Ronald Acuña Jr. slots in at DH for Wednesday’s finale against Washington

After starting the last six games in right field, Ronald Acuña Jr. will slot in as the DH for the Atlanta Braves in Wednesday’s series finale against the Washington Nationals. The Braves have been cautious with Acuña, who has been bothered by lingering soreness in his knee. Wednesday’s day game presented a good opportunity to rest his legs without taking him out of the lineup.

Since Acuña returned to the outfield, the Braves have been using a lineup that often featured Travis d’Arnaud at catcher and William Contreras as the DH. d’Arnaud caught the first two games of the series and wasn’t going to catch a day game after a night game anyway. So Acuña will DH and Contreras will slot in behind the plate. The move also allows Atlanta to get Eddie Rosario back in the lineup in left field. Rosario singled and homered in Monday’s opener and is 8-for-20 over his last eight games.

For the Nationals, former Braves farmhand Joey Meneses has had a big series. Meneses had four hits in the opener and a hard hit double over the head of Acuña in right Tuesday night. He is 5-for-8 with a walk in the series and will hit third Wednesday.

Ildemaro Vargas gets another start at third base and has three hits in the series. Besides Meneses and Vargas, no other Nationals hitter has more than one hit over the first two games. Luke Voit will DH and bat cleanup and is 1-for-8 with six strikeouts in the series.

Wednesday’s game will get underway at 12:20 p.m. ET and can be seen on Bally Sports South.