I’ve
seen several variations of the following theme lately: The Braves should NEVER
let Brian McCann leave.
I responded with something along these lines: Let’s say you’ve
used a shampoo your entire life. You love it. Works wonders. You decide you
will NEVER change shampoos. Then the cost of the shampoo doubles. Then it
doubles again. To the point where it costs five times as much as a shampoo that
works better. Then you find out the shampoo is causing your hair to fall out.
Do you still keep using it?
No,
you don’t. You do not (or at least should not) have a deep emotional attachment
to a shampoo, plus you can realistically feel the negative repercussions of an
ineffective, overpriced product.
No one wants to see a player like McCann leave. I love him;
everyone loves him. But if we can find someone who can help us win better, then
we need to look in to the matter.
Chipper’s
story book retirement and farewell tour has served to romanticize an already
biased fan base. Every player will leave the team they are on. And 99.9999%
leave in a manner far less poetic than Chipper did. In fact, the vast majority
of players who spend their entire career with one team do so only because their
careers last less than a few years and aren’t good enough for another team to
give them a shot.
Maddux,
Glavine, Smoltz, Lopez and Murphy all left the Braves. The team and its fans
survived, and none of their departures made the team appreciably worse on the
field. If anything, Murphy staying around as long as he did caused more harm
than good- the Braves had multiple large offers for him in the late eighties,
but refused out of loyalty. When they finally dumped the shell of his former
self in 1990 all they could get were spare parts.
Every single player who has had their number retired by the Braves
eventually left the team not entirely of their own doing. Aaron, Mathews,
Murphy, and Spahn were traded, Niekro, Maddux, Smoltz, and Glavine left to free
agency, and Cox was fired in the 70’s. And while we’re at it Glavine was let go
a second time, being released in 2010. The team survived. No one looks back on
Aaron or Spahn’s career and rues them spending a year with Milwaukee or the
Mets. I guess it would have been ideal for them to go out like Chipper, but
virtually no one does.
If you know me, you know Chipper is my man. He’s been my favorite
since third grade, covering more than two thirds of my life. I named my dog
after him and wore socks up throughout elementary school to honor/emulate him.
If the Braves had traded him, or he left via free agency I would have been
devastated. I would have been irate at Schuerholz/Wren for letting it happen.
But if the move made us better, pushed us closer to winning the World Series, I
could deal with it.
Which brings me to my point, the one thing I want to scream at
misguided tweeters every day: If you’re a fan of a team and your allegiance is
greater toward individual players than to overall team success, you’re doing it
wrong. If you’re a (insert player name here) fan, and not a team fan, good for
you, but don’t confuse what’s good for your player/your psyche with what’s good
for the team as a whole. If you don’t want McCann to go and replace him with
someone else because the Braves would be less likely to win, great! Tell me why
you think so. If you don’t want McCann to leave because you think he’s cool and
you can’t ever imagine anyone else catching for the Braves, you need to do some
more research and reassess your priorities.
There will come a day when Brian, Jason, Craig, Andrelton and all
of the Braves are no longer wearing a tomahawk across their chest. Almost all
will leave for one of three reasons: 1) they just couldn’t cut it anymore, 2)
someone could pay them more, or 3) we found someone who could do it better than
them/made more sense for the team. To delude yourself in to thinking we can
somehow keep everyone we like forever does nothing but hinder your
understanding of the game and set you up for heartache when they do inevitably depart.
The Braves are a midmarket team. We can’t afford to give
sweetheart contracts to veterans who’ve done us well. (Ask the Phillies how
that’s working for them) Our ownership/financial state is such that we have to
make difficult decisions. A player who provides 10 units of production at ten
million dollars is wonderful, but if we can find a youngster who can provide 4
units of production at league minimum, the latter is likely the better fit.
Feelings will get hurt and good, decent human beings will get screwed over.
What happens on the field is a game, everything else is a cold, brutal
business. Keeping this in perspective will help lessen future disappointment
You think the Braves should keep McCann? Tell me why. Show me how
his option is affordable to the Braves or how we wouldn’t be able find a decent
replacement. Believe we should let him go? Come up with a coherent plan for
replacing him.
Until then I’ll keep saying this refrain: I’d rather win a World Series
with players I’m getting to know than sit at home in October with players I
love.
