Twin rainouts over a bleak Atlanta Braves weekend may ultimately be good for the club… ultimately only time will tell.
For whatever reason, the New York Mets — or what passes for that team these days — really seem to have the Atlanta Braves‘ number so far this season.
The Braves are just 1-3 against the Mets thus far, with that lone win requiring a 9th inning walkoff blast from Ronald Acuña’s bat.
Normally, we would be decrying the postponement of the Friday and Sunday games, as New York continues to deal with an inordinate amount of injuries to key players.
You’d think they’d be vulnerable. It didn’t work out that way on Saturday when 13 hits and 2 Braves’ errors resulted in a 13 run outburst from the Triple-A Mets (or so it seemed).
With that — and other news — hanging over the visitor’s clubhouse like a shroud this weekend, perhaps it was good that Atlanta had a chance to more-or-less skip New York and move on to Washington this week.
The “gotcha” may be that the Mets might be more healthy by the time these deferred games come up on the schedule.
According to information obtained by beat writer Dave O’Brien, these are the makeup dates:
- June 21: a single game on that date becomes a double-header
- June 26: likewise, another new double-header and now a 5-game set vs. New York.
O’Brien points out that the earlier add-on gives Atlanta a 7-day trip to New York and Cincy with 8 games to play.
For the latter make-up, the Braves will arrive in New York from having completed a 4-game set in Philly, so that trip becomes 9 games over 8 days.
Counting the home games book-ending this late July trip, that becomes 18 games in 17 straight days after the All-Star break.
Did the Braves need this break? Probably. Will it help them down the road? Probably not, given the new schedule. If nothing else, their pitching will be stressed significantly.
At this point, though, “it is what it is” and this team will simply have to press on. They haven’t exactly made it easy on themselves thus far, regardless.