It looked bleak at the start, but an offensive explosion leads to the win

The Braves were facing Chris Carpenter and the Cardinals. St Louis jumped out to a 4-2 lead until the bottom of the sixth when Atlanta piled on 6 runs to escape with a 8-6 victory. The big hits in the 6th came from Jason Heyward and Martin Prado while a two-run error by STL right fielder John Jay off the bat of Brian McCann allowed two runs to score. Takashi Saito pitched a scoreless 8th while Billy Wagner did the same in the ninth to seal the win.

The Phillies beat the Mets, so the Braves are still 1 game back in the NL East. The Giants won, so the Braves a game ahead in the wild card race.

Omar Infante was 1-for-4 in his quest to win the batting title. He is currently batting .340, but his qualifying average is .319. Carlos Gonzalez leads the NL in batting average with a .335 clip. Infante needs approximately 27 hits over the next 20 games with at least 87 plate appearances.

Braves show early spark, then forget to play the last 8 innings

The Braves took a 3-0 lead on the Cardinals in the first inning only to give 5 runs back in the second inning and much more as the game went on in a 11-4 defeat. The game pushed Atlanta 1 games back of the Phillies in the NL East. The Braves are still one game ahead of the Giants in the wild card race.

Omar Infante was 1-for-4 to lower his average to .342. His qualifying average is .319 because he does not have enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting title. Using his playing time averages with respect to at-bats and plate appearances, he needs 29 hits in 89 at-bats over the next 21 games to catch NL batting leader Carlos Gonzalez' .337 average.

Can Omar Infante win the NL batting title?

During the Braves blowout of the Pirates last night, Omar Infante was 3-for-5 to raise his average to .342. Right now, he is short of the 3.1 plate appearances per game to qualify for the batting title. He does have a chance to make it, but he will need to play every day and get at least 4 PAs per game to reach the necessary 502 PAs for the season.

Current: 407 PA 380 AB 130 H .342 AVG

The Braves have played 140 games, so Infante needs 434 PAs to qualify, so add 27 PAs/ABs to his total: 130 H/407 AB's = .319 average, which puts him 4th in the NL.

Last 30 team games: 138 PA 127 AB 44 H, so he is getting over 4 PAs per game.

22 games left, he needs at least 95 PAs which will consist of about 88 ABs. To catch NL hitting leader Carlos Gonzalez (.340), Infante needs 29 hits in those 88 ABs, or bat around .330 in more than 95 PAs.

This was just a quick calculation. Over the next few days, I hope to have a better calc on how Infante can win the NL batting title.

Where has all the power gone? Long time passing....

With a loss to the Pirates last night and a Phillies win, the Braves are in second place in the NL East for the first time since May 30. What has happened to the team in the last few weeks? Well, Chipper is out for the year, Derek Lowe missed his last start, and the team can't decide on who should play left field or center field. Kris Medlen is out for the year, which takes us down to three healthy starters (Hudson, Hanson, Jurrjens), a hurting Derek Lowe, an ineffective Kenshi Kawakami, and rookie Mike Minor. That is disappointing for a team with too many starting pitchers to begin the season. It just goes to show that a team can never have enough starting pitching.

But, the most confusing thing is the lack of power over the recent week or so. In September, the Braves are 7th in the NL in batting average and 8th in on-base percentage, so they are hitting the ball. However, the team is 15th in the league in slugging percentage and dead last in isolated power (slugging minus batting average).

The pitchers are 5th in the NL in ERA this month and 3rd in WHIP, but they are not getting the outs with runners on base as the team is 14th in the league in stranding runners so far in September, allowing 33.8 percent of all runners to score.

I don't know what is going on, but the Braves need to get back on track. They have one game left in the Pirates series, which they need to win because getting swept by Pittsburgh is embarrassing. Then they host the Cardinals for 4 games and the Nationals for a three game series. The Braves have the best home record in the NL and the Cardinals have been struggling. It would be nice to take 3 of 4 from them. (Plus it would also help the Reds in the NL Central). Atlanta needs to win 4 of the next 5 games to get back into the driver's seat in the NL East.