I’ll go ahead and give you credit if you saw ‘baseball’ in the tagline and opened the email. Maybe you’re just helping my open rate statistics (hat tip if that’s you). I’ll give you two more guilt-free chances to exit and go about your day further down, don’t worry.

Everyone hates baseball now. Maybe you do, too.

Growing up, there was no one universally cooler on planet Earth than Ken Griffey, Jr. It seemed like every kid I knew was hitting Sammy Sosa’s trademark home run hop in the backyard playing wiffle ball or waving their bat like Gary Sheffield until a Little League coach told them to knock it off (guilty).

Baseball was an undeniable part of the US’s cultural DNA in the late 90’s / early 2000s. That has changed.

While the real life game experience still seems to be universally beloved, it’s pretty typical for sports fans of all sorts to hate on watching baseball on TV like it’s soccer or something.

Maybe it’s just that I grew up with baseball. I like the pageantry, the history, and the pace (even when it was much slower before the new pitch clock). I like the 1-on-1, mano-y-mano matchup in a team sport. I even like most of the rule changes they’ve made to modernize the game and try to attract the younger audience.

So get out of here if you don’t want to hear about baseball. It’s my newsletter, deal with it #IMNLDWI. It’s what’s on my mind, damn it, not yours!

This is what we in the biz call a “bait-and-switch”. You thought this was going to be a think-piece about baseball as a whole (it is, but there will be detours). Maybe you kept reading out of curiosity.

You’re an absolute sucker.

And, too bad. This next bit is about my fandom and what I’ve been thinking about the Braves’ season and playoff chances.

This is the equivalent of your buddy sending you the roster of his fantasy football team in a league you’re not in. You have to pretend to care (“Dude, Ladd McConkey in the 5th? He’s gonna go crazy this year - great pickup.”). No one does.

I’m doing that to your eyeballs right now.

I love the Braves far more than an adult should. I watch regular season games as often as I can force my wife to without the threat of divorce.

Postseason baseball is non-negotiable, though. October is my personal sports nirvana between football season and postseason baseball. (Luckily she’s very accommodating for postseason baseball - even claims to enjoy it).

I live and die on every Braves pitch in the postseason like I’m 9 years old. It’s my favorite thing and my least favorite thing. I watched this team win a World Series 5 years ago and still react like Bryce Elder giving up a bomb in the 3rd inning is the worst thing to happen to me in my lifetime.

I’m a grown man with a wonderful wife, incredibly supportive family and friends, living in the best community on the planet and my first child’s delivery date knocking on the door. My life is amazing. And I will burn it all to the ground if Austin Riley swings at another slider that started on the outer half of the plate.

(I’m like 40% kidding, 25% dead serious, 10% certain I’ve matured past that, and 25% sure Sarah would disagree with all this and say I’m 100% dead serious.)

The best part about baseball season is the length. All the ups and downs, injuries, unsung heroes, statistics, and marveling at the consistency of guys like Matt Olson who play everyday, mashing baseballs.

Our offense hangs in every game - every player performing their role, no matter how big or small, to the best of their ability. The defense is top-10 level and errors are limited. Our bullpen has 4 guys you’d trust in any situation, despite one of them just now being old enough to buy a pack of cigarettes after a late night Waffle House run (IYKYK). Chris Sale continues to be the best pitcher of his generation and a weekly must-watch, despite his scraggly gray beard letting you know he’s getting closer and closer to hanging it up.

Even the front office is great. Alex Anthopoulos continues to assemble a world class roster and farm system that is a perennial contender with a “next man up” philosophy - even with Brian Snitker retiring and making way for bench coach, Walt Weiss, to take over the reins. Not every decision pans out and guys struggle individually, but the whole of the Braves team is always much greater than the sum of the parts. This year is no different. Last season’s disappointment felt like a true fluke in the midst of a near decade-long run of domination in an excellent division.

It’s a team I’m proud to root for every year from top to bottom. And, as a Falcons fan, I’m highly aware of where that is not true.

(I’d literally commit a crime (not a big one, but one of substance) to Men-In-Black-style wipe my memory and become a Steelers fan or Patriots fan or something)

However.

I do think the Braves are set up for October disappointment again. We just don’t have the starting pitching past Sale to make it.

Postseason baseball is different. I hit on this earlier, but it’s a different game. Different way of playing. Different season all together. You can throw out everything that happened between March and September. October is its very own. (Sorry).

I don’t know exactly what makes it different, but the only thing I can point to is how guys handle pressure. Every pitch matters, every swing matters, every throw matters. A mistake in the 4th inning in July that resulted in a one-run loss is forgotten about. In October, it’s replayed over and over again. Brutal for any average person. I’m not sure if it’s the “clutch gene” or if it’s some way that certain guys deal with things or if it’s just pure luck. It’s just some guys have “it” and others do not.

And - much like pornography - you can’t define “it”, but you know “it” when you see “it”.

While our offense and bullpen have either shown “it” in the past or might very wall have “it”, the other 3 starters behind Sale in the rotation - Bryce Elder, Grant Holmes, and Martin Perez - give me pause.

In their defense - they have each been solid pitchers this season, with Holmes and Perez widely exceeding their expectations of being “placeholder guys filling in for injuries” and becoming meaningful pieces of the rotation. Braves fans, including myself, are grateful and understand the shifts each of the three have put in all summer long. These guys have shown up and been the model of consistency, even if not at a high level of play.

Consistency gets you a long way in the world. You beat the majority just by showing up and doing the little things right. Performing those fundamentals well and showing up night-in/night-out is what gets baseball teams to the playoffs in a 162 game season. Consistency is what makes me proud to be a Braves fan.

But the edge consistency gives you over the competition dies, and dies HARD, on September 30.

October takes “it”

“It” goes well beyond the fundamentals, though those are a requirement. Instead of a losers’ game, like much of the regular season, in October, teams are playing a winners’ game.

In a losers’ game - you play not to lose. Great fundamentals. Show up and do your job. Outlast by limiting your own mistakes to force the other party to make one. Almost every game in life is a losers’ game - you can beat the majority by doing little things well.

In a winners’ game - it takes something special. You’re competing with the elite for the biggest prize of all. I don’t think I play many (if any) winners’ games in life - and I don’t think many others do either. If you think you are, you might be right, but I suspect you’re overestimating the game you’re playing - and your performance would probably benefit from realizing it’s a losers’ game.

Fundamentals are the foundation of success in a winners game. Built on top of that foundation is some combination of focus, precision, power, command, athleticism, supreme mental fortitude, and a psychotically short memory in every facet of the game where momentum is critical, palpable, and extremely fragile. And probably a lot of luck, too.

That’s the essence of “it”. “It” is what is behind the clutch 8th inning home run, the strategic investment that goes 100x, the 3-pointer at the buzzer - the magic moments it takes to win a winners’ game.

In May, you can get away with a few bad pitches. In October, Bryce Harper is going to take an 89 mph hanging slider 475 feet, changing the entire trajectory of the next few innings. Shohei Ohtani is going to throw 6 shutdown innings and then hit 2 doubles off a right-hander throwing 92 mph sinkers. Some guy you’ve never heard of is going to be completely locked in for an effortless 3-for-5 with a double off of pitchers who just don’t have “it” tonight.

“It”’s unpredictable, but “it”’s there. I think “it” is just reality. I’ve seen enough of “it” in my lifetime to know “it”’s real, as I suspect you have, too. Some people have “It” and some people don’t. And, while I’m sure “it” doesn’t hurt, I’m not sure if “it” really even matters all that much in life - like I said, there are not many winners’ games for normal folks.

To bring this back to the Braves, I don’t see enough of “it” in our rotation. But what the hell do I know.

I’m just a guy sitting on my couch watching TV and eating Doritos, shouting at superhuman athletes to do better on something I couldn’t do at a middle school level. Take my ramblings with a grain of salt (if you’re not doing this for everything I say, bravo, but you probably should).

The Dodgers series a couple weeks back made me think I could be wrong. And hell, I’d love to be wrong. If we score 4+ runs a game, we are a legitimate contender. But that’s tough to bank on in October, and I’m not banking on it.

The Brewers series right before that, where we won 1 of 3 and were just choked out by great pitching and making small pitching errors, seems like much more of a likely outcome while playing one of the great teams next month.

Whatever the outcome, I’m happy to be here. I’m happy to have another October on the horizon where I know I will live and die by every pitch, even if it’s a short series we lose. The game is fun and watching it all unfold is magic.

To any Braves players who are subscribers (I’m sure there are at least a handful):

Let’s go Braves. God, I am so excited for playoff baseball.

Not exactly the soundtrack to my week - I just want you to share in the misery of these catchy tunes getting locked into your brain for the foreseeable future

Sincerely,

Zander Barth