In the visitors’ clubhouse at Oracle Park, the lockers of four former Giants are along the same wall. All are in a good place — actually a better place — as part of the first-place Atlanta Braves.

“We’re just trying to relive the good old days,” quipped Mike Yastrzemski, who was a teammate of Joey Bart, Dom Smith, and Mauricio Dubón while wearing orange and black and now is their teammate in navy blue and scarlet red.

Yastrzemski, Smith, and Dubón were in the lineup for Friday’s opener against the Giants — a 3-1 Braves victory in which Dubón had two hits and scored twice — and Bart probably will appear before the end of the series as the backup catcher.

It’s not rare to face an old teammate here and there throughout the season, but it borders on ridiculous this weekend with the number of ex-Giants on Atlanta’s payroll. Besides the four players, the coaching staff includes J.P. Martinez and Antoan Richardson, and the front office has Pete Putila and Michael Schwartze.

It feels like a family reunion. Or, as Yastrzemski called it, ahead of Saturday night’s game when he’ll face old friend Logan Webb, “Probably more like a backyard wiffleball game than anything.”

The Braves have led the National League East since early April. They cruised most of the first half and built a 9 ½-game lead on June 7, but then they lost 10 of 13 entering this series, their first-place lead dipping to four.

However troubled the Braves might feel, it pales in comparison to the state of the Giants, who have reached the season’s midway point at 33-48, the second worst record in the majors, on pace for 96 losses. The Braves caught the Giants at a tumultuous time with much of the fanbase down on the team because of its poor play and its bad optics including the fallout from Pride Night and Rafael Devers’ refusal to exit the field when pulled from Sunday’s game.

What a contrast from the team across the field. The Giants are envious.

“It’s baseball, man. That’s the main thing,” said Dubón, describing life with the Braves under manager Walt Weiss. “I played with a bunch of managers like [Bruce] Bochy and Dusty [Baker]. You don’t have to look at exit velo. You don’t have to worry about, ‘I gotta hit the ball 110 [mph].’ No. It’s just ‘find a way to get a base hit  and help your team win.’ I think that’s why we’re having success here in Atlanta.

“Old-school baseball, man. Sometimes you win games by doing the little stuff, and sometimes you forget about that stuff if there’s too much analytics involved. You want the 109s, the 110s, but sometimes that 68 [mph] and 30 [-degree launch angle] works. You get the runner in, and sometimes that’s all you need to win the game.”

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In fact, Dubón’s first at-bat, he lofted a flare to the outfield grass that was 74.2 mph off the bat with a launch angle of 22 degrees, not exactly explosive stuff.

“I don’t have 110 in the tank,” Dubón said, “but I can make something happen with what I have.”

One by one, all the players were discarded by the Giants, who traded Dubón to the Astros in May 2022, Bart to the Pirates in April 2024, and Yastrzemski to the Royals last July. Dubón won a World Series ring in Houston, Bart is thrilled to be playing for his hometown team (he grew up just outside of Atlanta), and Yastrzemski has earned his first multiyear contract (two years, $23 million).

“We’re the Kapler rejects,” Dubón said with a smile, referring to former Giants manager Gabe Kapler, who ran the team for four seasons including the magical 107-win juggernaut in 2021. 

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Dubón was traded 21 games into the ensuing season and has made a name for himself as a versatile player and two-time Gold Glover. He has appeared at every infield and outfield position and started in left field Friday. He has gotten the most reps this year at shortstop.

As for his days playing for Kapler, Dubón said, “It wasn’t the right fit for me, and [the trade] ended up working out for me.”

Yastrzemski, who remembers Dubón’s early days with the Giants when he sometimes looked lost at the plate and on the bases, now sees a much more confident player. 

“I think he’s matured a lot, and he’s also learned a lot from playing to survive versus playing to win,” Yastrzemski said. “When he was over here, it was, ‘How do I stay in the big leagues?’ ‘Why do I keep getting set down?’ ‘How do I figure this out?’ Now it’s, ‘All right, how do I help this team win?’ His focus has shifted to that.”

As for Smith, his time in San Francisco was brief, 63 games last year. He hit a team-high .284, and after he sustained a season-ending hamstring injury on Sept. 12, the Giants called up Bryce Eldridge for his major-league debut.

Because Smith is a first baseman, like Eldridge and Rafael Devers, the Giants didn’t try to re-sign him, and he caught on with the Braves. Now he’s one of their most effective hitters especially in the clutch — .368 with two outs and runners in scoring position — and he became the first player ever to hit a walk-off grand slam in a team debut.

Smith, like Dubón and Yastrzemski, aren’t close to superstardom, but still an asset to a roster and clubhouse.

“Some people don’t see ‘grinders’ as a compliment, but it certainly is, and those guys are grinders,” Weiss said. “They’ve done a lot of good stuff for us, high-baseball-IQ guys, helped us win a lot of games. I would say that’s a common thread with those guys.”

Bart, the Braves newcomer, is the only player among the four drafted by the Giants as the No. 2 overall pick in 2018 and supposedly the heir apparent to Buster Posey, which added gobs of pressure. Bart had some injuries that slowed his development and never was able to win the No. 1 job.

That’s all in the past. Now he backs up Drake Baldwin as the Braves try to find the right mix of catchers; they’ve used a whopping eight already. Bart grew up a Braves fan, watching Chipper Jones and Andruw Jones, and wears the same number as Brian McCann (16)

“Everybody was fired up,” Bart said of his family, when hearing he was traded a bit over a week ago to the team that plays 20 minutes from his home. “I’ve done the long-distance thing for a long time. Obviously, this has all happened fast. We’re starting to settle in.”

The Giants did a tribute on the scoreboard to Yastrzemski before the second inning, and the crowd of 39,051 gave him a nice ovation when he was shown on the board afterward. Dubón and Bart have been back at Oracle Park with other teams, and apparently Smith didn’t play here long enough to get a Yaz-like tribute.

The main thing is, they’re in a good situation as the Giants continue to flounder. The Giants got zero hits with runners in scoring position. They made two errors. And they ran into two unnecessary outs on the bases. At least new catcher Drew Cavanaugh got his first big-league hit.

Next up, the former Giants will face Webb.

“We’ve been through a lot of stuff together, had a lot of fun,” Yastrzemski said of his old buddy. “So it’s like playing against your best friends. You go out there and try to beat them just for the pride of it. You take away the big leagues, take away the win-loss record, take away the fans, and that feels like a pride thing. You’re going up against your boys, and you want to be able to walk away and say, ‘I was on top today.’ ”