If you’re a fan of September drama, the Braves are doing their best to make you watch football until October. If you’re a Braves fan, you don’t mind that drama is taking a happy hike. Your team has lapped the field in the National League East. Your team is bound for its first division title since 2005, and that’s a big deal. Here’s why:
1. A division winner can't be one-and-done. Last season the Braves became the first loser of baseball's official Wild Card game. Those scars linger. One bad throw by a Hall of Famer, one misapplied infield-fly rule, and a 94-game winner was gone by 8:30 p.m. on the postseason's first day. Of the play-in game, manager Fredi Gonzalez said: "I don't wish that on anybody."
2. At the rate they're going, the Braves won't just finish with the best record in the division. As of Wednesday morning, they trailed Pittsburgh by two one-hundredths of a percentage point for the best record in baseball. Of the Braves' remaining games, seven will come against teams with a winning record. Of the Pirates' remaining games, 18 will come against plus-.500 opposition. The Braves are in Position A to claim home-field advantage through the NLCS. (Having won the All-Star game, the American League has the World Series edge.)
3. Not incidentally, the Braves have been baseball's best home team. They're 38-15 at Turner Field. Twenty-eight of the team's final 47 regular-season games will be played there. The Pirates have only 22 home games remaining. (St. Louis has 30, though. Keep an eye on the Cardinals.)
4. The NL's No. 1 seed figures to miss the Dodgers in the division series. Assuming L.A.'s stirring midseason run doesn't come undone in the final reel, it will be seen as The One You Don't Want To Play In October. The Dodgers have a hugely talented (albeit exceedingly fragile) roster, and in Clayton Kershaw and Zack Greinke they have the sort of pitchers who can rule a playoff series. You'd rather see those arms later in October, when they've had a chance to get tired.
5. Speaking of arms, running away with the division should give the Braves a chance to rest their best pitchers. Teams try not to let a young pitcher's innings take a huge jump in any given year. Mike Minor, 25, has thrown 150 innings this season; his high as a professional is 183 1/3. Julio Teheran, 22, has worked 137 innings; his high is 164 1/3. Given that each could start a half-dozen postseason games, it would make sense for the Braves to have Minor and Teheran miss a turn in September. Not a Strasburg-like shutdown, mind you — just a bit of preventive maintenance.
6. Other Braves also could stand to stand down in September. Craig Kimbrel, to name one. Freddie Freeman and Dan Uggla, to name others. But sitting a healthy guy is tricky: If you don't want him tired in October, you also don't want him rusty. This is where the Braves' bountiful bench should pay dividends. Gonzalez can spend the final two weeks of the regular season mixing full- and part-timers, and these part-timers — can we really call Evan Gattis a sub? — shouldn't allow the record to dip much, if at all.
7. Brandon Beachy has time to work himself into October shape. When Tim Hudson was lost to injury, Beachy became the key man among starting pitchers. Kris Medlen is a solid pro, but not a No. 1 or No. 2 starter; Paul Maholm might not make the postseason roster. With an in-form Beachy at No. 3, the Braves' playoff rotation wouldn't be embarrassed by anyone's — not even the Dodgers'. The trick is to get him ready.
8. Winning the division will carry the Braves into the playoffs on a high they haven't known this century. As noted, the last NL East title came in 2005, but the thrill of winning divisions had waned long before that. (That's what happens when you do it 14 times running.) This summer surge has changed the dynamics of this team and maybe this franchise: No longer do we see the Braves as a team that caught a flying start and then muddled through. We see this a team with both a gifted lineup and a useful bench, with a splendid rotation and an even better bullpen.
Even if postseason baseball flouts prediction, it’s better to be a team that enters the month believing it belongs than one not fully convinced it has the ingredients. The Braves have felt since spring training they can beat anybody, and in these dog days of summer they’ve been beating everybody. Maybe you wouldn’t want to face the Dodgers in October, but you mightn’t want to face this crew, either.
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