You’re the Atlanta Braves. You’re giddy right now after your version of The Hit, The Catch and The Throw.
Mostly, you know you’re going to increase your chances of rising from eighth place at $2.6 billion on Forbes’ list regarding team value of Major League franchises, and you’re going to do so by fulfilling your destiny.
Your destiny?
Your destiny is capturing your second World Series in three years (or at least your current National League Division Series matchup against the suddenly dazed Philadelphia Phillies).
You know about your destiny, not so much because you spent the season winning more games than anybody at 104 after you led your peers in nearly every offensive category worth mentiong.
You know because of two innings.
You know those innings were such an emotional boost for yourselves that they can propel you toward winning it all. You know those innings were sprinkled with pixie dust, and you know they involved the bottom of the eighth and the top of ninth Monday night in Atlanta at Truist Park, where you sealed one of the most unlikeliest of come-from-behind victories in baseball postseason history.
As for the rest of us, well, at the very least, we should consider putting the Braves in the Fall Classic right now.
They won 5-4 during Game 2 of their NLDS against the Phillies to tie things at 1-1 in this best-of-five affair, and it made no sense. They couldn’t hit much during their 3-0 loss in Game 1 at home, and they couldn’t hit at all (literally) through the opening 5 2/3 innings of this one.
Then came the bottom of the eighth.
The right-handed-slugging Austin Riley completed the Braves’ climb from a 4-0 deficit to their first lead of the series with a tw0-run homer. More dramatically, he used only his left arm to guide the ball into the bullpen behind the fence in left field.
The Braves sealed things in the top of the ninth.
Somehow.
With one out, Bryce Harper stood on first base for the Phillies until he raced around the bases after teammate Nick Castellanos ripped a shot over the head of Braves center fielder Michael Harris.
The Gold Glove winner in waiting raced toward the fence, leaped and made the catch before firing toward second base.
“I knew off the bat it was going to be close to the fence,” Harris said. “I knew once I went back I wasn’t stopping. I was going to do anything I could to get a glove on it. If my body had to go down because of that, I would have done that.”
Harris did enough. In fact, after his acrobatics, he said he blacked out, but no worries.
Here’s what Harris missed: His throw (which wasn’t The Throw) got away from Braves second baseman Ozzie Albies, but Riley hustled over to grab the ball between second and the pitcher’s mound, and he delivered a rocket to first base for The Throw to nail Harper trying to retrace his steps around the bases.
Game over, but not the series.
“We were trying to stay as positive as possible in that dugout,” Riley said, referring to Phillies pitcher Zach Wheeler dominating the Braves for most of the game with 10 strikeouts through 6 1/3 innings. “Everybody was saying we just gotta keep going, gotta keep going.
“He had an unbelievable night.”
So did folks among the record crowd of 43,898. After those two innings, they went screaming, dancing and laughing throughout the area surrounding Truist Park called The Battery Atlanta, which is the Braves’ $1.1 billion business and entertainment complex that also has featured the ballpark since 2017.
Even when the Braves lose at home, they win.
You know, financially.
Courtesy of The Battery Atlanta, welcoming the 3,191,505 folks who attended Braves home games this year (and others visiting to buy stuff regardless of the month), the Braves had the largest one-year percentage jump in value (24) of anybody in the top 10 on that Forbes’ list for team value.
Along those lines for the Braves, it’s been several big things — such as sellouts for Truist Park on most game days — and a bunch of little ones to show they remain quite healthy in the pocketbook under their new company since July called Atlanta Braves Holdings Inc., That happened after Liberty Media initiated the long-rumored split as owner of the club since 20o7.
As for those little ones, the Braves held three scrimmages last week at Truist Park in preparation of the playoffs as the game’s No. 1 seed. Team officials offered free admission to the general public, and they opened the concessions stands with business instead of charity on their minds.
That’s right.
Food and drink weren’t on the house.
Then came the pep rally.
Long before Monday night’s first pitch, Braves officials encouraged fans to pack The Battery Atlanta Tuesday at noon “to send the Braves off to Philadelphia” for Game 3 of the NLDS. Those Braves officials said the whole thing is free, but they stressed fans will have the opportunity to get a 15% discount when they purchase items at the team-owned stores on site.
The more the Braves keep winning, the more they can do those little things combined with those big things, and the more The Battery Atlanta will prosper.
Which means if you’re the Braves, you’re thinking you’ll make a bundle by Thanksgiving. That’s because you’re thinking you’ll have your fingerprints on another World Series trophy by then.
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