One decision can make all the difference. Even though the Atlanta Braves are struggling right now, they have not been down for very long over the course of the last 35 years. Since 1991, they have given the great city of Atlanta 21 division titles, six National League pennants, two World Series championships and so many memories that will last a lifetime. Many of them involve Chipper Jones.
It was 35 years ago yesterday Bobby Cox made one of the greatest decisions in his life to pass on Todd Van Poppel in favor of the promising shortstop out of Jacksonville. Jones was the No. 1 overall player taken in the 1990 MLB Draft. He debuted in Atlanta three years later. After a knee injury, Jones became a mainstay on the Braves baseball diamond from 1995 to 2012 during his hall of fame career.
He may have grown up a fan of the Los Angeles Dodgers in North Florida, but Jones is now synonymous with Atlanta Braves baseball. After spending his entire MLB career with one team in one city, he was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame on the first ballot in 2018. There are very few icons in the sport who represent their team, their fanbase and America's pastime quite like Jones.
Look at this picture from way back. Jones looks like just a kid. He was just a kid. Now he is a legend.
While he has been around the Braves organization for years, they need a new tone-setter like he was.
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Chipper Jones began his storied Atlanta Braves journey 35 years ago
While I do not want to make this all about nostalgia, there is something Jones possessed that most of this team simply does not have. Outside of Ronald Acuña Jr., where is the heart? I spoke with Jones nearly two years ago in the wake of Acuña's record-setting 2023 season. He joined Jones, Freddie Freeman and Terry Pendleton as National League MVPs in an Atlanta Braves uniform that season.
Jones raves about him constantly. Why would he not? The guy does things on the diamond Jones could never dream of. Where the Braves franchise continually frustrates me is the talent is seemingly always there, but they almost always seem to lose the never-ending battle with complacency. Outside of Acuña, the only other guy I can definitively say has it in spades like Jones did would be Chris Sale.
That is why he will one day join Jones in Cooperstown, with hopefully Acuña not that far down the line. This has been the most frustrating season of Braves baseball in about a decade. Last year was painfully maddening. I think it just goes to show that the mental makeup of a ball player goes much further than what they could ever hope to compile on the stats sheet for a certain amount of money.
Look at Jones for example. He always got his numbers, but he made it a point to always take less to help keep the team's core together. We will never see another run of 14 straight division titles like we did from 1991 to 2005 in the Team of the 90s era. Jones was a vibrant part of that string of success. Jones did not get to 3,000 career hits or 500 career home runs, but was a first-ballot hall of famer.
As the smartest baseball mind I have ever spoken to, we can all learn a thing or two from Jones.