Writing that the Atlanta Braves’ season is in ruins is a little like saying Michael Phelps can swim a little.

Duh.

After Sunday’s 3-1 loss to the Giants the Braves are now 12 full games behind the New York Mets in the NL East. Not even Phelps couldn’t make up that kind of ground.

Especially if he had suffered the injuries Atlanta has throughout the summer. Pitchers John Smoltz, Tim Hudson and Tom Glavine are all gone for the year, and only Hudson accomplished much before he departed. Fellow arm Mike Hampton, though finally back, had been missing so long that his face was more likely to be seen on a milk carton than the Turner Field video screen.

Throw in injuries to Chipper Jones and the super slump of Jeff Francoeur and it’s easy to understand what’s wrong with the team that was the chic pick to win its division for the first time in three years at season’s dawn.

Or is it?

Is there something more at play here than bad luck? Could the Braves have done something to prevent at least a portion of their collapse?

Two moments from this season stand out as correctable mistakes. Reversing either or both of them probably wouldn’t have been enough to vault the franchise into playoff contention, given all its other woes.

But both cause a scratch of the head, given the team’s shrewd, savvy past.

The first occurred at the end of June, as the Braves were beginning a home series with Philadelphia. On the Sunday before that series, Chipper told reporters that he probably should have already been placed on the disabled list with a recurring quad injury.

He said he had come to a point where he could only help the club standing at the plate, since he was batting .394 at the time.

Jones even said of his mobility, or lack thereof: “About 50 percent is all I can do running, and I’m not any help to us at 50 percent.”

Even teammate Brian McCann said of the need to rest Chipper, “We don’t want him coming out here at 80 percent and then stretching it out and having to miss two months.”

If ever a DL assignment was a walk-off homer this was it. So what did the Braves do?

They played Chipper the following series against the Phillies. He’s pretty much been hurt ever since.

Yet however wrongheaded that decision, it was no worse than the club’s handling of Francoeur.

Mired in a horrific slump through much of the early summer, the Braves’ Golden Boy was demoted to Class AA Mississippi on the first Friday of July. The move was clearly meant to send a message to Atlanta’s native son that if he couldn’t shape up, the clob was willing to ship him out, at least temporarily.

And the move seemed to be working. Francoeur went 7-for-13 with two RBIs during his first three games under Mississippi manager Phillip Wellman, who once managed the Chattanooga Lookouts.

Still, it was just three games. So what did the Braves do?

Francoeur hadn’t run out of clean underwear before the Braves — who had said their right fielder would remain in Mississippi through the All-Star break — was back with the big club by Monday.

Three games. Not three weeks. Three games and Francoeur was supposedly cured of all that ailed him.

You know the rest. Before Saturday’s 4-for-4 effort and Thursday’s 3-for-5 with a three-run homer shot, Francoeur hadn’t collected four hits total in his last 10 games. He was batting under .230 on the season with just nine home runs and has been benched on multiple occasions by manager Bobby Cox.

Clearly no lesson was learned by Francoeur except that nothing we say today will necessarily remain true tomorrow.

To be fair, had Chipper played every inning of every game this season and Francoeur batted .300 with 30 home runs, it’s still doubtful the Braves would have remained a serious contender in the NL East.

Then again, maybe that’s what makes this worse. Atlanta had an easy opening to place the long-term good ahead of short-term gain. Now all is lost for a third straight summer. Whether any lessons have been learned from that will have to wait until this time next year to find out.