The Atlanta Braves are heading back to the World Series for the first time since 1999. The miracle Braves, who were two games under .500 (52-54) and five games behind the New York Mets for first place in the NL East on July 31, find themselves in the Fall Classic against the Houston Astros, who are in their third World Series in five seasons.
It's been an incredible ride by the Braves. They went 36-19 in the final two months of the regular season to take the NL East, ran right through the postseason, which they capped off on Saturday night by taking down last year's World Series Champions, the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-2 in Game 6 of the NLCS.
In fact the Elias Sports Bureau says the Braves didn't climb over the .500 mark until August 6, and that is the "latest-first-day-over-.500 date ever for a team to reach the World Series.
As he has throughout this series, Eddie Rosario spearheaded Atlanta's offense. Rosario's three-run bomb off Dodgers starter Walker Buehler gave Atlanta a 4-1 lead in the fourth inning. They would never look back.
The Dodgers best shot to score came when A.J. Pollack both doubled to drive in Chris Taylor to make it 4-2 in the top of the seventh inning. With two runners aboard and nobody out, the Braves brought in hard-throwing lefty, Tyler Matzek, who blew away the Dodgers over two innings, recording four strikeouts in the process.
One of those strikeouts was Albert Pujols, who lasted only four pitches before swinging away wildly at a slider in the dirt in the top of that seventh inning. In the past, two runners aboard and nobody out was the prime situation for Pujols; he built his legend on coming up big in the clutch during his heyday with the St. Louis Cardinals.
But that was a long, long time ago.
After getting Pujols, Metzek struck out Steven Souza Jr. and Mookie Betts to end the eighth, and all but write a finish to it.
Matzek's heroics set the stage for Will Smith to record to save in the ninth, which he did. Smith struck out both Taylor and Cody Bellinger; then jamed Pollack on a hard grounder to Dansby Swanson at shortstop to end the game.
The Braves now head to the World Series for the 10th time in their glorious history. They haven't won it all since 1995; were last in it in 1999, when they were swept by the Yankees.
This year's Fall Classic will be a tall order for Atlanta to go up against a Houston Astros team that has a number of players who were on the championship team that won it all in 2017, and were there when the Astros lost to the Washington Nationals in 2019 Series.
For Houston they want to quiet the doubters who have pegged them as cheaters the past two-plus years since since the revelations of the sign-stealing scandal came out. It means a lot to them, and the Astros are very tough on opposing pitching staffs at Minute Maid Park.
The Astros appeared to be in big trouble when the Boston Red Sox beat them soundly in Game 3 to take a 2-1 series lead.
But Houston rallied.
They came from behind to steal Game 4 with a seven run rally in the ninth inning to boot.
The Astros dominated Boston in Game 5, 9-1, then slipped past them in Game 6 by a score of 2-0.
Give a lot of credit to Astros manager Dusty Baker, whose veteran leadership settled things down for the Astros during these two tumultuous years.
In addition, how will Rob Manfred be received by both fanbases? Fans in Houston blame him for taking down their beloved 2017 Astros over the scandal; a scandal that cost A.J. Hinch his job, and put a target on the backs of many of Houston's stars like Jose Altuve and Alex Bregman.
Meanwhile Braves fans are still angry over the fact Major League Baseball took the All-Star game away from the city as a political response to the voting rights law passed in the state of Georgia.
Let's just say, Manfred won't be received well in either city.
Should be a fun series.
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