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Braves vs. Cubs Prediction, Odds and Key Players for Wednesday, May 22

After a series in Atlanta last week, the Cubs and Braves meet again, in Chicago this time around for a midweek series at legendary Wrigley Field.

By William Schwartz

Pittsburgh Pirates v Chicago Cubs
Pittsburgh Pirates v Chicago Cubs / Quinn Harris/GettyImages
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It took 10 innings, but the Chicago Cubs were able to pull out a win in the first game out of three against the Atlanta Braves at Wrigley Field.

Chicago pulled itself out of a pair of small deficits before Nico Hoerner walked things off in extras, granting it a big series-opening win against a fellow National League postseason contender.

Of course, these two teams did play a series recently -- the Braves won a tight first game before the squads traded more lopsided victories to wrap things up.

Now, Chicago is a game away from at least leveling the score on the season with a series win of its own, and setting itself up for a potential sweep.

Conversely, the Braves could strike back and set up an intriguing rubber match. With fascinating arms on the mound for both squads, let's take a look at what we could expect from the matchup, and a bet to make.

Braves vs. Cubs Odds, Run Line and Total

Run Line

  • Braves -1.5 (+105)
  • Cubs +1.5 (-125)

Moneyline

  • Braves: -135
  • Cubs: +114

Total

  • 9 (Over -105/Under -115)

Odds via DraftKings Sportsbook.

Braves vs. Cubs Betting Trends

  • The Cubs are 15-9 straight up at home
  • The Cubs are 11-15 straight up after a win
  • The Braves are 11-6 straight up after a loss
  • The under hits 58.3% of the time at Wrigley Field this season

Braves vs. Cubs How To Watch

Date: Wednesday, May 22
Game Time: 7:40 PM
Venue: Wrigley Field, Chicago, IL
How To Watch: (TV, Streaming): Bally Sports South, Fubo, MLB.TV
Cubs Record: 27-22
Braves Record: 27-18

Braves vs. Cubs Key Players To Watch

Braves

Matt Olson: The slugging first baseman has gotten hot over the past week, with an OPS pushing 1.100. It hasn't been the type of power surge that you would expect to fuel those kinds of numbers from him, as he's mostly been doing a solid job of getting on base. Overall, it's been a tough start to the season for the defending Major League home run leader, so it's great from Atlanta's perspective to see him heat up. However, he's still struggled against left-handed pitching, so we'll have to see if he can keep his good form going against Chicago's Justin Steele.

Cubs

Christopher Morel: After a power surge early in May, things have cooled off for the Cubs' slugging third baseman. Over the past week, he's running an OPS below .500 and has only recorded one extra base hit, but is still a fixture in the middle of Chicago's lineup. For the team to get back to consistent winning, it'll need him to dial up his performance, and this could be just the game for it to happen. As tough as Fried is, Morel has done some of his best work against left-handed pitching, so this could be an opportunity for him to get back on track.

Cubs vs. Braves Prediction and Pick

It's been an uneven start to the season for both of these contenders, and with a 4-6 record in the past 10 games for each squad, there's no sign of it turning around in the immediate future. However, a series win would go a long way towards changing the tenor around either team, while another tough defeat could start to raise some questions. With everything on the line in Wednesday's game two, both teams will have excellent, even if embattled lefties on the bump.

Chicago's Justin Steele has had a really tough time to start the year after a nearly Cy Young-winning 2023 campaign, as he's the not-so-proud owner of an ERA up over 5.00 and a WHIP over 1.20 after four starts, each of which came in a Cubs loss.

On the other side of things, it's Atlanta's Max Fried, the 2022 NL Cy Young runner-up, who is off to a better start in general, but has given up at least three runs in two of his past three starts.

The troubling thing for Steele is that he doesn't appear to be getting unlucky -- he's been poor. Even beyond traditional metrics, his advanced numbers are all worse than last year.

Despite a small pitch velocity bump, he's getting hit much harder, and more into the air as compared to last year. Of course, he's been rehabbing an injury -- there's little reason to believe that his poor performance is much more than shaking off the rust and getting back to speed; a pair of really strong seasons should easily outweigh a couple of rough starts.

As far as Fried, somehow he's maintained his ability to limit hard contact while inducing chases and whiffs, but has lost ground in most other metrics. There's no reason he should continue to perform below his standard while still forcing hitters to hit the ball weakly, so we should believe in him to bounce back as well.

These offenses are both ice cold. For starters, Chicago's series-opening win snapped a streak of three straight games in which they scored fewer than four runs, and they haven't scored at least five since the 7-0 win over the Braves last week.

As for Atlanta, they haven't scored over five runs in a game since their last win over the Cubs, as they really struggled in the final game of that series and then in the next few against the Padres.

With two struggling offenses and pitchers poised to take a step up, expect a low-scoring affair in a ballpark that has yielded plenty of those thus far. It should be a hard-fought game, and with a premium placed on every run, very entertaining television.

Pick: Under 9 runs (-115)

Note: Game odds are subject to change.

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