a lineup that otherwise features familiar names if you’ve followed the prior series between these two clubs in Atlanta. This marks a new arrangement for St. Louis, a club that doesn’t typically shuffle as much as some others (the Cardinals rank 62nd in 93 games for lineups shuffled), opting to stack a number of right-handed hitters toward the bottom of the order against Chris Sale.
Looking at the Braves’ lineup against Leahy, there are only a handful of collective plate appearances (PAs) for Atlanta, and everyone except Michael Harris II and Jim Jarvis has faced him at least once. The overall matchup data shows a humorous disparity: a collective .201 wOBA versus Leahy but an expected wOBA of .518 in 15 total PAs. That gap is driven in part by Yastrzemski and Riley, who each crushed a ball off him previously, only to see it end up as an out rather than the anticipated extra-base hit.
Among the entire St. Louis lineup, the only hitter known to have faced Chris Sale previously is Nelson Velázquez, who managed a weak flyout and a walk against Sale back in 2023—a small, almost quirky footnote in the buildup to this series. The novelty of the matchup adds a layer of intrigue to what should be an interesting interleague clash as the Braves and Cardinals meet in St. Louis.