By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL/Designated Writers

It happens to everybody’s favorite baseball team, except one, every year. It’s that day when the six-month journey comes to an end. You can be sad about it and you can be mad about it. Or both.

There comes a time in which you just need to (rhymes with “rich”) and you really don’t care who reads it or hears it. Now is one of those times. I’m sad that the Atlanta Braves’ season is over and, to be honest, I’d rather lose 13-1 (which they did Wednesday) than on an extra-inning sacrifice fly (which they did Monday). After winning the National League last year out of nowhere, the 2019 season was ripe for taking a step back this year. Every team in the NL East looked to be improved (except the Marlins, who don’t count) and it might be tough for Atlanta to put another magical season. But they did and it was glorious as they basically ran away with the division again.

But caught in the wake of the Division Series loss in Game 5 to the St. Louis Cardinals, it’s hard to see the regular season forest for the NLDS trees. Mainly because this appears to be another example of over-thinking, thanks to the analytics people who seem to think they invented the game.

Work with me here, even if you don’t follow the Braves and/or thought Chipper Jones still played third base.

From beginning to end of the season, Mike Soroka has been Atlanta’s best pitcher (13-4, 2.68 ERA). Though it doesn’t appear he has ever shaved, there is no Atlanta pitcher who has been better this season. That’s the guy you could trust every time he toed the rubber.

So what do the Braves do? They listen to the guy with the Excel spreadsheet and decide that it makes sense to pitch Soroka is Game 3 of a five-game series. Simply because he has better stats on the road than at home and Game 3 was in St. Louis.

Tell me when this makes sense: Set up your rotation so that your best pitcher gets only one start in a series instead of twice.

He’s 22 years old and never been in a post-season game and you’d rather have him pitch on the road? Meanwhile, veteran Dallas Keuchel gets the Game 1 and Game 4 starts and can’t get into the fifth inning in either one of them. Mike Foltynewicz, who spent time in the minors this season because he was so bad, got the other two starts. He was great in Game 2 and then managed to get one out (on a sacrifice bunt) in Game 5.

So for the four starts the Braves got from these two pitchers, it added up to one quality start. Meanwhile, Soroka did a nice job cheering on his teammates and working over several packs of sunflower seeds.

What’s the difference in a 10-run inning, like Cardinals had Wednesday, and a one-run inning? A ground ball to a Gold Glove first baseman. Even though it was obvious that Foltynewicz didn’t have it, a ground ball to Freddie Freeman should have been an easy double play (on a ball hit by the catcher) to end the inning. Instead, Freeman, probably distracted by the runner in front of him, had the ball go off his glove and into right field. Nine runs later, it was Atlanta’s turn to finally get the bat.

Give the Cardinals credit. They always seem to be at the best when it means the most. Maybe the moment was too big for Atlanta, but that was more the case last year (when they obviously weren’t ready) than this year, when the Braves failed to take the necessary step forward.

There is still more baseball to be played and certainly plenty of exciting playoff games. But when it’s over for your team, you think about how long it seems to be before spring training starts again. And then another six months to grind out.

It takes a lot of things to go right for your team to advance in the playoffs. It doesn’t take a whole lot of things to go wrong for it to end quickly.

We warned you that things could get wild in the postseason.

Don’t you love it?

We even caught a weather break this week in cooler temperatures. (“Cooler” meaning less than One Hundred And Five.) It actually feels like October Baseball.

Thirty minutes into the St. Louis vs. Atlanta Elimination Game Five, one of my besties from St. Louis texted: “Can you believe this game?” I hadn’t turned on the game because I was working but I did wonder what could have happened a half-hour into the game that would make it an already ‘unbelievable’ game. Five homers already? Four outfield diving catches? Three players already ejec…

Oh. I see. 10-egg.

Ouch.

If only there were a 10-run rule like in Little League.

But neg. It’s the majors. Crazy things happen at every level. This is one of the crazier.

I checked my phone’s sports app and saw it was 10-0. In the top of the first. With the Cardinals still batting. I actually said to myself, out loud, “It’s Ten Nothing top of the FIRST?” I’m pretty sure that’s what I said. I never listen to me.

The Cards held on for a 13-1 win. The Braves … have a while til spring training.

Still, I bet every Brave will tell you that it’s better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all.

Do the Dodgers feel that way? Clayton Kershaw, maybe the best pitcher of his generation, entered the eighth inning (and no one knows why on earth LA manager Dave Roberts put him in) in last night’s late game against Washington, another Game 5, with a two-run lead; he allowed home runs on consecutive pitches. Tie game. The Nationals win in the 10th.

Baseball is a very humbling game.

Rays at Astros in another elimination game tonight at 6. Rays had to play their way in with a one-game playoff against the A’s. Houston is the better team, obviously. But it’s the postseason and it’s baseball so…who knows?

As my man and former major league Dominican pitcher the late Joaquin Andujar, who I love, once said, “Baseball can be sum up in one wort: june never know, mang.” 

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