3 reasons the Mets shouldn't fear the Braves

2) NY Mets can take advantage of the Braves tendency to strike out

A strength of the Mets, their pitching, can take advantage of a major weakness of the Braves, their tendency to strike out a lot. The Braves have one of the league’s most powerful rosters in terms of home runs. With all of those heavy swings comes a lot of missing.

Only the Los Angeles Angels have struck out more this year than the Braves. Last year, they finished 11th in MLB. This season, it’s looking like they will at least lead the National League with the most Ks.

Meanwhile, it’s the Mets whose pitchers feast on opposing batters with strikeouts. From their top-tier starting rotation to the closer, Edwin Diaz, striking out batters is how they get a lot of their outs.  For a team like the Braves that doesn’t play much small ball, it feels like the Mets will have the advantage more often than not.

There will, of course, be days like the recent Taijuan Walker start where Atlanta beat him up. Those 5 recent games in Flushing were a nice test of what can happen over a longer series. The only thing missing was a change of location and Atlanta getting last ups.

After these four games, we’ll have a total of nine to reference. For Atlanta to strike any fear into the Mets, they’ll need to win at least three. With Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom slated to start the last two, that’s going to be a difficult task.