HOUSTON — As Harry James and Kitty Kallen so famously expressed, “It’s been a long, long time.”
That long, long time between 2001 and 2020 felt like an eternity for the Braves, the community and passionate supporters nationwide. The franchise most recently experienced October goodness when it swept the Astros in the 2001 National League Division Series. Little did the Braves know that would be their last time capturing that feeling in nearly two decades.
Two waits have ended in the past week. Exactly one week after earning their first postseason series victory in 19 years, the Braves are moving on again. They advanced to the NL Championship Series by defeating the Marlins 7-0 in Game 3 of the NLDS on Thursday, completing their second consecutive postseason series sweep. It was the first time the Marlins have lost a postseason series (7-1).
“I’m glad we can do it (for our fans and community) because this has been a tough time for all of us," manager Brian Snitker said. “In this sport, in our world, in our city, in our fan base; I love the fact that we can give these people something to look forward to and watch. These guys are very entertaining. They play their hearts out every night. I’m so proud of them. And I’m equally proud that we can give our fan base something to cheer about and get excited about for the next couple weeks.”
The series was held in Houston as part of MLB’s 2020 postseason bubble. The Braves, who are 5-0 since the regular season concluded, will move on to Arlington, Texas, to face the winner of the best-of-five Dodgers-Padres NLDS. The Dodgers lead the series 2-0 entering Thursday night.
“I’m going to watch as much as I can (of the Dodgers-Padres game),” said Snitker, who wasn’t sure if he could stay up to watch the rest of the night-time series in its entirety. “I hope they beat each other up for the next couple days. Now that we know we’re going, we’re absolutely going to be in tune with what’s going on."
Ronald Acuna, naturally, was the Braves’ spark plug, drawing a leadoff walk off Sixto Sanchez in the third. Freddie Freeman, who might soon be named the NL season MVP, followed with his own single. Marcell Ozuna singled home the game’s first run.
If there was an NLDS MVP, it would go to catcher Travis d’Arnaud, who hit 6-for-10 with two doubles, two homers and seven RBIs in the series. For the third consecutive game, he had a key hit, slamming a double to center that scored two more runs and put the Braves up by three. He later scored on Dansby Swanson’s sacrifice fly to complete the four-run frame.
D’Arnaud’s seven RBIs set a record for most by a catcher in a Division Series. Swanson’s five RBIs were the most for a Braves shortstop in a Division Series and tied for the most by a Braves shortstop in one postseason run (Rafael Belliard, 1991; Jeff Blauser, 1997).
Ozuna and d’Arnaud might be the most offensively productive free-agent duo in franchise history. Ozuna led the NL in homers and RBIs in the regular season and has knocked in five runs this postseason. D’Arnaud homered in each of the Braves' first two games against the Marlins and provided the key hit of Game 3.
“I knew that this organization had it in them (to go far into the postseason),” d’Arnaud said. “I knew playing against them, calling a game against them, that I wasn’t going to bed until 5 a.m. because I was thinking about the next day. Now I can sleep a little better at night knowing I’m on that team. To be part of it, and see what’s behind closed doors, is magical, and I’m thankful to be part of it.”
The Braves would tack on further insurance, unleashing their frustrations on an inferior team that likely lost hope in the third inning. Despite their pristine postseason record, the Braves exceeded five runs in only one of their previous four playoff games, which ranked below the club’s lofty standards.
Braves starter Kyle Wright labored early, yet pitched his way out of jams. He settled in to cover six innings, striking out seven, walking two and holding the Marlins to three hits. It was his first postseason start and the Braves' first playoff game started by a pitcher other than Max Fried and Ian Anderson. Wright gave the team what it needed before turning it over to a stellar bullpen, which will now have ample rest before the NLCS begins Monday.
Wright and Anderson became the first teammates to pitch six or more scoreless innings in their playoff debuts across one single postseason. Because of Fried, Anderson, Wright and the bullpen, the Braves have shut out opponents in four of five playoff games. They’re the second franchise to achieve such, joining the 1905 New York Giants. It’s already the most shutouts thrown by a Braves staff in one postseason (the 1991 and 1996 teams pitched three shutouts).
The Braves' cumulative ERA through five postseason games (49 innings): 0.92. The rotation owns a 1.26 ERA and the bullpen has produced a 0.44 mark.
“We have a really good pitching staff,” Wright said. “It starts with Max and Ian. I’m just trying to follow in their footsteps. Obviously our bullpen has been unbelievable. You can look at the numbers. They’ve been good from the start and in the postseason they’ve been incredible. It’s about passing the torch and putting up as many zeroes as you can. It’s pretty cool to have that many shutouts. It just points to how good we’ve been as a staff as of late.”
Over the last week, the Braves moved past what felt like endless postseason horrors since they were ousted in the 2001 NLCS by the eventual-champion Diamondbacks. There was a bevy of eliminations at Turner Field, Craig Kimbrel standing cross-armed in the bullpen at Dodger Stadium and a 10-run first inning to be beaten in the most embarrassing fashion imaginable.
Thursday was a significant step forward for the franchise. Consider the landscape in 2001, when the Braves last participated in the NLCS:
- At the beginning of the year, George W. Bush was sworn in as the 43rd president.
- Apple released the iPod and iTunes program.
- Wikipedia, which has since been the lifeblood of college students, was created online.
- It was a crowning year for fantasy films, including “Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone,” “Shrek,” “Jurassic Park III” and “Planet of The Apes.”
- Ronald Acuna was 3 years and 9 months old (or 1,394 days), and Brian Snitker was managing at High-A Myrtle Beach.
- Mark Richt guided Georgia to an 8-4 record in his first season. Georgia Tech was 8-5 in George O’Leary’s eighth and final season.
- The Falcons traded up to draft Virginia Tech quarterback Michael Vick at No. 1. It was also their final year under the Rankin M. Smith family, as they were sold to Arthur Blank in 2002.
- The Hawks selected Spanish big man (and future Hall of Famer) Pau Gasol with the third overall pick and traded his rights to the Grizzlies.
Since that busy year, the Braves have endured their share of painful postseason losses. Much of their regular-season results haven’t been stellar, either. They’ve sometimes had the starters but lacked the bullpen. Sometimes they would ‘fix’ the bullpen only for the rotation to be an issue. Their offense fluctuated, from adding players such as Gary Sheffield and J.D. Drew during the Chipper Jones era to bringing in the Upton brothers during the early Freddie Freeman era.
In 2020, it came together despite a deteriorating rotation. Through two rounds, the Braves' glaring weakness – the back of the rotation – hasn’t even come into play. They’ll deal with that when the time approaches next week.
For now, the Braves should celebrate as much as one can under MLB’s health and safety protocols. It took empty stadiums and a neutral-site series, but the Braves avoided the letdown so many have come to expect.
“I’m just glad the narrative is changing from series win to getting past the division series,” Freeman said. “There’s not as much (bad) to talk about now, so we’ll start our own narrative. That’s the great thing about this. (Many) of our guys are too young to know the history, but I’m not. It’s just amazing that we’ve gotten past this point for the first time since 2001. A lot of these guys don’t know the history inside that clubhouse, but now we get to start our own, and hopefully it’s a good one for us.”
While the team has greater goals, the trials and turmoil of the past 19 years should be put at rest after the past week. The Braves no longer have to hear about their postseason horrors, at least for a few more days. They’re headed to the NLCS, within striking distance of the NL pennant for the first time since 1999.
“It’s pretty special,” Snitker said. “It’s hard to do this, I don’t care what kind of season it is. When we got into this thing, and you look at it from the outside before we got started, and you maybe had some doubts (because of COVID-19), and then you grind through it and get here, and how hard it was to get here. This was a difficult season to navigate. It’s special anytime you’re going to the NLCS and giving yourself a chance to go to the World Series. It’s exciting right now.”
Whatever unfolds during the remainder of the playoffs, the Braves established themselves as a true World Series contender again. It’s no longer a rebuild or feel-good story. It’s not even about being a multi-time division champ.
The Braves are a legitimate title threat that’s fulfilling aspirations while striving to meet higher expectations. It’s been a long, long time, but the grandest stage is only four wins away.
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