It Takes a Brave One to Change His Mind

PITTSBURGH —  Atlanta in four.

I’ve told you all along that Atlanta was the team to beat. First time I laid eyes on that ballclub, I told anybody who would listen: “Now there’s a championship baseball team.” One look, that’s all it took. Just one look.

And now that the Braves have actually made it to the National League playoffs, beginning tonight against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Three Rivers Stadium, well, there isn’t much doubt which side will win. The only doubt in this seven-game series is whether the Braves will take it in the minimum of four.

I think we all know they will.

Pitching. Hitting. Fielding. Good managing. Great support from the greatest fans in the world. How could Atlanta not win?

The Dodgers did their best to keep up with this team for 162 games, but only did so for 160. Whenever the Braves absolutely had to win, they did. Whenever they had to show what they were made of, they did. And nobody can ever say otherwise.

Let’s face it, anybody with half a brain could see that this team wouldn’t fold.

Which leaves only one real question:

Why do newspapers hire sportswriters with only a quarter of a brain?

OK! OK!

I’m sorry!

Chop me with a tomahawk! Beat me until I’m bluer than a Dodger! Pine tar and feather me! Knock me out, step on my face, slander my name all over the place!

I’m ugly, stupid, ignorant, incompetent, rude, crude, unfit to live, unfunny, un-American, anti-Southern and, worst of all, Californian. That’s the consensus. I’ve read my mail.

Anything postmarked, “Georgia,” had to be turned over to the FBI. Damn, you folks take your baseball seriously, don’t you?

The hard truth is, this was a difficult team not to admire.

Whenever a pitcher needed a strike or a hitter needed a hit, he got one. Whenever Tom Glavine or Steve Avery had to buzz one by some batter, he did. Whenever Terry Pendleton or David Justice had to deliver from the batter’s box, he did. Greg Olson was an ironman. Ron Gant was made of steel. Even Prime Time Neon Deion did his share.

Had the Dodgers blown five or six games in a row and given the Braves the division championship, there might be some argument over whether they deserved what they got. No such argument exists.

With nine games remaining on their schedule, the Atlanta Braves went out and won eight straight. This fact is indisputable. This fact will never change, from now until 2091, when the Cleveland Indians win their next pennant.

It doesn’t matter whether the hearts of the Cincinnati Reds were in the right place when they played the Braves, or if the bodies of the Houston Astros were a trifle young and green.

It doesn’t matter that an occasional opponent said he preferred the Braves to the Dodgers, because everybody is entitled to an opinion, even quarter-brained sportswriters.

All that matters is that Bobby Cox’s ballclub went out there and won. They did it on their own, with no outside help.

Unless you want to count those hundreds of thousands of hatchet-wielding, war-whooping, wa-hooing yahoos who came to the park night after night to lend the Braves their support.

These people were hungry and they made their team hungrier.

Atlanta has gone a long time without a title. Atlanta at critical times also had to do without certain individuals who let down the team and let down themselves. But we shall overcome , said the Braves and those who loved them, and they did.

The desire to win was so intense in some that occasionally an Atlanta fan lost his sense of humor, took even the most lighthearted comment very personally. Saying that a player named Treadway sounded like he was named after a tire store was hardly the insult of the century.

And how come when you attempt to make harmless fun of someone’s being from the South, you get accused of insulting treatment of fellow Americans? Yet, when you question someone’s insulting treatment of American Indians, the defense is that it is simply harmless fun?

It isn’t easy to needle people when they aren’t in the mood for it. Baseball teams such as the Cubs or Red Sox or Indians have been losing for years, and most of their fans are accustomed to being ribbed about it. Atlanta’s fans weren’t so inclined.

They turned out to have one heck of a baseball team. I particularly am pleased for Pendleton, one of baseball’s classiest acts, and for Sid Bream, who is so popular inPittsburgh that he will be applauded tonight as loudly as most of the Pirates.

And wait until you hear the cheering in Atlanta, after the Braves take Game 4.

Hey, simply because I was born stupid doesn’t mean I have to stay stupid.