I feel like the baseball season is halfway over already.
I know, the Braves are only 14 games into the year, but doesn’t it seem like so much has happened?
First there was Opening Day—Derek Lowe being Derek Lowe, a packed crowd at Turner Field, and of course, the monster homerun hit on the first swing of Jason Heyward’s career.
The Braves finished the series with the Cubs with a couple of low-scoring games, and Heyward continued to be the big story. He hit a mini-slump, and some people panicked and decided that he couldn’t be the second coming of Hank Aaron/Willie McCovey/Fred McGriff/etc.
The following four games gave the Braves a blown save, another terrible performance in which Derek Lowe got the win, the “return” of Jason Heyward, and a Jo-Jo Reyes implosion.
These were followed by a three-game winning streak, highlighted by Martin Prado tying a franchise hit record and Derek Lowe (gasp) getting himself the league lead in wins.
Since then, the Braves have had a two walk of wins coming between a no-hitter (by Ubaldo Jimenez) and a complete game shut-out (by Roy Halladay).
With all that has happened in the first couple weeks of the season, I can’t imagine things getting too much more exciting for the Braves.
But this team seems different to me.
I’m not in the dugout, so I don’t know for sure, but this group of players seems to fit together better than Braves' teams in the past. I mean, we are two weeks into the season, and already someone (Chipper) has gotten the silent treatment and someone else (Nate McLouth) had the whole team retreat to the clubhouse following homeruns.
Maybe it’s because this is Bobby’s last year. Maybe it’s the addition of a good clubhouse guy like Billy Wagner. Maybe the whole team is energized by the presence of Jason Heyward.
I don’t know what it is, but the Braves have been the most exciting team in baseball so far, and I can’t help but imagine the amazing things that could happen if this team is playing in October.
Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com
- Login to post comments