​ATLANTA, GA – SEPTEMBER 12: Braves mascot Blooper and third base coach Tommy Watkins of the Atlanta Braves goof off before the Saturday evening MLB game between the Philadelphia Phillies and the Atlanta Braves on September 12, 2026 at Truist Park in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by David J. Griffin/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images) | Icon Sportswire via Getty Images Before the 2026 season started, the Braves were projected to be good. Per FanGraphs, their central estimate Steamer-plus-ZiPS blend projection saw them in a virtual tie for the NL East crown with the Mets at 90 wins, with division odds of 36 percent, top-two-in-NL record odds of 29 percent, and overall playoff odds of 79 percent. The projected record was top three; the playoff odds were top four.As I start writing this on September 21, the day after the Braves clinched the NL East with a sweep of the Astros, it’s hard to say that things didn’t work out as expected. The Braves have 92 wins, good for fourth in MLB — whatever extra wins they collect this week are gravy, as the Braves have little chance of overtaking the Dodgers for a top-two NL record and corresponding bye, and they probably won’t try in favor of getting guys rest and lining up their rotation for the first round of the postseason. In at least this way, things went according to plan: the Braves were projected to be good, they were good, and they ended up basically where they were expected to. Hooray, the system works, at least this time. (Not in 2025, but the less we can say about that cursed season, the better… perhaps 2025 was the debt repaid for 2018.)This turn of events should be satisfying. Or, failing that, at least mollifying. For all the hand-wringing from 2024-on: the core is aging and no longer good; the team can’t supplement its roster with quality players, especially in the rotation; the team can’t manage player health well enough to complete; and so on and so forth ad nauseam like a giant Battery Power Atlanta Braves Game Thread and Discussion made manifest into a marquee crawl blazoning from the inside of fans’ eyelids… yes, for all that hand-wringing, here came the 2026 Braves, clinching with a week to go, while the Mets went full Mets (again, and earlier this time) and the Phillies look like a much more apt target for the same sort of hand-wringing.Are you satisfied? If so, this post isn’t for you. This post is for me, someone who spent a huge chunk of the offseason thinking about how this roster shaped up, and then pulled an update together every two weeks that told a… different… story. A weird story. Not weird like 2018, where a young roster led by a budding superstar played well enough on both sides of the ball to roll through five of the season’s six months en route to a 90-win season. Weird a different way. I considered burying the lede, but I won’t, and chances are, you’ve seen this written before. The Braves have the fourth-most wins through the point where win collection w