One should limit the number of southerners in critical positions. They always lose the same war.

You know fans in the “A” Don’t care about the braves when Tony Homo and the Cowgirls game results on the radio preceed the braves highlights…

The first comment of your blog speaks volumes

Bitter memories of failed runs in 2000-05 are still on the taste buds. I believe the Rockies WILL lose 3 games this week, but that Reds series could recur any day now and I have to say I’m guarding my emotions a little.

Still, I’ll be there Thursday night for sure. Maybe Saturday too. It’s thrilling to be in the hunt in the last week – the last three years were despiriting.

The fans who say “don’t get your hopes up because the Braves will only disappoint you as they have in the past” don’t understand that “getting your hopes up” is PART of the JOY of baseball. Part of the collective consciousness of Red Sox and Cubs Nations is their shared suffering over decades of getting close… but not winning the big one.

Fans who became dulled by the 14 consecutive post-seasons for the Braves, and soured by only one World Series win, don’t remember the good old days when less than 1,000 people would “pack” old Atlanta-Fulton County, only to watch Darrel Chaney and company lose 100 games a year.

The Braves fans of that era are hyperventilating that the Braves are a mere 2 games out with 5 to go.

The chase is part of the fun. If we’re let down, eh, we’re let down. The Braves didn’t help or hurt my salary one dime (or one yen as I’m an American Serviceman on Okinawa right now). But if the Braves win – I will rejoice! And my joy will be all the sweeter because it joy was preceded by anticipation – which was preceded by hope.

I Believe.

I think what seemingly killed the electric atmosphere and the fan enthusiasm actually happened long ago, right about the time that baseball dropped into the Metrodome outfield in the tenth inning, or we watched the Blue Jays celebrate on our own field and mock the Chop chant after winning the Series in ‘92 (the year Sid Bream slid home and we thought for sure this was destiny dialing our number), or maybe being quickly polished off by the Phillies after that grueling divisional run in ‘93. By the seventh game of the ‘95 World Series, David Justice came under fire because he spoke out about what he considered to be an apathetic fan base and challenged everyone to come out and support the team. They did, and he rewarded them with the games lone run and the lone world championship for Atlanta in any pro team sport.

All seemed right with the world, and the Braves were busy sweeping aside the outmatched Yankees in ‘96, when Mark Wohlers just happened to throw an eighth straight slider to Jim Leyritz, and from that moment, I (and I believe many others) knew we were destined to lose that Series. More postseasons came and went, and the best year in, year out regular season-record baseball team on the planet found some way to break our hearts or have everything turn against them seemingly on a single play, every single time, and often it was because they were just out-hustled and out-played by on-paper lesser teams who came in with more hunger and passion. Those fans not jaded by the amazing run of success began to wonder if this team was cursed, forever able to compete but never able to create a true dynasty. In short, we came to expect nothing less than winning it all from the teams we had; nothing else mattered when the dust settled, so several Hall-of-Fame careers came and went perhaps not as much appreciated as they should have been in retrospect.

Here we are a few years later, and as several folks here have already remarked, it’s not like we don’t care; it’s simply that unlike the years past where this Braves team stayed on a highly competitive level from start to finish, this time it just has a surreal feeling to it, because the 2009 Braves have been anything but consistent. They’ve somehow managed to put together a very impressive run, much as Colorado did two years ago, but as the Rockies learned in the World Series, at that level of competition even a hot average team will be exposed for what they are: average. It just doesn’t feel RIGHT. Even if the Braves make the playoffs this year, don’t expect the fan fever to return immediately, maybe not even if they make it to the World Series. Most memories of this team’s postseasons past aren’t those that center around Sid Bream’s slide or Marquis Grissom’s catch; they’re much more painful in nature, and that’s hard to get over.

Because anything less than a world championship is a failure in professional sports, and especially in a city that’s become accustomed to seeing legitimate chances to win it all come and go in heartbreaking fashion time and again. That said, let’s go Braves!!!!