Max Fried, Braves look for another win in Houston

Fresh off of a victory in Game 1, the Atlanta Braves will try to make it two straight wins against the Houston Astros when the World Series continues Wednesday night. Jorge Soler and Adam Duvall homered staking Atlanta to an early lead that they wouldn’t relinquish in a 6-2 win in Game 1. The Braves however lost Charlie Morton for the remainder of the series after he suffered a fractured fibula on a comebacker off the bat of Yuli Gurriel in the second inning.

The longer the series goes, the more impact Morton’s loss will have as Atlanta was forced to go to its bullpen early to cover the final 6 1/3 innings of Game 1. The Braves will send out Max Fried to start Game 2 who will be looking to bounce back from a rough outing in his last start in the NLCS against the Dodgers.

“Obviously, this is what you dream about as a kid,” Fried said when asked about making his first World Series appearance. “From the time that I started playing, you dream about playing in the World Series.”

Fried allowed two runs combined over his first two postseason starts but struggled in Game 5 against the Dodgers allowing eight hits and five runs in just 4 2/3 innings.

“Last outing, played a good team that’s seen me a little bit, and they were aggressive in the zone. When I made mistakes, they hit them,” Fried said of his last start. “Some balls that I thought might have gotten to the corner were hanging out over the plate, and they were taking really good swings.”

“The Astros lineup, it’s a really good team,” Fried said. “They take really good at-bats. They’re going to make you throw strikes. They’re not going to chase a ton. They’ve obviously been here. They’ve been in the moment. They’ve played a lot of playoff games.”

Houston will counter with right-hander Jose Urquidy who will be making his second start of the postseason and was hit hard in his one ALCS appearance. Urquidy allowed five hits and six runs (five earned) in just 1 2/3 innings in Game 3 against the Red Sox. He made 20 starts during the regular season where he posted a 3.62 ERA and a 4.14 FIP in 107 innings.

The Braves limited the Astros to just eight hits in Game 1. Jose Altuve, Alex Bregman and Carlos Correa were a combined 0-for-12 with a walk and six strikeouts. They will need to hold down that offense again to have a chance to return to Atlanta with a commanding lead in the series.

“If you asked us at the beginning of the year what our goal was, it was to win the World Series,” Fried said. “It’s kind of been the goal the whole entire year. Obviously, we’re excited about having this opportunity to kind of have that goal come to fruition, but we know that we’ve got four more games to win.”

“We’re here. We’re ready to go. We’re going to play some good baseball,” he added. “We’re going to leave it all out there. I think that’s — I think we’re just ready to get going.”

Game Info

Game Date/Time: Wednesday, October 27, 8:09 p.m. ET

Location: Minute Maid Park, Houston, Texas

TV: FOX

Radio: 680 / 93.7 FM The Fan, WNNX 100.5, Braves Radio Network, ESPN Radio

Latest odds from DraftKings Sportsbook: Astros -125, Braves +105