KISSIMMEE, Fla. – Remember the Atlanta Braves?

Hmmm … OK, it’s starting to come back now. Oh yeah, they’re the team that used to finish first every season.

Whatever happened to them?

Well, the Braves are still around, going through the familiar rituals of spring training at their Disney World complex: batting practice, fielding drills, bullpen work. And they’re downright astonished at how quickly everyone has cast them aside as some Mickey Mouse team – yesterday’s news, finished, kaput.

Sure, they slipped badly last season. Fell flat on their faces, actually. But is that any way treat one of baseball’s most dominant franchises of the past 15 years, a team that did it all except win a bunch of World Series titles?

“I’m really surprised that no one is even talking about us,” third baseman Chipper Jones said. “I think we’re as good as anybody in our division, which is all that matters over the next 162 games.”

Most of the NL East buzz revolves around the New York Mets, who are coming off a runaway division title and have oodles of money to spend. Then there’s the Philadelphia Phillies, who are talking big even though they haven’t made the playoffs since 1993, and the Florida Marlins, armed with some of the game’s most dynamic young players.

As for the Braves, they’re viewed as a team that’s past its prime – much like the New York Yankees of the mid-1960s, another dynasty that came to an inglorious end.

There was no media horde awaiting the Braves when they arrived in central Florida. Most of those folks were off covering the World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals, delving into the Barry Bonds soap opera or trying to figure out the relationship between Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter.

Hardly anyone has time for the Braves.

“They’ve written us off,” outfielder Jeff Francoeur said. “Let them keep doubting us. I love it.”

Even though youngsters such as Francoeur and Brian McCann have bolstered the Braves, it’s clear this isn’t the same franchise as the 1990s.

Once able to match teams such as the New York Yankees dollar for dollar, Atlanta has been forced to make tough budgetary decisions in recent years. You might have noticed that Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, Javy Lopez and Gary Sheffield don’t wear the tomahawk anymore.

“This team started to change,” Jones said, “when Ted Turner no longer owned the team. You take $30 million off the payroll, the names on the back of jerseys change a little bit.”

With the team going through a protracted sale from one corporation to another, there’s already concern that longtime stars Andruw Jones and John Smoltz could be playing elsewhere in 2008. Both are in the final year of their contracts, and there’s no indication the sale from Time Warner to Liberty Media – should it go through – would lead to a bigger checkbook.

The financial belt-tightening began to take its toll last year. After winning 14 straight division titles, a streak unmatched in any of the major sports, the Braves slumped to 79-83 and were basically out of the race before the All-Star break. They finished 18 games behind the Mets.

“I had never been anywhere but the playoffs,” said Andruw Jones, entering his 12th season with Atlanta. “It was tough to see other guys popping champagne.”

To his credit, general manager John Schuerholz addressed the team’s major concern – a hideous bullpen that led the National League in blown saves with 29.

After acquiring closer Bob Wickman midway through 2006, then re-signing him, the Braves traded for Pirates closer Mike Gonzalez and landed another promising reliever, Seattle’s Rafael Soriano, during the offseason.

Suddenly, Atlanta’s weakness would seem to be a strength.

“Some would regard this as overkill or overload,” Schuerholz said. “It’s my view that the bullpen, especially the back end of it, is as strong as it’s ever been. We have good reason to believe we won’t have to endure what we did last year.”

The veterans have tried to get across to the youngsters that anything short of playing in October will not be tolerated.

Manager Bobby Cox changed up his normal speech before the first full-squad workout of spring training, putting more fire in his words while making it clear that he considers last year an aberration.

“I’ve never seen so many people focused on day one of spring training,” Francoeur said. “A lot of people have ranked us third in the NL East. That’s great. Let them do it. I love it. We’ll just kind of cruise along and sneak in there at the end.”

Although the Phillies have spent most of their time trash-talking with the Mets, they haven’t forgotten the Braves.

“You can never count that team out,” Philadelphia’s Aaron Rowand said. “They’re definitely a team to be reckoned with and certainly not to be overlooked because they have way too much talent over there.”

But can Hampton bounce back from Tommy John surgery? Can Scott Thorman and Kelly Johnson come close to matching the production of first baseman Adam LaRoche (traded to Pittsburgh) and second baseman Marcus Giles? Can Chipper Jones come anywhere close to playing a full season after being plagued by injuries the last three years? Can Tim Hudson regain the form that once made him a 20-game winner in Oakland? Can Smoltz remain one of the game’s top starters as he approaches his 40th birthday and goes through a painful divorce?

If nothing else, the Braves should have the odds in their favor.

after everything went so wrong in 2006.

“The law of averages was bound to catch up with us,” Chipper Jones said. “But the bank collected last year. Now, it’s time to start a new streak.”

AP-ES-02-23-07 2027EST