On the Braves' last road trip, a national baseball writer and a St. Louis writer both mentioned to me that Freddie Freeman would probably be in their top five for National League MVP, and both said it with a tone of surprise.

  FreddieFree has that way with people who don't see him play every day. His performance is so consistent and strong, yet so understated and devoid of flash, that voters look at his season numbers and watch him play defense and think to themselves, why come this guy isn’t mentioned more as a top MVP candidate?

  But I’ve got a feeling that enough others will say that when it comes to voting, that when they look at his body of work they’ll have no choice but to put Freeman in the top five on this year’s ballot. I know he’d be my Braves MVP right now, and the only one who’d be even close would be Craig Kimbrel.

  Justin Upton carried the Braves in April and was on fire for much of August, Andrelton Simmons has been the best defensive player in baseball, Brian McCann has returned to form since coming back from shoulder surgery, Chris Johnson has been a big surprise with his consistent hitting and OK defense at third base, and Jason Heyward was stellar from the beginning of June until his broken jaw not quite two weeks ago.

  But on balance, over the course of the season, Freeman has been the Braves’ best hitter and most valuable player.

  He’s hitting .307 (11^th in the NL) with 44 extra-base hits, a .385 OBP (eighth in the NL) and an .868 OPS (ninth in the NL), and he’s fourth in the league with 93 RBIs in 466 at-bats. All others among the NL’s top-five RBI leaders have more than 500 at-bats (Freeman had a DL stint for an oblique strain in April).

  Basically it’s been a case of, the more important the situation, the better Freeman has been. With runners in scoring position, he’s second in the majors with a .439 average (50-for-114) with 14 extra-base hits, 26 walks, 23 strikeouts, a .535 OBP and .658 slugging percentage.

  In all situations with runners on base, Freeman is third in the NL with a .360 average (80-for-222) with 11 homers, a .438 OBP and .563 slugging percentage. With none on base, he’s hit .258 (63-for-244) with seven homers, a .335 OBP and .410 slugging percentage.

  The Braves have the best home record in baseball largely because of their pitching staff, but Freeman also has plenty to do with it: In 65 home games, he’s hit .325 with 30 extra-base hits (14 homers) and 63 RBIs, with a .403 OBP and .572 slugging percentage. (In 58 road games, Freeman has hit .287 with 14 extra-base hits (four homers), 30 RBIs, a .365 OBP and .386 slugging percentage.)

   Defensively, teammates will tell you he saves numerous errors with his stretches, both horizontal – seriously, how does he do the splits so often without hurting himself? – and vertical, reaching up with his considerable wingspan (he’s 6-foot-5).

   Few current first baseman pick balls as well as he does, and he’s got one of the best arms I’ve seen on a first baseman, which enables him to start more successful 3-6-3 double plays than most.

   Best hitter and strong defender at a key position on the team with baseball’s best record? Yeah, I’d say that warrants at least top-five MVP consideration.

 • Schafer no decoration: Did you see Jordan Schafer’s comment after his four-hit, three-stolen-base game Monday? Gotta love it. If you know the guy, you know they were said in his disarming way, with the kind of swagger that teammates like to see, not the kind of cockiness that turns off anyone. Schafer is like that. Anyway, I’ll get to the comment in a moment.

   After struggling in his initial return from a five-week stint on the DL for a stress fracture near his right ankle, it looks like Schafer is getting back into his pre-injury groove. This is particularly important for the Braves right now, since he’s their only legit quality leadoff hitter with Heyward on the DL.

   Schafer is 11-for-34 (.324) with a double, a triple, four RBIs, a .361 OBP and seven stolen bases in his past eight games, after going 3-for-34 (.088) with no extra-base hits, no RBIs, a .162 OBP and four steals in his first 10 games off the DL.

   Schafer has 23 strikeouts and only five walks in 18 games since the DL stint, but also has 11 stolen bases in that period. Hard to believe, but that matches the highest season total among other Braves (B.J. Upton’s 11).

  Schafer has 20 stolen bases for the season, tied for 10^th in the NL and 38 percent of the Braves’ team total (53). His three-steal  game Sunday was the first by a Brave since Willie Harris in 2007.

  Anyway, I asked Schafer after the game how much he looked to take advantage of a slow-delivery pitcher like Daisuke Matsuzaka on Monday.

  “I mean, I’m not on the bases for decoration,” he said, smiling. “When I get on there I’m trying to go. As fast as I can. I’m not trying to wait around and stand there, I’m trying to take off.”

  He left the game after his back spasmed on his final two swings on a seventh-inning at-bat, and when he ran to first on that single. But Schafer said it was nothing serious and he thought he’d be ready to play tonight.

BRAVES LINEUP Wednesday

1. B.J. Upton cf
2. JUpton rf
3. Freeman 1b
4. Gattis lf
5. Laird c
6. EJohnson 3b
7. Uggla 2b
8. Paul Janish ss
9. Loe p

•The Return of El Oso Blanco: Sounds like a spaghetti western directed by Sergio Leone or Robert Rodriguez. Instead, it’s Evan Gattis due to rejoin the Braves today after racking up six hits including three doubles and a home run in his three-game stint with Triple-A Gwinnett over the holiday weekend.

  The big rookie was sent down to get some ABs, sinc he hadn’t been playing much at all in the past couple of weeks after struggling since his return from a DL stint for a strained oblique.

   The Braves watched Gattis to see some pitches, get some ABs and get his big bat going again, since he’s potentially a big weapon for them down the stretch and in the playoffs. Remember how Gattis started out the season, when he was hands-down the most dangerous pinch-hitter in baseball, with four pinch-hit homers before most of the baseball world even knew of the long and winding back story?

   There have been quite a few games in the past couple of months where Gattis could have made a difference if he were still PHing at anything close to the level of damage he was inflicting early in the season. It’ll be interesting to see how Fredi Gonzalez uses him the rest of the regular season.

 •Batting title update: If Chris Johnson wins the batting title, it would break a string of NL batting-average leaders coming from five different teams. Not to mention, it would also give the Braves two batting titles from third baseman with the initials C.J. in a six-year span. Chipper won it in 2008 with a .364 average at age 36.

  Wait a second. I think that demands a pause and a paragraph. Because the old Battle Axe broke so many records and set so many standards in the last years of his career, I think we too easily look past the fact that Chipper hit .364 with a league-leading .470 OBP and 1.044 OPS at thirty-freakin’-six! And finished 12^th in the MVP balloting that year.

  OK, back to current C.J. Chris Johnson’s .334 average entering Tuesday was the NL leader by five points over Colorado’s Michael Cuddyer, with Yadier Molina (.327) the only other NL hitter over .320.

  If Johnson wins, the Braves will be the only NL team with two batting-title winners in the past six years.

  Now, if you go back just one more year, the Rockies would also have two – Carlos Gonzalez (.336) in 2010 and Matt Holliday (.340) in 2007. And if go back a few more years, Giants would have two in the past 10 years -- Buster Posey (.336) in 2012 and Barry Bonds (.370) in 2002. But Colorado has high-altitude home games and Bonds had … well, you know.

  By the way, as many of you know, the last Braves hitter to win a batting title before Chipper was yet another third baseman. Terry Pendleton won the batting title with a .319 average in his 1991 MVP season, and now gives instructions and fist-bumps to Johnson and other Braves when they get to first base (he is, of course, Atlanta’s first-base coach).

  One more note on that: Pendleton finished just ahead of Bonds on the MVP ballot in 1991, but how many remember that Pendleton was also MVP runner-up the next year? Yes, he finished behind Bonds and ahead of Gary Sheffield in ’92.

  • B.J. Upton’s turnaround: Speaking of B.J. (see Schafer note above), he’s really shown signs lately of breaking out of his epic funk. The Braves are privately crossing fingers and toes and hoping that this is the start of one of his trademark late-season surges, and not just a momentary pause in his season-long struggles.

  He’s 9-for-21 with two doubles, a home run and four RBIs in his past six games, after going 1-for-32 with one walk and 16 strikeouts in his previous 13 games, which had dropped his average to a majors-worst .182 on Aug. 25.

   “He’s been swinging the bat great,” Freeman said after Upton had a couple of doubles in Monday’s 13-5 dismantling of the Mets. “You could tell in BP last week that he was almost there. He was back-spinning balls to right-center. He was just on the verge of breaking out, and now here he goes.

  “I think he seems to do very well in September, and he’s getting hot again. That’s just what we need, so hopefully he can carry that on.”

  • Uggla still struggling: Since returning from a DL stint for LASIK eye surgery, Dan Uggla still isn’t hitting, but he’s at least drawing walks again, which might be a sign that he’s seeing the ball better. He’s 3-for-18 with three singles, no RBIs, six walks and five strikeouts since coming off the DL. That’s a .167 average and .400 OBP during that stretch.

  Uggla’s majors-worst average has sunk to .185, including .160 at home. He’s hit .146 (13-for-89) with runners in scoring position, third-lowest in the NL (B.J. Upton is second-lowest at .123, up significantly after three RISP hits in the past week).

  He still has the team’s second-most homers (21) behind Justin Upton (24), but Uggla has hit .103 with no homers in 78 at-bats over his past 23 games, with 28 strikeouts, a .128 slugging percentage and four RBIs in that stretch.

  • J-Up’s ups (and downs): Speaking of Justin Upton, his power binges and hot/cold cycles continue to boggle the mind.

 He had a majors-leading 12 homers in April, then four in three-month stretch May through July, then eight in his first 16 games in August, during which he went 22-for-63 (.349) with 12 extra-base hits, 16 RBIs and a .794 slugging percentage.

  In nine games since, J-Up has gone 6-for-29 (.207) with no homers, one double, no RBIs and a .241 slugging percentage.

 • Here's one from the The White Stripes, which you can hear by clicking here. Cool, odd song.

“I THINK I SMELL A RAT” by The White Stripes
Oh I think I smell a rat
I think I smell a rat
all you little kids seem to think you know just where it's at
Oh I think I smell a rat
walking down the street carrying a baseball bat
Oh I think I smell a rat

Oh I think I smell a rat
Oh I think I smell a rat
all you little kids seem to think you know just where is at
Oh I think I smell a rat
using your mother and father for a welcome mat
Oh I think I smell a rat