Biggest Offseason Acquisition: All of the Uptons.

Potential Fatal Flaw: Third base. Rotational depth. I’m nitpicking.

Ceiling: World Series champion.

Floor: .500 baseball team.

Overall: To be very clear, right off the bat, I don’t think they come even close to their floor.

You don’t just go out and acquire two-time All-Stars just entering their prime. At least, you shouldn’t if the other 29 GMs are doing their jobs well.

But that’s what Atlanta did. I talked about the Upton trade in my Arizona Diamondbacks preview. Arizona gave up on a 25 year old All-Star because they thought he looked lazy. Simple as that. With every passing day, that trade sounds more and more preposterous. There’s a lot to be said about the “lazy” tag in baseball. It’s almost always used to refer to black players (Justin and his brother BJ, most vocally). There exists a notion that if you’re supremely talented, like Justin and Bossman Junior, you should also play the game with the reckless abandon of Eric Byrnes. That notion is absolutely stupid. In professional football, supremely talented quarterbacks are taught to slide and run out of bounds to avoid injury. In baseball, we’ve come to expect our stars to be covered in dirt by 1:08 p.m.

Arizona’s short-sightedness was Atlanta’s huge gain in what was a transformative offseason in the Dirty South. Earlier in the offseason, the Braves signed BJ Upton to be their long-term centerfielder, likely unaware that they’d be pairing him with his younger brother. Combined with Jason Heyward, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better outfield in the National League. And I say that with the utmost reverence and respect for the team located in the city that I live in. And for the team that employs Mike Trout.

Atlanta’s hole offensively is in the infield. Freddie Freeman is a sure thing. Not a great thing. But a really quality bat. At short, Atlanta fans are in for a treat as they’ll get to watch Andrelton Simmons everyday (you know, the Atlanta fans who actually show up to the park). The Dutch shortstop might not be the next coming of Nomar Garciaparra circa this at the plate, but in the field, there’s no one better in baseball. Simmons gets to everything and makes every throw. He’s a joy to watch. And then, there’s Dan Uggla who will drive you crazy with his 4-56 slumps, but will win you back when he looks like the second coming of Honus Wagner for two weeks. He is 33 and his power has certainly dipped (and he’s an atrocious fielder), but you could do a lot worse than Dan Uggla, at least offensively, at second. Trust me, lots of teams are trying to.

No, the hole is at third where Chipper Jones no longer resides. In his place, Chris Johnson, who is a terrible baseball player, and Juan Francisco, will try to platoon (Johnson v. lefties, Francisco v. righties). Juan Francisco is an abysmal hitter against lefties, but Chris Johnson is frankly not much better with a career .372 slugging pct. against left-handed pitchers and a sub-.300 on-base pct. Will it kill Atlanta to have an easy out every time through the lineup? Probably not. But when injuries add up (and they do over the course of 162 games), it’s sure nice to not have to give up 2 outs every time through the batting order. Or 3.

If Atlanta’s not going to win the NL pennant, I don’t think Chris Francisco or Juan Johnson will be the reason. It will be their starting pitching. The bullpen is obscenely good, so that will help. But I have my doubts when it comes to Paul Maholm, Mike Minor, and Julio Teheran, who, despite the hype, has never looked impressive in any of his 200 spot starts. And yes, I realize that he’s only 22 and it’s only 4 spot starts. Point being, if we’re going to compare the Nationals’ rotation to Atlanta’s, I like Washington’s more. You know what you’re going to get (barring injury) from all of Washington’s starters, save probably for Ross Detwiler, who could certainly regress some. In Atlanta, the surest thing is probably 37 year old Tim Hudson. Hudson is a great number 3 starter at this point in his career. But if we’re comparing staff aces, I’ll take Stephen Strasburg, thank you very much. And if you think that Kris Medlen is going to have a 1.57 ERA and a K/BB ratio over 5 again, I also have a lovely beachfront home in Sioux City with your name on it.

Ultimately, I think Atlanta gets to the NLCS and faces the Nationals. And ultimately, I think Washington’s starting pitching, 1-4, with a guy like Detwiler coming out of the pen, gets the job done.

That said, the NL East race, regardless of the fact that they’ll both make the playoffs, will be thrilling to watch. Two years ago, we were wondering who was going to challenge Philadelphia for division superiority. Now, I’m wondering how many years we’ll get of Atlanta and Washington slugging it out 18 times per year for division dominance.

Predicted Finish: 95-67