After 5-3 stretch, Braves have to do it again (and again, and again)

Jul 25 2008

Published by bud006 at 6:42 am under Braves analysis Edit This

By Bud L. Ellis
braves.today.com

ATLANTA – Seven weeks ago, the Atlanta Braves opened a three-game series with the Philadelphia Phillies on a Friday night, looking to gain ground in the NL East.

And in the 40 games since that fateful night inside Turner Field, the night Kelly Johnson dropped the final out of the game in the top of the ninth, much has transpired … and not a lot of it good for the Braves or their beleaguered, frustrated fan base.

As the Braves arrive in Philly tonight to open a three-game set with the second-place Phils, they find themselves painted into a corner from which there doesn’t appear to be an escape. Atlanta sits five games under .500, resides 6 ½ games behind the first-place Mets and trails three teams in the standings.

That ticking sound? The countdown clock to the trade deadline, now six short days away.

It is a team in desperate straits that dons those tomahawk-emblazoned uniforms and takes the field at Citizens Bank Park tonight, opening its most crucial series of the season. By the time it’s finished late Sunday afternoon, the Braves’ playoff hopes may be finished, too.

But amid all the rubble that’s piled upon this franchise in the 42 days since KJ’s now-infamous drop, there is one ray of hope, one sliver of light that’s somehow slid its way through the twisted wreckage of one-run losses, injuries and the shell of a player once known as Jeff Francoeur:

In their past eight games, the Braves are 5-3.

I majored in journalism in college, not math, but the calculator on my computer tells me the Braves have played .625 ball in their past eight games, a stretch that started July 12 with a Saturday-night victory in San Diego. It’s nowhere near enough to drown out the Mark Teixeira trade rumors, the venomous venting of bloggers or the boo-birds who let loose with understandable vigor during two embarrassing losses at home to the Nationals last weekend.

But it’s a positive sign.

And, it’s a strategy the Braves will have to shake, pour and repeat for the next two months. If they do so, they very well can play themselves back into the race for the division championship.

Sixty-one games remain in the season. Divided into blocks of eight, Atlanta has seven eight-game blocks left on its schedule. And granted, saying this team – a squad that’s befuddled the experts, its fans and even itself with its lack of clutch hitting, its inability to win more than three games in a row since late May, its injury woes – has to play .625 ball the rest of the way is a lot like saying gas prices need to return to $1.50 a gallon.

It’d be nice to believe it’ll happen, but nobody’s exactly jumping the first flight to Vegas to bet on it.

But when you say “win five out of eight,” the task doesn’t seem as daunting, does it? Winning five times in eight games basically means winning series, which – as I have opined in recent weeks – is the only realistic avenue to returning to contention.

I mean, do any of you see a nine-game winning streak in this bunch? Nope, I don’t either.

The hard part is going 5-3 over and over and over again. Remember, we’re talking about a team that’s only consistent feature is the manner in which it frustrates its fans. But in building in three losses out of each eight-win block, you’re allowing for those days when Jo-Jo Reyes can’t get out of the fourth inning, when the bats get one-hit by some dude you’ve never heard of, when the latest Braves starter makes the gingerly walk from the playing field to that crowded corner of Braves Nation known as the disabled list.

All of this may be moot by Monday morning. The Phillies are 8-1 against the Braves this season. Two losses this weekend probably forces general manager Frank Wren to push the plunger and ship Teixeira and Will Ohman and perhaps Mark Kotsay away. Time is ticking, after all, and a dud of a showing this weekend likely seals the Braves’ fate.

But if Atlanta can just replicate what it’s done the past eight games, it can make the East a four-team race to the finish. One believes that finish line falls somewhere between 85 and 88 wins.

Win five out of eight over the next 56, and Atlanta would be 83-74 with five games to go. It might take a heck of a finishing kick that final week to make it happen, and certainly, going 6-2 or even 7-1 in a couple of those eight-game blocks would make it easier to reach the finish line first. It goes without saying this plan gets blown to heck with one five- or six-game losing streak.

It may be wishful thinking to even try to figure out how this team can stay in it. But thinking about September beats thinking about 2009, especially when the calendar hasn’t even flipped to August.