Braves pitchers carried a heavy load in 2024

At this point, Atlanta Braves fans are well aware that the Braves offense in 2024 has been inconsistent at best. Part of that is due to injuries to guys like Ronald Acuna Jr., Sean Murphy and Austin Riley slowing down the offense, but a lot of it is due to good old underperformance up and down the roster. Despite last season’s record-breaking offense being just 13th in all of baseball by fWAR in 2024, their pitching staff has really stepped up to keep Atlanta in contention.

It’s hard to overstate how important (and surprising) the Braves’ pitching staff has been this season. Despite some fairly speculative moves like the signing of Reynaldo Lopez and his rapid conversion from reliever to one of the best starters in the league this season, as well as their biggest trade of last offseason to acquire Chris Sale who was coming off a tenure plagued by injuries in Boston. .

These moves have paid off and even without Spencer Strider in the fold, these are the arms of the Braves that will carry the team into 2024 and keep Atlanta dangerous, especially if the offense really picks up.

ERA is by no means a perfect metric, but it tells us a lot about a team’s ability to prevent runs, although the “whys” may vary from team to team. In this case, Atlanta’s pitching staff ranks in the top eight in team ERA in 2024. The starters rank a bit lower thanks to less-than-stellar performances from guys like Allan Winans, Ray Kerr, Hurston Waldrep and Bryce Elder, but the third-ranked Braves bullpen helped make up for that to a good extent.

Not surprisingly, each of baseball’s division leaders currently all rank in the top 10 in team ERA. Assuming the Braves pitching staff can maintain this or even improve, this bodes extremely well if Atlanta’s bats can at least resemble the production they put up in 2023. However, that MAY not be enough to chase the Phillies to Holland. Is, but we’ll get to that in a moment.

Plus, the Rockies are incredibly embarrassing in these rankings. We knew the Angels weren’t going to throw the ball well, especially after losing Shohei Ohtani and having virtually every Marlins starter injured, but for Colorado to be the worst by far is a pretty scathing indictment of this front office and a clear illustration that playing half your games at Coors Field is pretty brutal.

When it comes to the division picture, the big task ahead of the Braves is very clear. Not only has the Phillies’ offense been among the best in the league in 2024, but their pitching staff has been the best in MLB by virtually every metric that matters, from ERA to WAR to FIP . When a team is among the best on both sides of the ball, it’s going to lead to a lot of wins and make them extremely difficult.

Even if Atlanta’s offense hadn’t shit the bed for virtually all of May, it might not matter since the Phillies have refused to lose this season. Turning the offense around and allowing Atlanta’s pitchers to keep rolling would be a good start, but Philadelphia is going to have to slow down if the Braves want to overcome the seven-game deficit in the division they are currently studying.

Additionally, this is your friendly reminder that the Mets have a total payroll this season of over $308 million and are below .500 for the season. Even after a tough loss to the Yankees on Saturday, this has to make Braves fans smile.

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