The Braves Are Going To Get Their 15th Straight Division Title

One of the biggest reasons that I wanted to come back to the Village Tavern was to be able to write some blog articles about the Atlanta Braves. Having spent the majority of my life in Georgia, the Braves have always been my favorite professional sports team. In fact, my earliest memory is a Braves game that my family attended for my 6th birthday in 1988. I don’t remember much about the game itself, but I remember the view from our seats halfway up the third base line. I also remember getting sunburned on my legs. Granted, these aren’t great baseball insights, but, then again, I was only six years old. The next year (1989), my family attended a dinner and baseball clinic that the Atlanta organization put on for the fans. I took grounders from Mark Lemke and spent sometime on the field of Atlanta Fulton County Stadium (fondly called the “Launching Pad” because of its propensity to yield home runs). Other early games that I attended include the 1991 NLCS game 1 against the Pittsburgh Pirates (Bobby Bonilla, Andy Van Slyke, and Barry Bonds were all on this Pirates team) and a LA Dodgers game that year (it was Darryl Strawberry’s first season with the Dodgers and everyone was wearing Strawberry foam hats - remember, I was 9 so I was focused in on the nuisances of the game).

I give you all of this background just to prove that I was raised a Braves fan and have been a loyal follower ever since that time (when a team is as successful as the Braves, you get a lot of bandwagon fans). Furthermore, I’m knowledgeable about the Braves because I’ve been following them consistently since 1991. Given my knowledge of this team’s history, I can safely say that the Braves are going to win their 15th straight division title. As I write this article, the Braves are 16-19, sitting 6.0 games behind the New York Mets. They’ve been as many as 9 games behind the Mets thus far this season. Following the Braves this season, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard that their run is over. The Mets are too good and too dominant; the Braves are too young and inexperienced. While the Braves maybe younger than most of their previous years (except last year when some of these same players were rookies), they have plenty of talent and experience to win the division title. Let’s examine the facts:

1. The Braves have one of the game’s best players in his prime in Andruw Jones. Andruw had a monster year last year when he turned 28 at the beginning of the season. He’s now 29 and firmly entrenched in the prime years of his career (historically, the prime years for a major league baseball position players are 28-34). Regardless of how the baseball writer’s voted last season, he was the Most Valuable Player on any team last year (by the way, we need a definitive ruling on the actual meaning of this award since every league treats it differently: in baseball, it’s the person with the best all-around number (Pujolos); in basketball, it’s the player who’s most indispensable to his team (Nash the past two seasons); in football, it’s the guy that has a record setting season (Peyton the year before and then Alexander this season)). Andruw will continue to put up these kinds of numbers this season. Also, it’s not just straight numbers with Andruw. He probably saves 2-3 runs a week with his defense in center field (8 consecutive Gold Gloves), and no National Player is better in the clutch (see 21 game-winning RBI and 19 late-inning home runs last season).

2. The Mets record is skewed by playing bad teams. Before this week, the Mets had played 1 team with a record above .500. I’m sorry, but if you are a good team (and let’s be honest, the Mets are good team - definitely talented enough to challenge for the division title and the wild card), you should be off to a great start when the schedule makers help you out so much. As the season progresses, the Mets will have to play more teams with records above .500, and their record will suffer because of it. You can already see this effect beginning to occur as the Braves have made up 3 games on the Mets since their series closed last Sunday (the Mets played the above .500 Phillies and the .500 Brewers this week).

3. The Braves sophomores aren’t really slumping. Much has been made of the supposed sophomore struggles of many of the Braves 2nd year players (specifically OF Ryan Langerhans, C Brian McCann, and OF Jeff Francoeur). While Jeff’s average has suffered early in the season (remember he came up last July and hit .300 with 14 HR’s, 45 RBI’s), he’s still been putting up decent RBI and HR numbers (he’s currently on pace for 28 HR’s and 120 RBI’s while “struggling”). Furthermore, in the last 10 games, Francoeur has begun to improve his batting average hitting by hitting .326 in that span along with a 10-game hitting streak. His early season struggles are just part of the adjustment to Major League Baseball. When you come up as a rookie, you have an advantage as a hitter because teams do not have a great scouting report against you. As you get more plate appearances (1/2 of a season’s worth from last year), teams can develop a way to pitch you. The hitter must then learn how teams are pitching him and make the necessary adjustments. Jeff is beginning to make these adjustments over the last 10 games. McCann is actually hitting 69 points higher this season than last (.347 compared to .278). Ryan Langerhans is hitting for the exact same batting average that he has in each of his major league seasons (.267). I think it’s safe to say that the “slump” talk has been overblown.

4. The Mets don’t have the starting pitching to match the Braves over the course of the season. I’ll give you that Pedro and Glavine are a solid 1-2 combination at the beginning of a rotation (even if they are old and susceptible to breaking down), but it’s hard to have worse 3, 4, and 5 starters than the Mets. Steve Trachsel, Jeremi Gonzalez, and Jose Lima are hardly the kind of pitching depth you want when you are trying to knock-off the 14-time defending champs. Trachsel’s ERA is 4.91, Lima’s currently sits at 9.31, and Gonzalez is coming off two right elbow surgeries in the past two seasons. The Mets may have a potent offense, but it isn’t nearly good enough to carry these 3 sub-par starters all season long. You need deep starting pitching to be successful over the course of a 162 game season.

In conclusion, it’s still really early in the season. I’m not sure why everyone has been so quick to dismiss the Braves’ chances at a fifteenth straight division title. Hopefully my arguments have made you think twice before you dismiss this team like all of the “experts” have done. There is a reason that lifetime baseball guys tell you not to check the standings until the end of May.