What a game. This is what makes baseball so much fun. It’s the impossible and the improbable.

The first game of yesterday’s season-ending doubleheader was one of the most fun baseball games you’ll ever watch. Mainly because, if you’re a Rangers fan, you didn’t have to suffer through the agony of every single pitch like happened last season.

The Braves needed to win just one of the two games to assure themselves of a playoff slot. So did the Mets. The Diamondbacks needed either team, the Braves or the Mets, to lose both games, and they were in. 

Atlanta took a 3-0 lead into the eighth inning, needing just six outs to assure themselves of their seventh consecutive post-season appearance. Their starter, Spencer Schwellenbach, cruised through seven innings of shutout baseball. He was back for the eighth inning.

He finally wore down when the first Mets hitter in the top of the eighth battled him in an eleven-pitch at-bat that ended up in a leadoff double. 

He left the game. Then the hit parade began. Double. Single. Single. Single. Sac fly. Home run. The Braves used four pitchers in the inning, giving up six runs. Normally, that would be a heart breaker you can’t come back from.

Not the Braves. Down 6-3 now, they got themselves off the mat and answered with four runs in the bottom of the eighth to take the lead back at 7-6. But the Mets weren’t done, either.

They scored two in the top of the ninth to stick the dagger into the hearts of the Braves and their fans in stunning fashion. Atlanta let two leads disappear. They lost 8-7.

Now, they absolutely had to win the second game of the doubleheader. It was do or die time. This doubleheader was the result, by the way, of the massive rain from Hurricane Helene that washed out the last two games of the Mets-Braves series last week.

If coughing up two leads wasn’t enough of a blow, a few minutes before the game, the Braves found out their eventual Cy Young winning pitcher, Chris Sale, was scratched because of a bad back. 

Yet, they picked themselves up, turned the ball over to a guy who had made just six starts all season, and won a must-win game 3-0.

Not only did this usher them into the playoffs and ensure last year’s World Series participant Arizona, like Texas, would not make this year’s playoffs, but the Braves also did something considerably more significant.

They made it impossible for teams to use the injury excuse from here on out. The Braves lost perennial Cy Young candidate Spencer Strider after just two starts. Then they lost last year’s MVP, Ronald Acuña Jr, after fifty games. They lost All-Star third baseman Austin Riley in mid-August. They also weathered long I.L. stints from their catcher, their center fielder, and their second baseman.

Still, they won 89 games. None more important than number 89, just after having lost a heart breaking first game and the gut punch of losing their best pitcher.

That there is what they call resilience. 

*****  
TODAY’S GAMES: 

1:32, Detroit @Houston, ABC

3:38, Kansas City @ Baltimore, ESPN

6:38, New York Mets @ Milwaukee, ESPN

7:38, Atlanta @ San Diego, ESPN 2