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Wood hopes to pitch Braves to sweep of Phillies

Apr 17, 2014 - 12:44 PM (SportsNetwork.com) - Alex Wood follows up an outstanding performance from teammate Julio Teheran on Thursday afternoon when the Atlanta Braves go for a sweep of a three-game set with the Philadelphia Phillies.

Wood is 2-1 with a 1.89 earned run average through three starts and gets the call today in the finale of this weather-shortened set that saw Tuesday's meeting rained out.

The 23-year-old lefty called his last outing "weird" as he got the win versus Washington on Saturday, but only lasted five innings as he had to work around six hits and three walks to allow just one run.

"It was definitely a pretty weird game from a lot of aspects, but somehow I managed to get through five," said Wood, who struck out eight. "Don't ask me how and if I could do it that way again, but we made it through and came out with the victory tonight."

Wood is 1-0 in his career versus the Phillies with a 3.86 ERA in seven meetings, two of those starts.

Atlanta is in position for the sweep after Teheran put together a three-hit shutout on Wednesday, the first of his career, in leading the Braves to a 1-0 win. He fanned four in his club's fifth straight victory.

"Julio was terrific to navigate a dominant left-hand lineup for his first career complete game," said Braves manager Fredi Gonzalez. "To make it 1-0 against that lineup in this ballpark, you can't ask for anything more."

Evan Gattis continued his hot play of late by going a career-high 4-for-4 with a solo home run. Gattis stroked two home runs in Monday's 9-6 win to open the series.

The Braves have homered in seven straight games since getting shut out by the New York Mets on April 8, going deep 16 times in that span.

Cliff Lee picked up a complete-game loss for the Phillies, striking out 13 batters while throwing a career-high 128 pitches.

"The pitch to Gattis I made a mistake," said Lee, who recorded his 29th career complete game. "I tried to elevate a fastball. It wasn't a bad spot, but it wasn't the spot I was trying to go to."

Despite being diagnosed with an inguinal hernia, A.J. Burnett will make the start for the Phillies in an attempt to pitch through the ailment.

Burnett was pulled after 4 1/3 innings versus the Miami Marlins on Friday due to discomfort, charged with a pair of runs on five hits and six walks in the no-decision.

While the hernia will eventually require surgery, Burnett for now plans to try to just manage the pain.

"I've pitched with worse. The other night was more of an uncertainty because I didn't know where it was coming from," the right-hander told the Phillies' website. "I didn't know if it was hip, groin, whether I tweaked something or pulled something. Now that I know upstairs what I'm dealing with, I can deal with it a lot better."

Burnett, 37, will also need to deal with some control issues as he has walked 14 batters through 16 innings while going 0-1 with a 3.94 ERA.

He is 5-12 with a 4.14 ERA in his career versus the Braves.

The Braves had gone 23-14 versus the Phillies over the previous two seasons, but lost five of nine in Philadelphia in 2013.