Going into this weekend’s series against the Mets (98-61), the Braves were one game behind in the standings for the lead in the NL East. By the time the dust had settled on the field at Truist Park, the defending World Series champs are two games up and looking to secure the fifth straight division title.
Matt Olson and Dansby Swanson each homered for the third straight game as the Bravos finished off the New York Mets 5-3 on Sunday and won the tiebreaker for the critical season series in addition to reaching the 100-win benchmark for the first time since 2003, when team finished with the best record in the league at 101-61.
With the ink dry on the one-year, $20 million contract extension to stay with the team for one more season, Charlie Morton took the hill and tossed 4.1 innings, surrendering 3 earned runs on 9 hits while striking out five. The bullpen did its job the rest of the way, shutting down the Mets bats while Atlanta continued to swing the big sticks.
It feels like the Braves have been chasing the Mets the entire season. With a three-game set against the Miami Marlins (67-92) to wrap up the season, the Braves need just one victory or one Mets loss to lock up the NL East crown and enjoy a first-round bye in the 2022 MLB playoffs.
The Mets had a 10.5 game-lead at the beginning of June but now sit farther out of first place than they have during the entire season. New York came into the series with their aces on the mound, throwing Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer in the first two games of the definitive series with 15-game winner Chris Bassitt took the mound on Sunday.
The three Mets starters were good for a combined 2.79 ERA over 377 innings going into this weekend; collectively, they were good for 6.91 ERA over 14.1 innings with six home runs allowed over the weekend.
The new MLB postseason format means the winner of the NL East will get a first-round bye into the divisional round as the second seed.
The NL East runner-up will get the fourth seed and play in a three-game wild-card series, with the winner of that series moving to the divisional round.