Atlanta Braves Top Franchise Managers– #2 Bobby Cox
Cox Becomes a Manager
When Yankees director of player personnel Lee McPhail heard Cox was retiring, he offered him a job managing Low-A Fort Lauderdale. A winning record there earned him a promotion to AA in 1972, where he repeated his success, and the Yankees promoted him again, this time to AAA Syracuse.
Cox produced a winning season in each of his four seasons at Syracuse and won the IL championship in 1976. He ended his six years managing in the minors with a 459-317 record - .591W-l%. In 1977 he acted as first base coach for Billy Martin with the infamous Bronx Zoo group that won the World Series.
Meanwhile, the 1977 Atlanta Braves posted the worst record in the NL. Ted Turner fired Dave Bristol and hired Bobby.
Atlanta Braves – Round One
Coming out of the Yankees system and the Bronx Zoo, Cox wanted to set the tone quickly.
Every spring training, he handed down six rules:
1. No beards.
2. No uniform pants covering the shoe tops.
3. Dress code.
4. Mind the curfew.
5. Be on time.
6. Play hard at all times.
Eddie Perez spoke years later about Cox's impact on him and his career.
“He taught me to not only be dressed good (at the ballpark), but dress good outside. … (Cox) said, ‘We’ve got to dress nice. There’s people around. We have to look like a professional player.’” Cory McCartney, Tales from the Atlanta Braves Dugout (New York: Sports Publishing, 2016), 164.
Cox inherited a team with weak defense and little offense. In 1980 the perennial losers moved up to finish fourth. He knew he needed the best coaches available and hired Don Baylor, Pat Corales, and Jimy Williams to fill out his coaching staff.
Defense improved, but the team continued to struggle at the plate, and at the end of the season, Turner replaced him with Joe Torre.
Toronto
Cox wasn’t out of work long. His reputation for turning young players into finished major leaguers led Pat Gillick to hire Cox. The Blue Jays were the youngest team in the league and, like the Atlanta Braves when Cox arrived, stuck in last place.
After finishing last in 1982, the Jays slowly climbed the standings, finishing fourth in 1983, second in 1984, and winning the division in 1985, a run that raised attendance from 10th in the AL to second and earned Cox the AL Manager of the Year Award.
After the season, Ted Turner called, congratulated him on the award, apologized for firing him, and offered to make him GM.
Atlanta Braves GM
Cox took the reins of a team that started slipping after Torre’s departure and knew his priorities were pitching and defense. Dan Schlossberg quoted Cox’s brutal assessment in his book When the Braves Ruled the Diamond (New York: Sports Publishing, 2016.)
“In order to have great pitching, you’ve got to have great defense. We just didn’t. … our defense was horrendous, not good at all.”
Cox and Paul Snyder created a plan based on drafting and player development. He leaned heavily on his scouts and signed the players they recommended.
. . . We spent all of our money drafting players. We didn’t want to lose anybody. If a scout wanted somebody, we signed them. That really got the foundation going and all that had to do with Paul Snyder, our scouting director . . . YouTube Hall of Fame interview, 7:25- 7:56
The Braves were improving each year, but the GM thought a new manager might improve the team’s chances, so 65 games into the 1990 season, Cox fired Russ Nixon and hired himself. The Braves finished last after Cox took charge in 1990, a place the club never visited again while he was in charge.
Streak Trivia
The story of the Atlanta Braves streak is well documented by better writers and videos available free online, but a few less publicized things are worthy of note because they relate to Cox as a manager.
- During the streak, the Atlanta Braves had one manager, the other 29 teams had 149. Cox managed 272 different players, including 144 pitchers.
- The only player with the organization from start to finish was John Smoltz. Javy Lopez was there for the final 13 seasons.
- The only player with the organization from start to finish was John Smoltz. Javy Lopez was there for the final 13 seasons.
- The Braves played 2362 regular season games during the streak, Mark Lemke’s 906 ranks fourth on the list of players involved, behind Chipper, Andruw Jones, and Lopez.
- 144 pitchers appeared, only five started 160 or more games, Glavine, Maddux, Smoltz, Avery, and Millwood.
I Quit
Frank Wren was a micromanager who eventually drove many talented people out of the origination. The first to get fed up with him was Bobby Cox.
After suffering significant financial losses in 2003, Time Warner tightened the purse strings, preventing the Braves from retaining their best players and adding new talent.
The club slipped to a third-place finish in 2006, and despite a strong start in 2007, once again finished third. John Schuerholz stepped down, and Wren took over as GM; it didn’t take long for the relationship between the micromanaging Wren and Cox to deteriorate.
Cox had always consulted with Schuerholz, but Wren didn’t consult. Instead, he began inserting himself into every facet of the way the team was coached and managed.
Early in Spring Training 2008, Cox called Chipper Jones, Brian McCann, Tim Hudson, and Jeff Francoeur to his office to give them some news.
I just wanted you guys to hear this from me before you hear it from someone else, I quit yesterday . . . I drove halfway (from Orlando) to Georgia, and Schuerholz called me and talked me back down. I can’t work with Frank Wren, Can’t do it.” Chipper Jones, Carroll Rogers Walton, Ballplayer. (Dutton, 2017) 303
In 2009, Cox reflected on his relationship with Schuerholz. His words in this quote from his SABR bio give insight into that day in 2008.
“It’s as good a relationship as there could possibly be in sports, . . . John runs everything by me. I’m involved in everything that John wants to do. Some GMs don’t operate that way anymore. I respect him a great deal. I think he respects my knowledge of what we should do: what trades, free agents, and my reasons for and against some of those.”
Cox Trivia
- Cox’s 2504 Major League wins rank fourth on the all-time list. His 2149 wins managing the Atlanta Braves is twice as many as Frank Selee in second, and his 2149-1709 record, .557 W-L%, is behind Frank Selee, Fred Haney, and Harry Wright.
- He holds the record for postseason appearances by a manager (16), division titles (15), and wins on his birthday (19).
- Bobby not only holds the record for managerial ejections with 158, he’s also the only manager ejected from a World Series game, and it happened twice: 1992 World Series, Game 3, and 1996 World Series game 6.
Epilogue
Cox stayed for three seasons, retiring after the Cardinals won the outfield- fly-rule game – me bitter, nah, not me – to a standing ovation from the Cardinals and the crowd.
- The Fresno County Athletic Hall of Fame inducted Cox in 1981.
- In 2011, the Atlanta Braves inducted Cox into the team’s Hall of Fame and retired his number 6.
- In 2014, Cox saw his plaque added to other baseball immortals in Cooperstown.
- In 2020, International League inducted Cox into its Hall of Fame.
The day after attending opening day ceremonies at Sun Trust Park in 2019, Bobby had a stroke. His health has improved, and he speaks with Brian Snitker before every game.
It seems appropriate to get an outsider’s view of Bobby’s career. For that, I’ll turn to Sparky Anderson, as quoted in Bobby’s SABR bio.
“I always gave Bobby the name ‘The Greatest,’ and I believe that. I believe Bobby Cox can out manage every living soul you want to see.”
Bobby’s players echo a theme that Tom Glavine sums up well.
“. . .He was so good at getting the best and most out of his guys. He treated everybody with the utmost respect and made everybody understand that whether you were a superstar or the 25th man coming out of spring training, you were going to be an important piece of the puzzle. He made guys not only understand that but believe it.”
That's a Wrap
Bobby Cox is one of those rare living legends that earned the title. He led a team to the most remarkable run of postseason success in any sport and gave all the credit to his players.
He was a true player’s manager because he told his player’s the truth but never threw one under the bus, even for an egregious error. Marquis Grissom said it best, “if you can’t play for him, you can’t play for nobody.”