The Braves' Second Quarter: Surprises Abound

When both Eric O'Flaherty and Jonny Venters suffered season-ending injuries, I thought that meant for sure that Atlanta's bullpen would inevitably be struggling throughout the season to hold leads and allow Craig Kimbrel to even have a reason to enter ballgames. As it turns out, the Braves arrived at the halfway point of the season with the best relief ERA in the majors (2.70). But the even bigger surprise is that Fredi seems to have learned from what many believe was the error of his ways a few years back when he seemingly exhausted the arms in his bullpen, as the amount of Atlanta's relief innings after 81 games was the fifth-fewest in Major League Baseball.

So midway into this 2013 season, the pitching has in fact been remarkably strong. That, of course, was the story throughout the 1990s, which could just as easily make the average Braves fan confident as it could skeptical. Still, with the second-best overall ERA (trailing only the remarkable Pittsburgh Pirates—whom you might recall I picked to win that division this year) in baseball, I'd be nuts to complain.

In addition to the pitching, the other pleasant surprise at this point would be that Atlanta is no longer in the lead for that team batting strikeout record that I thought they would eclipse this season. The Astros overtook the Braves in that category, and ended up only four behind where the 2010 Diamondbacks that own that dubious record were after 81 games. Of course, Atlanta's batters are indeed still striking out a lot, but they've been scoring and winning too. All things considered, it's hard to have asked for more at this point.

I'd be remiss at this point not to note that the Braves certainly have had the good fortune of being in a division that has not offered much of a contender to this point. While I was among the nearly universal level of people predicting that the East was Washington's division to lose this year, the Nationals have been nothing short of a total disappointment thus far. It's not terribly surprising to see the Phillies, Mets and Marlins below .500 at this point, but very few of us could have envisioned Washington trailing Atlanta, let alone doing so by a 6 ½ game margin that is the largest in baseball. Part of me wants to believe that at some point the Nats are going to just snap out of it and make this a race again, but right now there's pretty good reason for DC fans to be pretty concerned.

At the plate, Freddie Freeman has been having a very strong season, Brian McCann has come back from injury with encouraging numbers and Evan Gattis continues to be a feelgood story that's backed up by impressive OPS numbers and a team-best WAR. It's been a tale of two Uptons, however, in regards to the two big off-season acquisitions for the Braves. Justin will likely be headed to the All-Star Game, but B.J. will be struggling to hit above the Mendoza Line.

There's work to be done in the second half when it comes to success on the road. While Atlanta had the best home record in baseball after 81 games, the team needs to get back above .500 in games away from Turner Field before I can develop a convincing amount of confidence when the postseason arrives. If the Braves can maintain their overall level of winning, they should at least be able to avoid that dreaded dumbass single-game Wild Card playoff.

Finally, this will likely be the last quarter for a while that the graphic features an image of a number being retired. I did not realize until Chipper's jersey retirement ceremony that the team had abandoned the old left field display of the numbers, but whatevs. If it had fit into the quarter better, I would have preferred to have used this picture.