Braves Complete Sweep of Brewers, Improve to 5-4

Well the Braves pulled off  the sweep after a solid outing from Brandon Beachy and some offense on the backs of Chipper Jones and Jason Heyward. Beachy (1-1) went seven innings to become the second Braves started to get past the fifth after Mike Minor‘s gem yesterday. He gave up 3 hits and allowed to walks to give the Brewers just a single run over the 7 inning span. He keeps showing us that his strikeout numbers from last year might not be a fluke with 6 K’s during the game.

Michael Bourn could be getting out of his early season slump after getting 3 hits in 5 at bats including a double and a stolen base. He was also caught stealing once.

Chipper Jones and Jason Heyward combined to go 2 for 6 with 3 walks and 2 home runs. The patience being back this year is huge for the lineup and is starting to solidify the belief that Larry Parrish ruined everyone last year. Martin Prado has quietly been chugging along so far this season adding his own multi-hit game including a walk and a stolen base.

Like I tried to tell people before the season began, the offense is noticeably better than they ever were last year. The lineup has been carrying the starting rotation for the most part when last year the opposite was true. Freddie Freeman, and Michael Bourn have also not done a whole lot so far and if they start hitting like they can the Braves will have one of the more potent offenses in the National League.

Now the Braves rank 13th in the National League in batting average (.225), 11th in OBP (.293), and 9th in slugging (.393). They still aren’t numbers to brag about but they are a pretty noticeable improvement from a couple days ago, if that means anything to you. For what it’s worth the team’s BABIP so far is the fourth lowest in the NL at .261. Last year the abysmal Braves offense finished with a team BABIP of .284.

The Braves have now won 5 games straight and need to keep it up in the next two weeks. 7 out of the next ten games are against the Diamondbacks (4) and the Dodgers (3). The Diamondbacks are probably the better team but the Dodgers offense has been hot and they are leading the NL West division with an 8-1 record.