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Thursday, September 7, 2006
Tip your cap to the Braves
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
The streak that began on the giddy afternoon of Oct. 5, 1991, is days from its end. The Braves are four losses — or four Mets victories, or any combination thereof — from elimination in the NL East race. Yes, the issue was essentially decided months ago, but the official attachment of what John Schuerholz calls “that funny mark by your name that means you can’t win anymore” should have a special and somber resonance here.
Not since September 1990 has that unfunny mark been affixed to the Atlanta Braves. Not since 1991 has this franchise completed a full season and finished anywhere but first. Not since Schuerholz arrived from Kansas City in October 1990 has a team of his making failed to win its division. And how, with the run of titles about to conclude at 14, does the architect feel?
“Disappointed,” he said Thursday. “And saddened. And proud.”
The Braves assembled a team this season that was, for reasons ranging from design flaws to rotten luck, not good enough to finish first. Such seasons befall other organizations all the time, but for 14 seasons every other group of Braves overrode injuries and down years from individuals and challenges from beefed-up rivals and even Old Lady Luck to finish first every blessed time.
The people — and there are some out there, wrong-headed though they be — who came to insist that division titles didn’t mean anything simply don’t understand the nature of baseball. Those who do regard the Braves and the hallowed 14 as an outrageous benchmark. Said Schuerholz: “You don’t know how many general managers and managers and star players have said to me, ‘You can’t do what you’ve done. What you’ve done may be the most remarkable feat in sports history.’ “
Certainly it qualifies for consideration. No other franchise in the four major sports based in the U.S. and Canada — not the Yankees, not the Cowboys, not the Celtics, not the Canadiens — has finished first 14 times running. Over that ridiculous span, the Braves moved from the West to the East and saw seven organizations finish as runners-up, but the team atop the standings never changed. The players did, the Braves remaking themselves a half-dozen times, but each batch of players produced the same outcome.
Until this bunch. But the wonder of it isn’t that this one team failed — it’s that all the others found ways to succeed. “We’ve had problems and we’ve fixed them and we’ve patched them and we’ve found alternate strengths,” Schuerholz said. “Last year we jettisoned Plan A and went with 18 rookies.”
No player was an active part of all 14 titles. (John Smoltz missed the 2000 season after surgery.) Chipper Jones arrived in September 1993 as part of the vaunted Next Wave of Braves — Ryan Klesko and Javy Lopez were classmates — and has since seen several more waves come and go. For 14 seasons, it didn’t really matter what names the Braves ran out there; what mattered was that they were Braves.
Just being the Braves wasn’t enough this season. (Schuerholz holds out hope of his team winning 20 of its last 23 games to grab the wild card, but even he concedes the improbability of that.) “If reality sets in,” he said, “we’ll deal with it. … It just didn’t work this year, but that doesn’t mean the spirit is broken or the mechanism is broken.”
Maybe next year will be better than this one, but nothing in our lifetimes will ever approach the extended splendor of what we’ve just beheld. Said Schuerholz: “When the disappointment of this season passes — and it will, though it’s palpable now — I should think that any honest-thinking person would say, ‘What a remarkable accomplishment.’ “
If a player gets a hit every third time at bat, he winds up in the Hall of Fame. The Braves hit their target 14 times in 15 seasons. That’s a batting average of .933, and that’s not just Cooperstown material — that’s Valhalla stuff. We around here have been honored to bear witness to the longest run of excellence pro sports has seen, and in its passing we should tip our figurative caps.
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Weekend predictions: Birds upstage panda
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Before getting to this week’s blue-chip indicators, this update from the Weekend Predictions Animal Planet, a disturbed subsidiary of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, which Thursday devoted 7,000 column inches to a panda bear’s artificial love child. (Coming next week: Itsy Bitsy Spider denies eating disorder. Also, Lun Lun fumes while Yang Yang claims he and Paris Hilton are “just friends.”)
An actual factual: A cow in Harriet, Ark., this week gave birth to her fourth set of triplets. “Faith” has now given birth to 22 calves over nine pregnancies, which is believed to be a record in Arkansas, which of course doesn’t have an NBA team.
“She is huge before giving birth,” said Jenny Williams, the cow’s owner. “We can tell if she will have twins or triplets by her size.”
There was absolutely no reason for me to use that quote, except that it created the easiest transition to Grady Jackson and Falcons of lesser girth.
It’s the first week of the NFL season, and the Falcons open in Carolina. According to several publications, the Panthers already have made it to this year’s Super Bowl, and lead 13-10 at halftime.
OK. They’re good. But if they’re not missing Steve Smith, it’s because he’ll be running pass routes with three layers of duct tape wrapped around his hamstrings. That should make things easier on Falcons cornerback DeAngelo Hall, who I think expects to be inducted into the Hall of Fame by Week 6. (If Hall pats himself on the back one more time, he’s going to tear a rotator cuff.)
Carolina likely will have to depend more on its running game, which is where the 674-pound Jackson should help. He steps into a spot previously occupied by nobody.
The Falcons are getting five points. Take them as a gift. They should be able to run. Michael Vick also has looked more under control of late. Maybe he just hadn’t heard the news about the panda. The season starts with an upset. Grab the points, but Falcons win this straight up.
Faber College (Where Knowledge is Good) Georgia at South Carolina: Matthew Stafford probably won’t start, but then nobody even thought he would play last week. Then Mark Richt discovered that everybody else pretty much stinks. But see, if Richt can’t figure out his quarterback rotation, there’s no way Steve Spurrier can defend it. Wait, that didn’t come out right. Georgia barely covers 3 (final score: 6-2).
Samford at Tech: The schedule goes from college football’s most storied program (Notre Dame) to Alabama’s Lollipop Guild (Samford and Troy). Welcome to Chan Gailey’s nightmare. Anything less than twin dismemberings and the questions start all over. No official line. So let’s say, Jackets by 18 2/3.
Ohio State at Texas: Jim Tressel claimed he voted Texas No. 1 in the USA Today Weasel Coaches Poll, which seemed noble, until USA Today reported Tressel actually voted his own team No. 1. It was the paper’s greatest journalistic moment, eclipsing the previous high: the color weather map. Fact is, neither of these teams should be sniffing No. 1. But for now: Take the Buckeyes and 2 1/2, and in a straight upset.
Duke at Wake Forest: Something is wrong when Wake Forest is a 19 1/2-point favorite. Duke just got shut out by a I-AA team (Richmond). Ted Roof has managed the impossible: He lowered the standards of Duke football. Wake big (but won’t cover).
Mississippi State of Confusion: Sylvester Croom lost his starting quarterback in the first game, so he has moved a starting wide receiver to backup QB. Maybe it’s time to schedule a game against Duke. Auburn covers 20.
NFL Five Pack (I drank one)
Manning Bowl: The last time Eli beat Peyton in anything was a pickup basketball game. I’m guessing that won’t make a difference when his team is unmasked as another creation of the New York media. Colts cover 3 1/2.
Chargers at Raiders: Oakland signed Jeff George, then cut him four days later. Sorry, too late. It’s sort of like a guy drinking 17 beers, spotting Rosie O’Donnell across the room and saying, “Wow, she’s hot.” Can’t take it back. And the Raiders just confirmed the obvious. San Diego covers the trey.
Cowboys at Jaguars: Terrell Owens hasn’t played a game in over 10 months. No wonder he’s been low-keying his return. That was a joke. Jags win but take the Pokeys and 2 1/2.
Eagles at Texans: When Philly makes the playoffs and Dallas doesn’t, will Owens say, “This wouldn’t have happened if Donovan McNabb was my quarterback”? Philly covers 41/2.
Vikings at Redskins: T.J. Duckett: 27 yards, one TD, three missed blitz pickups resulting in sacks. Skins win but take Minny and 41/2.
Financial report
Opening week: 5-2 straight up, 3-4 against the line.
Next week: Better, I think.
Locks: Bagels.
Permalink | Comments (50) | Categories: Jeff Schultz
How soon we (choose to) forget
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
It was the record everyone wanted to see broken. Remember? Or is it more convenient to forget?
On Aug. 30, 1998, Mark McGwire hit his 55th homer of that season off the Braves’ Dennis Martinez. It traveled 501 feet to dead center in the old Busch Stadium, and it gave the Cardinals the lead in the bottom of the eighth inning. I was there, and the roar of the crowd when McGwire connected remains the greatest noise I’ve ever heard at a sporting event. And afterward McGwire said: “I’m going to do my best to give America what it wants.”
Eight years later, will anybody in America admit they rooted for McGwire to hit 62 that year? (Pushed by Sammy Sosa, Big Mac wound up with 70.) Will anybody admit that the issue of steroids was one we all simply chose to ignore?
Today we act righteously indignant and say things like, “You know, Ryan Howard just might break the REAL home run record.” As if 61 remains the untainted benchmark. As if McGwire and Sosa — and Barry Bonds, who bettered both with 73 in 2001 — were figments of the collective imagination. As if Sports Illustrated never dressed McGwire and Sosa in togas and laurel wreaths in naming the two co-Sportsmen of the Year.
Today we try not to think of Big Mac and Slammin’ Sammy at all, and it’s not that hard to do. The two have dropped from sight, de facto fugitives from their own accomplishments. (Bonds remains in full view, but Bonds has always been a contrary cuss.) And we the people try to act as if we knew, or at least suspected, that the big hitters were juiced and their feats bogus from the start, but the cold truth is that, in the golden summer of ‘98 when the balls were flying over distant fences, we didn’t care what propelled them.
Eight years ago, we wanted desperately to see someone hit 62. Eight years after two men went above and beyond that famous number, we seek to deny their existence. We the people are a fickle lot.
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