Kuzul

It’s been a while since Atlanta Braves fans have had much to cheer about. Long gone are the days of Maddox, Glavine, and Smoltz. The Jones boys broke up after 2007. The streak of 14 consecutive NL East Championships ended five seasons ago. The 1995 World Series is but a distant memory.

We all knew that their reign atop the NL East couldn’t last forever. Still, it’s been hard to watch the Bravos struggle through four seasons of mediocrity while the Phillies have won three straight division titles and have been to back-to-back World Series— winning it in 2008.

Granted, the Braves’ misfortunes pale in comparison to… the Chicago Cubs.

As they say, “There’s always next year.” This year, my friends, is that year.

The Braves are 37-27 and in first place in the NL East. They’re on pace to go 94-68— the most wins since they went 96-66 in 2004. It would also be the first time the Braves won more than 90 games since the division titles streak ended in 2005.

Why have the Braves been able to turn it around so far this season?

It’s easy to say that it’s been a team effort, and that’s true. However, I’ve identified five Braves who deserve a little extra attention for their contributions in 2010.

Let’s start with…

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As Ken Rosenthal reports , the Braves are stocked deep in pitching, which is no surprise to any Braves follower.

What he mentions in the article that caught my eye was that he sees the Braves’ left-handed side of the bullpen as potentially the best in the game.

“The left side of the ‘pen—Eric O’Flaherty, Jonny Venters, Billy Wagner—might be the best in the game,” said Rosenthal.

Over the past two seasons, Bobby Cox has gone away from his traditional approach of keeping one and possibly two left-handed relievers on the roster, with Billy Wagner entrenched as the closer. This was a similar case at the start of last year with Mike Gonzalez closing games and Boone Logan and O’Flaherty as middle relievers.

Lately, Jonny Venters’ role has increased due to Takashi Saito’s injury and the lack of production from other middle relievers. In addition to Saito being injured, Peter Moylan has performed poorly as of late (8.81 ERA in 7 appearances spanning 3.1 innings). This has put added pressure on Venters to produce, and aside from a few bumpy outings, he has certainly run with the increased role.

Here are the stats from all three lefties this year. The top number is their overall and the bottom is against left-handed hitters.

Billy Wagner : 4-0, 26 G, 25.1 IP, 1.42 ERA, 2.93 xFIP, 13.50 K/9, 3.91 BB/9, 11 SV

vs. LH: 6.1 IP, 0 ER, 3.61 xFIP, 9.95 K/9, 4.26 BB/9

Eric O’Flaherty : 2-1, 32 G, 25.2 IP, 2.10 ERA, 3.42 xFIP, 7.71 K/9, 3.16 BB/9

vs. LH: 13.1 IP, 2 ER, 2.28 xFIP, 9.45 K/9, 1.35 BB/9

Jonny Venters : 2-0, 23 G, 27.2 IP, 0.98 ERA, 3.57 xFIP, 10.08 K/9, 5.20 BB/9

vs. LH: 16.1 IP, 0 ER, 2.86 xFIP, 12.71 K/9, 3.18 BB/9

Both Venters and O’Flaherty have been much better against lefties than righties. Wagner has had better numbers against right-handers but has a much smaller sample size. Wagner pitches strictly the final inning, whereas Venters and O’Flaherty are brought in to pitch in certain situations. Obviously, that will allow O’Flaherty and Venters to pitch to more lefties, where Wagner will be forced to face whomever is due up in the ninth.

With an entirely right-handed rotation, teams usually stack as many left-hand options as reasonably possible against the Braves. This means, later in games, guys like Venters and O’Flaherty will get their opportunities—and when they get them, they certainly produce. Between the three lefty relievers, they have thrown a combined 36 innings and allowed just two earned runs.

The combined ERA against left-handed hitters of Billy Wagner, Jonny Venters, and Eric O’Flaherty is 0.52.

It would take a great deal of research to find out if their are any comparable left-handed reliever groups in the league, but at best they can only match what these three have done.

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That was rough, wasn’t it?

Count the layers of the L-sandwich: W-L-L-L-L-L-L-L-L-L-W.

After a stretch of futility of nonagonal proportions (bad geometry joke), the Atlanta Braves scratched out a win (and their first save in 20 games) Friday night in Atlanta as Billy Wagner induced a double-play to Houston clean-up hitter Carlos Lee.

Timely offense, superb pitching, and mostly clean fielding (we’ll forgive J-Hey’s boot in right field) netted the ‘Bravos’ what had so eluded them for over a week.

Well, it was either that or me wearing my Elon University shirt today—the last thing I wore before this horrid stretch started last week against the Phillies.

But, I think I’ll sit pretty with the former…

Doesn’t this just feel great, though?

Even sans Escobar and Jurrjens for a bit, just seeing some excitement out of this line-up (especially from the lead-off spot) is extremely refreshing.

Nate-Dogg energized this lifeless heap of humanity (and a surprisingly sizable Turner Field crowd) with a lead-off blast to left-center and also went on to swipe a bag after a perfectly placed bunt-for-hit.

Throw in 1.5 Jason Heyward home runs (as he was robbed of a near-blast in the eighth by Hunter Pence) to bring his April total to six (about 1/3 of what I predicted for him before the season started—that’s looking pretty bad), and this group showed some of the promise it displayed in the season’s first two home series.

A Tommy Hanson’s eight-inning, 99 pitch, seven strikeout, no walk, (*breath*) two-run performance followed by Billy Wagner’s second save took care of the other end of the game as the Braves added a tally to bring their win total to a whopping (sarcastically) nine.

Now, this was only one game—but it offered a lot to build on.

Sparking the offense on their home turf (provided this keeps up at least a bit) before shipping out for three game sets at Washington, Philadelphia, and Milwaukee should bode well for the National League’s worst team in terms of team batting average.

One win after nine losses is kinda huge—but two or three in a row are needed to really solidify the team’s bot of regained mojo.

But, it takes one in a row to get those multiples.

So, until tomorrow…

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