jesus and friends
(and goodnight, braves)


it probably wasn't clear to braves reliever kris medlen when he came into the games on wednesday and thursday that he was playing the role of bobby cox's proxy and shutting the door on atlanta's underwhelming season. two consecutive sixth inning meltdowns in winnable games marked the end of the road for this infuriating team. had they closed out both? last night's representative loss to the reds would not have been crippling. but they did. and it was. time to wait 'til next year.

i have not always loathed bobby cox. mostly, during the braves magnificent run of success not so long ago, i was indifferent to him. those braves teams didn't seem to win or lose because of bobby cox. they won because of starting pitching and a supernova of a switch-hitter in chipper jones that all opponents feared. last season and this season have felt different, though. it feels like the braves have lost their share of games and games in the standings due to incredibly boneheaded moves and non-moves made by their "manager", and by "manager" i mean the now comically disproportioned older gentlemen that occasionally finds a way to get thrown out of the game. all the players seems to have tremendous respect for cox, still, but i wonder how much of that is respect for a romanticized version of him from back in the day. this year, he has been nothing to love. he ruined jordan schafer's development. he has consistently refused to juggle his line-up in accordance to who may be struggling or who may be hot. his blind loyalty to kelly johnson and jeff francouer early in the season handicapped the line-up in a way that made the braves feel like a triple-A team after chipper and mccann. his most indefensible crime, though, has been the handling and feel for his team's pitching staff. the braves came into the season with it's deepest starting pitching rotation in years, but, as i noted early in the season, there was not one among the bunch that could carry the staff or that was a severe threat to throw complete game shutouts. that being said, the bullpen and when to make "the call" there and whom to call would end up defining the vast majority of the braves' failures this season. the last three losses have, again, illuminated the problem. wednesday and thursday, medlen was trotted out in the sixth after having pitched on tuesday. for a tenured reliever, this may not be an issue. for a rookie that has spent his baseball career as a starter pitching every four to five days and had been lit up on the second day of his last and only other back-to-back days effort, it was. he was horrible. the braves gave up leads, lost games and opened the door. friday night was lowe that was left out one inning too long. but it could have been javy. or kawakami. or jurrjens. it's happened to all of them. left out one inning too long only to give up the lion's share of their runs in that last inning and pulled after it was too late. on friday night, it ended up being lowe, and the braves turned out the lights and walked out that door, closing the book on any realistic shot of making the postseason.

bobby cox can't make guys hit. bobby cox can't make chipper not suck over the last two months. but he can and is fully responsible for keeping his team in games and with leads that their starters have afforded him. and in this regard, he performed miserably this year. i bite my thumb at you, bobby cox. enjoy the offseason.

to those starters and mccann and yunel and martin and diaz and sori and gonzalez and moylan and chipper of may and june that kept me interested in the braves for much longer than i was last year, i say "thanks". it was a good ride. i'll get excited again next spring when jason heyward comes to camp looking to claim his rightful place as the true heir to dale murphy's empty throne in the braves outfield.

for now?

when one door closes in life and in sports, another door opens. welcome back, college football.

more on that after tonight's game.

roll tide.