The Atlanta Braves are proof that you hardly ever can count a team out.
The newly-minted World Series champions -- who clinched the Fall Classic with a Game 6 victory over the Houston Astros on Tuesday night -- struggled well into the second half of the season. They finished the year at 88-73 and atop a middling National League East, but their record doesn't exactly give a true picture of what their year was like.
Atlanta didn't hit the .500 mark on the season until Aug. 6 -- 111 games into their season. According to Sarah Langs, Matt Kelly and Andrew Simon of MLB.com, that's the longest road to a .500 record for any team that has ever participated in the World Series.
And even once they got to the postseason, the road wasn't easy. The Braves forced their way past the Milwaukee Brewers (who finished at 95-67), Los Angeles Dodgers (106-56) and Astros (95-67) before getting their hands on the Commissioner's Trophy. In doing so, they joined the 2011 St. Louis Cardinals as the only teams to best three 95-win teams in the postseason.
So if your team is struggling in 2022, don't rule out hope -- at least not until Aug. 7.
