The Braves finished the 2020 truncated season at 35-25, winning their third-straight division title under manager Brian Snitker.
The NL East champion Braves are now the No. 2 seed and will face No. 7 Cincinnati in a best-of-three playoff series starting Wednesday. (The Braves were the No. 2 seed last year when they lost in the NLDS to St. Louis.) Max Fried — nursing an ankle injury — is expected to make the Game 1 start.
Here are five things to know about these playoffs:
The road to 60. MLB’s 60-game season is the shortest of the modern era. Atlanta’s 35-25 finish is not their best in a 60-game span. The club’s best 60-game stretch last season was 40-20, done several times and last from game No. 91 to game No. 150.
The fewest games the club has played in a season in the modern era (since 1900) is 114 in 1994 when a players’ strike ended that season early.
The last time the franchise played a 60-game season was 1878, when the Boston Red Stockings went 41-19 to win the NL pennant.
First-round games. All of the Braves’ first-round, best-of-three series games will be played at Truist Park in Atlanta.
- Game 1: Noon, Wednesday (ESPN)
- Game 2: TBD, Thursday
- Game 3*: TBD, Friday
* — if necessary
The winner meets the winner of the Cubs-Marlins series in the Division Series, which will be played in Houston.
Series history. The Braves and Reds last met in the playoffs in 1995 when Atlanta swept Cincinnati on their way to a World Series title.
The playoff field. Baseball expanded the 2020 postseason to 16 teams.
The NL’s Milwaukee Brewers (29-31) and AL’s Houston Astros (29-31) enter the playoffs with a record below .500. The only other team in major league history to reach the playoffs with a losing record was the 1981 Kansas City Royals — at 50-53 overall, they made it by winning the second half in a strike-split season.
Who gets “home field?” The higher seeded team reaching the World Series will have last at-bats in Games 1 and 2 and if needed Games 6 and 7, not necessarily the team with the best record.
Seeding was determined as such:
- The top three seeds (Nos. 1-3) go to the three division winners (East, Central, West) in order of record.
- The next three seeds (Nos. 4-6) go to the three teams that finish in second place in their division, in order of record.
- The final two seeds (Nos. 7-8) go to the two teams with the next best records, regardless of division and division standing.
The specification was contained in the July 23, 2020, agreement between Major League Baseball and the players’ association to expand the playoffs following a regular season shortened due to the coronavirus.
The World Series will be played Oct. 20-28 at the Texas Rangers’ ballpark in Arlington, Texas.
This article contains information from the Associated Press.
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