Atlanta Braves Cursed by Kelly Johnson's Departure?

Just three short weeks ago I was ready to don the new Braves shirt and cap that I purchased in advance of the 2010 season.

Things were looking up for the franchise at that time. The emergence of Jason Heyward was just around the corner. Tommy Hanson and Jair Jurrjens were ready to show their young, electric stuff once again. Chipper Jones was ready to prove that his terrible ’09 season was a fluke.

2010 was to be the grand sendoff for manager Bobby Cox. 

Now, nearly one month into the season, I’m already wearing my Colts gear, wishing my life away as I count down the days until NFL minicamp starts. What happened to these Atlanta Braves?

Chipper Jones has already been injured twice in the season’s first three weeks—both times swinging the bat. Heyward is the lone bright spot on the team despite his struggles to adapt to major league pitching at times this season. Hanson is 1-2. Jurrjens experienced a drop in velocity that led to a blowout in San Diego and continued in a stellar, yet losing effort in New York. The hapless Mets just swept these Braves.

Now that’s saying something. 

To hear many Braves fans, bloggers, and experts talk, one would get the impression that the team's offensive woes come from one non-move in the offseason. It appears, to them at least, that the Braves non-tendering Kelly Johnson has contributed greatly to the Braves lack of success in the seasons first month. 

Johnson has seven homeruns and is hitting a cool .322 for Arizona in 17 games thus far. Every time I turn around I see a blog or a tweet dedicated to the memory of Kelly Johnson—all from disgruntled Braves fans who “knew all along that it was a mistake to let him go.” All the Braves punditry can seem to do is second guess Frank Wren for letting the career .257 hitter leave after four incredibly inconsistent seasons in Atlanta. 

Johnson was always the type that could go on a tear at any moment. Sad thing is those moments were usually spent mired in a 3-for-30 slump. He’d awaken for a couple of series’ and then go right back into another funk.

Yet Wren should have never let the kid walk, according to a growing number of Braves fanatics/wannabe analysts. The people that are on Wren and Co. for letting Johnson go are the same one’s that loved the Troy Glaus signing. 

After the Braves signed the aging, oft-injured, former slugger I voiced my displeasure in this very space and I was told to “give him a chance.” He’s had a month of chances, and the Braves primary protection for Brian McCann in the lineup is hitting a cool .186 in the first month. Yet the Kelly-Johnson-proponents are saying, “Just move Glaus down in the order,” as if a former slugger hitting .186 could still offer some benefit to a club trying to make the playoffs. 

They don’t stop there, though. These folks lambaste Melky Cabrera’s every move, while stoutly defending the ever-inconsistent Nate McLouth. Granted, I’ve done my fair share of Melky bashing, but you’ll never hear me defend McLouth. The guy has been a huge disappointment since joining the Braves via trade last summer. The Braves are dreadful at most spots in this lineup.

Bobby Cox has needed a surefire, bonafide leadoff hitter since Rafael Furcal left for the Dodgers (and the money) four years ago. The middle of the order is depending on the rapidly declining Chipper Jones, a washed-up former slugger in Troy Glaus, and baseball’s version of Ron Artest, Yunel Escobar—who apparently is good enough to hit sometimes, but has the baseball sense of a gnat. 

Then there’s the hitting coach, Terry Pendleton. It’s hard to blame a team’s offensive woes on a guy who doesn’t swing the bat in the lineup, but the fact is the Braves offense has declined steadily every season since TP has been the hitting coach. 

With reports that Pendleton could be the favorite to succeed Bobby Cox as the team’s manager in 2011, now would be the time to make a statement and fire him.

Firing the hitting coach makes no sense to some, especially to the Kelly-Johnson-proponents, but it’s at the very least a symbolic gesture to let fans and players know that mediocrity in the lineup should not be the norm, as it has been during Pendleton’s entire tenure.

In other words, Kelly Johnson’s departure and his subsequent success in Arizona have very little, if anything, to do with the Braves tribulations of the first month.

The blame for what ails the Braves is easily spread around to many facets of the team.