1995 Braves: The First Half of the Regular Season

250px-Atlanta_Braves_Insignia.svg

After the strike’s official end on April 2, Braves’ players and coaches rushed down to West Palm Beach for three weeks of spring training before the start of the shortened 144-game regular season. The coaches focused on getting the players into shape and avoiding injuries.  Both the coaches and the players seemed relieved that the game they loved was back.

As the Braves began spring training in April, general manager John Schuerholz solidified the roster with the addition of Marquis Grissom and Jeff Blauser.  Grissom, an Atlanta native, came via trade with the Montreal Expos.  He brought the element of speed to the Braves that they had not had since Otis Nixon.  A natural leadoff hitter, Grissom either led the National League in stolen bases  or finished in the top three from 1991-1994 and won the Gold Glove in center field the previous two years before joining the Braves.  Schuerholz signed Blauser to a three-year deal.  Blauser had been the Braves’s starting shortstop before his contract ended after the 1994 season and was a key part of the team chemistry developed in the early 1990s.

Before the season began, Schuerholz and manager Bobby Cox decided that young, home-grown Chipper Jones, Ryan Klesko, and Javier Lopez would be in the everyday lineup. Schuerholz also called up relief pitcher Brad Clontz from the minors.

While the Braves players and management prepared for the upcoming season, Braves fans struggled with their emotions.  The strike prompted feelings of anger, resentment and betrayal from fans across the country.  Attendance at Braves spring training games dropped about eighty percent from pre-strike figures.  During spring training and early in the regular season, fans demonstrated their displeasure by boycotting games or coming to games with home-made signs and other forms of expression. While all Braves’ players and coaches wanted to re-establish fan rapport, Tom Glavine especially felt the need to mend fences.  He knew that fans resented him more than others because of his role as the union representative for the Braves.  Atlantans have generally looked unfavorably on unions of all types.  With that in mind, Glavine signed copious autographs and went out of his way to re-engage with Braves fans.

The Braves opened the 1995 season on April 26 versus the San Francisco Giants.  Just over 24,000 fans, less than half of Atlanta-Fulton County stadium’s capacity, saw the Braves defeat the Giants, 12-5.  Greg Maddux pitched five innings giving up one earned run on one hit while striking out five.  He also had two hits and scored a run.   Brad Woodall allowed the rest of the San Francisco tallies.  Fred McGriff paced the 17-hit attack with four hits, including two home runs and four RBIs. David Justice contributed three hits, including a home run and two RBIs.    Chipper Jones had two hits, two RBIs, and scored three times while Jeff Blauser provided two hits and scored two runs.

The opening game win belied the Braves’ play from late April to early July.  The team struggled at times with different phases of the game—pitching, hitting, and fielding.  By the end of the first week of May, the Braves trailed the Philadelphia Phillies for the division lead.  At the end of a five-game losing streak in early June, the Braves were four and a half games out of first.  Bobby Cox knew that if the Braves did not play better baseball soon the division title would belong to the Phillies.  The players also felt the time had come to step up their collective game.  After a team meeting and an abandoned flight to Montreal because of a fire in the cabin, the Braves went on a seven-game winning streak.  By July 4, the Braves had regained first place from the Phillies.

Independence Day provided just enough fireworks for Atlanta.  The Braves took over the top spot in the division with a 3-2 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers.  The Dodgers scored two runs in the second inning off of Kent Mercker but a David Justice solo home run in the bottom of the inning cut the deficit to one.  The game stayed that way until the bottom of the eighth when an opposite field blast from Ryan Klesko tied the game and a Jeff Blauser single drove in Dwight Smith with the go-ahead run.  Mark Wohlers, recently installed as the closer, pitched a perfect ninth inning to garner his seventh save of the season.

 

By the July 11th All-Star game, the Braves had opened a 4.5 game lead over Philadelphia.  The fun had only begun!

 

 

Why Didn’t the Atlanta Braves Win More World Series Titles in the 1990s?

Former Braves general manager John Schuerholz on Sunday was voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.  He joins former Braves manager Bobby Cox and pitchers Tom Glavine, John Smoltz and Greg Maddux.  Chipper Jones will most likely join them in 2018.  The common thread here is that all six participated in the Braves’ amazing run during the 1990s.  So the Braves now have from that era their general manager, manager, and three starting pitchers in the Hall, with their third baseman soon to follow.  The Braves, in the 1990s, won eight consecutive division titles, five national league pennants but only one World Series.  How is this possible? Let’s look at some theories behind the Braves’ failure to bring home more titles.

Leo Mazzone blames the lack of World Series titles on the extra round of playoffs added in 1995.  In his book Tales from the Braves Mound (Sports Publishing LLC, 2003, p. 74), Mazzone makes his case:

“The only time I felt anxiety is in that first round of the best-of-five.  In a

seven-game series, we’ve always felt that the depth of our starting rotation

and the depth of our pitching staff and the depth of our ball club could beat

anybody.  You go best-of-five and you lose one, there’s a sense of urgency.

You’re scrambling already.  One pitcher gets hot, one bad hop, one crazy thing

happens and before you know it, you’re scrambling.  That’s the only reason why

the Atlanta Braves have won only one World Series.  I guarantee we would have

won more World Series if we were winning our division, then going straight to

the NLCS.”

 

I respect Mazzone’s argument but that does not explain World Series losses to the Minnesota Twins in 1991 and the Toronto Blue Jays in 1992.  Remember the best-of-five first round playoffs did not begin until 1995.  However, maybe they would not have lost to the Florida Marlins in 1997 and the San Diego Padres in 1998 and would have gone on to win the World Series in those years.

John Smoltz is his book John Smoltz Starting and Closing (William Morrow, 2012, p. 220-229) offers several theories on why the Braves did not win more titles.  First, he claims that power pitching wins in the playoffs.  While finesse pitchers Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine were great pitchers, they pitched to contact.  They wanted hitters to hit the ball to their infielders and outfielders.  Smoltz states that this philosophy works well over the course of a 162-game regular season, but facing good hitters in the playoffs translates to more hits and more runs.  On the other hand, a power pitcher such as Smoltz can generate more strike outs thereby keeping more hitters off of the base paths and less runs from scoring.  There may be some truth in this theory.  Maddux had an 11-13 postseason record with a 2.81 ERA with the Braves and allowed an alarming 18 earned runs in 27 starts. Glavine had a 12-15 postseason record with the Braves while compiling an ERA of 3.44.  Smoltz’s postseason record with the Braves was 15-4 with an ERA of about 2.70.

The Braves played a total of 29 games in their five World Series in the 1990s.  Seventeen of those games were decided by one run and the Braves lost 12 out of 17.  All the losses to Toronto in the 1992 Series were by one run.  Fewer base runners would have meant fewer runs and maybe more wins for the Braves.  Another power pitcher may have helped.

Smoltz also points to the lack of timely hitting by the Braves in these losses and the preponderance of timely hitting from their opponents.  He argues that sound pitching and timely hitting win titles.  Hard to argue with that logic.  Oh what a timely hit in Game 7 against Minnesota would have meant to the outcome of that game and the Series.  Interestingly, Marquis Grissom had a reputation for timely hits throughout his career and he was arguably the catalyst behind the 1995 title against the Cleveland Indians.  He also hit .444 against the New York Yankees in the 1996 Series, but weird things happened in that Series (See below).

Smoltz offers one more reason for the lack of titles in Atlanta.  He argues that the Braves experienced some bad luck that decided several games and eventually cost Atlanta an extra title or two.  For example, if Lonnie Smith picks up the ball while running the bases in Game 7 against Minnesota, or at least watched his third base coach, he would not have slowed down and would have scored easily.  Maybe if the Braves had the extra home game instead of Minnesota, Atlanta wins the 1991 World Series.  Remember, the home team did not lose in 1991.  Also, if umpire Time Welke does not interfere with Jermaine Dye’s attempt to catch a very catchable foul ball during the sixth inning of that fateful Game 4 of the 1996 Series, then Derek Jeter would have been out.  Instead he singles on a later pitch and begins a three-run rally to cut Atlanta’s lead to 6-3.  The next inning, usually dependable Rafael Belliard boots a sure double-play grounder and only gets one out.  So instead of one on and two outs, there were two on and one out when Jim Leyritz launches his home run to tie the game.  The Braves would lose that game in extra innings and eventually the Series.  Again, Smoltz may have an argument here.

I have a little different take on why the Braves could not produce more titles and it revolves around John Schuerholz.  I concur with Smoltz that the Braves could have used another power pitcher and more contact hitters.  During the 1990s run the Braves were built on the long ball.  Fred McGriff, Ryan Klesko, David Justice and Javy Lopez were power hitters.  All played major roles in Atlanta’s ability to get to the World Series, but other than the 1995 Series, these players did little with their bats in other Series.  However, Mark Lemke, a contact hitter, did his part to win the 1991 Series when he batted .417 and hit .273 against Cleveland in 1995.  Unfortunately, he didn’t hit well against Toronto in 1992 and the Yankees in 1996.  Marquis Grissom, another contact hitter, batted .360 against Cleveland and .444 against the Yankees, then Schuerholz traded him to Cleveland. Grissom would lead the Indians to the 1997 World Series where he would extend his hitting streak in World Series games to 15.  The Braves did receive Kenny Lofton as part of that trade, but Lofton played one year with Atlanta before returning to Cleveland as a free agent. Another contact hitter or two may have changed the outcomes of some of the games against elite opponents in the World Series, where hits are generally at a premium because of the strong pitchers associated with each club.  Grissom brought the added dimension of speed, which enables clubs to manufacture runs more easily.  Just look at what Kenny Lofton did to the Braves in 1995 and may have done with Atlanta Braves if the Braves had elected to re-sign him after the 1997 season.

So had the Braves acquired another power pitcher or two or another contact hitter or two or someone besides Grissom who could manufacture a run with his bat and legs, would that have possibly allowed the Braves to win more of those one-run games and change the total of their World Series titles?  Maybe, but we will never know because the man responsible for acquiring such pieces, John Schuerholz, did not do so.  I am not laying the lack of more titles completely at his feet because I don’t know what he was or was not told to do by upper management.  However, Ted Turner owned the Braves for most of this run and I have to believe if Schuerholz requested that the Braves add one or more aforementioned pieces Turner would have agreed to do so. I don’t believe money really was an issue back then.

You can make your own judgments.  Maybe the Braves needed another power pitcher, or contact hitter, or base stealer.  Maybe they were just unlucky.  Or maybe, some other factor(s) played a role in the lack of titles that have not come to mind.  I really don’t know, but I give much of the blame to John Schuerholz, the man just elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame.  One thing I am sure of—the Atlanta Braves should have more than one World Series title.