Between 1991 and 2005, the Atlanta Braves won their National League division fourteen times in a row. The West won three times, including the monumental 93 season in which the Braves needed 104 wins to beat the San Francisco Giants, and their substantial free agent signed Barry Bonds for a single game. The Braves migrated to the National League East in 1994, a season that shortened the strike. When play resumed in 1995, the Braves found themselves the favorites in the National League and as one of the top teams in Major League Baseball. Atlanta held its first world championship that year.
The Braves have played in eleven division series, seven championship series and five world series in the past two decades.
Atlanta has had great success in the last twenty years, but the successive failures of the organization cannot be ignored. Atlanta hasn’t won a division series in nearly a decade, and a 1-4 World Series record with Bobby Cox simply indicates the inevitable. Sure, the Braves won numerous playoff games, but they also lost a staggering thirteen playoff series. For every year but one, 1995, the Braves failed to win the Fall Classic after improbable performances from the regular season.
What can be attributed to Atlanta’s shortcomings in their postseason and World Series appearances?
Players have come and gone, we’ve seen five or six base coaches, two different pitching coaches, three bench coaches, and not to mention hitting coaches galore from all walks of life.
There has only been one constant: Bobby Cox, the only coach to have held the reins in Atlanta since the mid-1980s.
Bobby Cox describes himself as the manager of a player. It has strict clubhouse rules, including no loud music and a strict dress code on the field. He believes in rotating players on and off day-to-day, squad methods he learned from Casey Stengel during his short stint as a player in the majors. Cox’s path is the only one known to most in Atlanta. Many players have come and gone, they are not efficient at following the rules.
While Cox’s clubhouse rules may seem harsh, he is highly admired for the personable treatment he gives his players. Unfortunately, this may be where Cox’s downfall lies, and it may be the reason for only one World Championship during his tenure.
A formidable theory to ponder is that Cox is too easy on his players, allowing them to hang around without any reprimand. This theory can be put to the test by looking back at the last 20 years in Atlanta. Count the number of times the Braves’ offense seemed to drop its bats in the postseason, unable to hit a lick after being recognized as one of the best offenses in a league dominated by pitching. Relive old memories of a star pitcher who took the mound, often a Greg Maddux or Tom Glavine, allowing too many runs to cost the organization the decisive game of an October series. And finally, remember the skillful defenses the Braves deployed over many seasons and how those same defenses made multiple mistakes in October, proving to be big factors in those close losses and key to the game.
Some may disagree, often citing sources like Joe Torre’s success in New York. Remember how easy Torre is on his players, but don’t forget how tough George Steinbrenner was on them in return. As we watched Steinbrenner grow old and diminish in age and in his influence over the Yankees, the victory of the World Series games came to an end. Torre could have been easy on his players, as he knew how tough old George was going to be on them. This example shows us that being nice to players is not always a good thing, unless there is someone else behind them pushing.
A player can always be too relaxed. This is a factor that is never good and a factor that must always be taken into account. As a player, if you are too relaxed, you can lose focus, and more importantly, you can stop worrying. Giving up a home run on the mound or striking out at the plate may not faze you, when it really should. If a player concentrates fully and emphasizes things that don’t happen, they will make these critical errors in judgment less often.
The best thing for a player is a coach who repeatedly lets his subordinates know how high his expectations are. This keeps players focused and on the game at all times. It is almost beneficial for a player to think that consistent performance below par will lead the coach to strip him of his job on that team.
Let’s take Ozzie Guillen or “Sweet” Lou Piniella as prime examples of managers who instill their high expectations in the heads of their players with force, and also as managers who push their players to the limit and cross the finish line at all times. Guillén’s guys love to play for him, just like Piniella’s, but these two are the hardest on their players. Not to mention, each manager has had immense successes in their tenures with their respectable teams.
There may be many factors that led to one loss after another in the postseason for the Braves, but there was only one constant throughout it all, and it was, and still is, Bobby Cox. Bobby will go on to be one of the greatest coaches in Major League history; he’s in the top three for career wins. Yet he will always be remembered as the man who led 13 teams to a chokehold in 13 different seasons.
Almost every October for Atlanta under Cox turned into months of disappointment and “what if?”
