Murphy sits again, Ozuna moves up to fifth against Taijuan Walker and the Phillies

After Travis d’Arnaud and Jared Shuster teamed up for the latter’s first good start in the major leagues, “Little D” is back in the starting lineup for Friday night’s contest against the Phillies, perhaps to kindle that magic a second time. Unfortunately for the Braves, that means that because Marcell Ozuna is still listed at DH and Eddie Rosario is still playing left field, Sean “I am tied for second-most fWAR in MLB” Murphy is nowhere to be seen for the second time in three games.

Ozuna has moved up to fifth on the back of his hyper-productive May (.483 wOBA, .439 xwOBA). It’s his first time batting fifth since the last (meaningless) game of the 2022 season. Probably the biggest head-scratcher is the continued deference to Rosario, who now has a .304 xwOBA that he’s underhitting, and has compiled -0.3 fWAR on the year.

Because of Ozuna moving up, this is a novel lineup for the Braves. On the flip side, this is the team’s most common defensive arrangement (yes, the team’s most common defensive arrangement doesn’t feature Sean Murphy, who hasn’t been injured this year), and the team is 6-0 in those games. As far as how these guys have fared against Taijuan Walker...

As for the Phillies, they’re running out basically the same lineup as last night, but with Josh Harrison taking over for Edmundo Sosa at third base.

That’s a new look, theoretically, but its mostly the same as it was.