Braves beat Marlins to win the NLDS

Well, if you were screaming and hollering when the Braves stranded the bases loaded with no one out in the second inning – like I was… we can all go ahead and apologize here and now.

There is no reason to panic about this Atlanta Braves offense. If it fails in one inning, they’ll get more chances to come up and do damage.

After squandering that early opportunity, the Braves turned right around and went off on the Miami Marlins. The Braves scored four runs in the third inning, one run in the fourth inning and two in the fifth to win 7-0.

National League RBI leader Marcell Ozuna got everything going in the third inning when he singled home Ronald Acuna. Then Travis d’Arnaud atoned for a bad baserunning decision in the second inning by doubling home Freddie Freeman and Ozuna to make it 3-0.

Dansby Swanson then had a sac fly to score d’Arnaud to make it 4-0.

In the fourth inning, Freeman signed home Acuna to make it 5-0. Then in the fifth, Swanson singled home Ozzie Albies and then scored himself on a double by Adam Duvall to make it 7-0.

Atlanta got another great start from Kyle Wright, who went six scoreless innings and gave up just three hits, two walks and struck out seven. The Braves rotation of Max Fried, Ian Anderson and Wright has given up only four earned runs in 28.2 innings in the five postseason games for a 1.26 ERA.

Meanwhile, the opponents’ ERA for the starting pitchers is 4.00 in the five postseason games.

Counting Wright’s last three regular season games and the performance on Thursday, Wright has now allowed just five earned runs in his last 25 innings (1.80 ERA) with 14 hits allowed, eight walks and 21 strikeouts.

The Braves' bullpen pitched three scoreless innings Thursday. It has allowed only one run in 20.1 innings of work in the five postseason games. That's an ERA of 0.44.

Atlanta will now wait on the winner of the series between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres. The Dodgers lead that series 2-0 and can clinch Thursday night.

When the Braves play game one of the National League Championship Series on Monday, it will have been 6931 days since the franchise last played in a NLCS game. The last time it happened was on October 21, 2001.

Several current Braves players were very young on that day. Cristian Pache had not turned three yet. Huascar Ynoa and Ian Anderson were both three years old. Bryse Wilson and Acuna were almost four years old.

FOR MORE BRAVES COVERAGE, LISTEN TO THE BILL SHANKS SHOW WEEKDAYS AT 3:00 P.M. ET ON SPORTSRADIO 93-1 WXKO THESUPERSTATIONS.COM