Atlanta Braves' Freddie Freeman follows through on a two-run homer in the sixth inning of a baseball game against the Chicago White Sox Sunday, Sept. 1, 2019, in Atlanta. It was Freeman's second two-run home run of the game. (AP Photo/John Bazemore)Finally.
Finally the Atlanta Braves won a game on the same day the Washington Nationals lost, Atlanta topping Toronto 6-3 on Monday at the same time Washington was falling 7-3 to the New York Mets.
That dynamic - a Braves win coupled with a Nats loss - hasn't happened often in the past month. In fact, for 10 straight game days prior to Monday that they both took the field, the Braves and Nationals either won or lost - mostly winning, of course - on the same day.
Nor did the anything-you-can-do-I-can-do-too run stop there. Of the 19 days they both took the field from Aug. 11 and Sept. 1, they posted the same result 16 times. Of those three other days, the Braves were 2-1 and the Nationals 1-2.
Talk about your pennant races.
"It seems like Washington is winning every game, so we need to keep winning, too," Braves first baseman Freddie Freeman said a little over a week ago. "Every game is so important."
The four most important remaining games on Atlanta's schedule will start Thursday night at SunTrust Park, the Braves beginning a four-game set against the Nats that will conclude Sunday afternoon.
With the Braves now ahead of Washington by 6 1/2 games in the National League East, a split of those four contests would appear to give them all the cushion they would need for the last three weeks of the regular season. Win three of four and Atlanta almost certainly could start planning for the playoffs as the Beast of the East.
But while Atlanta has won 13 of its last 15 games, Washington has won 12 of its last 16 to hang tough. And it's certainly arguable that the Nationals may yet prove to be the better team come the postseason, even if the Braves can hang on to win the East pennant.
Consider that the Nationals pitching trio of Stephen Strasburg, Max Scherzer and Patrick Corbin became the first NL threesome since the 1969 Houston Astros' Larry Dierker, Tom Griffin and Don Wilson to record as many as 200 strikeouts apiece when Corbin struck out eight Miami Marlins on Sunday.
Put another way, only four NL pitchers had recorded 200 strikeouts this season as of Sunday. Three of them were Nats, the fourth being the Mets' Jacob deGrom.
"You don't want to be that weak link," Corbin told MLB.com on Sunday. "Every fifth day if they're losing your game, you don't want that, so you try to go up there and one-up the person before you."
This is the dynamic that once powered the Braves to 14 straight divisional crowns. They had Tom Glavine, John Smoltz and Greg Maddux for the vast majority of that run, as good a pitching trio as has ever taken the field, all of them now in the Hall of Fame.
That doesn't mean the Braves won't hold their own this weekend, or even win the series. As mentioned above, they've actually been the slightly hotter team the past two weeks despite a grueling road trip that included that single makeup game in Colorado.
But the hungrier team is almost certainly the Nationals, who would have to go 20-6 from this point forward just to tie Atlanta after 162 games if the Braves merely go 12-11. Possible, but hardly probable given that the Nats must not only play the Braves seven more times but also face three road games at Minnesota, three more away from home at St. Louis and another three at Miami.
"They're getting an understanding that every game matters, and we're playing to win every game," Nationals manager Dave Martinez told the media prior to Monday's loss. "So, getting into the playoffs, there's no let-ups."
There are no let-ups for either side in a race this close. But there is that somewhat comfortable 6 1/2-game Atlanta cushion at the moment, an edge that looks more imposing by the day when one considers the once-leaky Braves bullpen has become the NL's stingiest since Aug. 17 (2.16 ERA).
"Like we said all along, they just needed to find their rhythm," Braves starting pitcher Mike Soroka said after Monday's win, when the bullpen once again was bulletproof. "The rest is history. They're doing it day in and day out now."
If they have a chance to close out at least two games against the Nationals this weekend and succeed in those opportunities, the NL East race should be history. If not, anything less than a Washington sweep still leaves the Braves in the East driver's seat, which is all you can ask for at September's dawn.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.