The Atlanta Braves got Chris Sale on the mound Monday night against the Los Angeles Angels, a matchup that came after a disappointing series against the Arizona Diamondbacks. Sale started opposite José Soriano on April 6, 2026, in a game built around two starters who had not given hitters much to work with.
Sale entered with a 0.75 ERA in two starts and 12.0 innings pitched, with four hits allowed and no earned runs. He had struck out 11 while walking four, a 7.1 percent walk rate that was the highest of his career, even as he was generating ground balls at a 48.3 percent clip. His strikeout rate sat at 21.4 percent, well below his 32.3 percent career mark, and he had been battling flu symptoms in his last game. Soriano had been even stingier in his first two starts, throwing 12.0 innings without allowing an earned run, giving up four hits, walking four and striking out 11 while holding hitters to a.105 average.
The matchup also carried a few individual numbers that mattered. Matt Olson had gone 3-for-3 against Soriano with a.333 average and 1.000 OPS, while Ronald Acuña Jr., Ozzie Albies, Austin Riley and Michael Harris II were hitless against him. On the other side, Jorge Soler had 14 at-bats against Sale and was hitting.143 with a.536 OPS, while Mike Trout had 20 at-bats against Sale with one home run, a.300 average and a.940 OPS, though Trout was day-to-day.
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That is what made Monday’s game more than a standard early-April stop: the Braves needed a reset after Arizona, and they were asking Sale to do it against a starter who had shut down nearly everyone he had seen. The cleanest way for Atlanta to answer the loss in the desert was with a win shaped by its ace, but the numbers suggested neither lineup was likely to get many easy swings.
