SPECIAL: Leaving Fulton County; An Atlanta Braves Turner Field Tale
By Dan Horton
It’s time again for your Atlanta Braves stories. Our Leaving Fulton County Series comes from none other than our own Benjamin Chase, and his Turner Field tale.
The Wind Up
As you know, Ben is our resident expert in all things Atlanta Braves Minor League. He does a fantastic job of keeping not only you, the readers abreast of the farm, but us as well. He has been to Turner Field once.
Ben tells the tale of one of the many great comebacks we have seen over the years as Braves fans. This one in particular is special, because it’s his only visit to Turner Field, ever.
2003 is the year … I’ll let Ben tell you the rest.
The Pitch
“I grew up in South Dakota. There was not a professional sport team of any sort when I was growing up. Even now the best there is would be D-League basketball.
However, one of the blessings of living in an area without a team was that you got to choose who you wanted to love.
My great-grandmother was a huge baseball fan. She loved her Chicago Cubs, and she’s probably enjoying the current team’s success. Her favorite player, in spite of her Cubs fandom, was Hank Aaron.
She was determined to make a baseball fan in the family, and she poured baseball into me.
I remember even as she reached later years in her life discussing the Cubs with her, though, Alzheimer’s had led that discussion to be about the 1960s Cubs as if they were playing presently.
It led to me becoming a major student of the game, but the biggest thing she blessed me with was my love of the Braves after learning all about Hammerin’ Hank.
Living through the 80s as a young man in an area where, even though there isn’t a pro team, the Minnesota Twins were the dominant team.
They were building up quite a team with guys like Kirby Puckett, Gary Gaetti, Frank Viola, and the worst person in the history of the planet, Kent Hrbek.
My friends railed on me for my terrible team while the Twins seemingly got better and better. Getting a chance to see the Braves in person for the first time in college at brand new Miller Park in Milwaukee was a thrill for me.
However, this isn’t about that game, or the game I consider to be the most memorable Braves game I ever attended (a 15-inning Braves/Twins game in the old Metrodome in June of 2002 takes that cake). It’s about the one and only game I’ve attended in Atlanta as a fan of the home team.
I worked as a youth director with a church in Minnesota. My youth was interested in going to our church’s national youth gathering, which happened to be in Atlanta in 2003.
We worked with multiple other towns in Minnesota to put together a couple of buses full of kids to help save costs and then set about planning itinerary.
High on my priority list was trying to get to a Braves game. To my delight, the agreement was to go to the Braves/Mets game on the way out of Atlanta on Sunday afternoon.
The day was hot, very hot. Horacio Ramirez started for the Braves and Al Leiter for the Mets. Leiter wasn’t his sharpest, Horacio’s performance made Leiter look like a shutdown starter, and by the time HoRam left the game, without completing the 5th inning, the team was down 5-2.
The middle relief of the Braves did nothing to help that deficit, either, and coming into the bottom of the 8th, the Braves were trailing 8-3. Edwin Almonte was on the mound, and he’d just made his debut less than two weeks prior, so he was still able to get hitters to look silly on a lot of pitches.
He got the 3-4-5 in the Braves order out in the bottom of the 7th, using just 10 pitches. He faced Vinny Castilla to lead off the inning, and Vinny coaxed a single just behind the third base bag. Then Henry Blanco, he of excellent defense and no hitting, found the ability to get a single himself.
Darren Bragg followed with another single, and a run scored, making the score 8-4 now. Mike Stanton came into the game now for the Mets.
Stanton was a big piece of the early 90s Braves success, but now he was part of the “enemy”, so I was not going to be cheering for him by any means.
Up stepped a pinch hitter for first baseman Matt Franco, one Mr. Javy Lopez. Lopez, in the midst of arguably the greatest season by a catcher in an Atlanta Braves uniform, stepped up to the plate against Stanton.
My group was sitting in straight-away center, and we all sat transfixed on 2-0 when Lopez launched the pitch in the section right next to us to make the game 8-7.
Wow! Now the team was back in the game. There were still no outs in the bottom of the 8th as well! The youth, moments earlier, asking how long we had to stay at the game, are now glued to their seats.
Rafael Furcal came up and dropped down a bunt single. He even advanced to third base on a throwing error by Stanton as he tried to field the ball. Mark DeRosa followed with a single between the shortstop and third baseman, scoring Furcal and tying the score. The entire stadium was shaking!
Gary Sheffield hit a ball of the end of his bat and still nearly hit it out for the first out of the inning. Andruw Jones then singles and moved DeRosa to second base. Marcus Giles stepped into the box to pinch hit for Ray King and singled into center field. DeRosa came around, and the Braves had completed the comeback to take the lead 9-8.
By the end of the 8th, 14 Brave hitters had come to the plate, 8 runs had scored on 9 hits and 2 errors. The score was 11-8. John Smoltz began warming up in the midst of the onslaught, and he came in to finish the 9th inning in 9 pitches.
I loaded a bus, and we drove through the night all the way back to Minnesota. The next night, in a loss to the Cubs, Andruw hit a ball into the section my group had been sitting in the night before for a home run in the second inning.
I watched the rest of the game as the game turned into a slug fest that the Braves were on the wrong side of. In the 8th inning, with one home run under his belt already, Javy Lopez stepped up to the plate, and he hit a home run that landed on the seat I was sitting in the night before.
While a ball landing in my lap would have been amazing, being able to see such an incredible come back in my only Ted game was an incredible thing!”
The Closer
Man, that sounded like a great game to be at! One I definitely wish I could have been at. Those days, they seem like so long ago.
Hopefully, though, those days aren’t too far off again. The latest surge by the Braves has given hope again. Last night’s come from behind win is just another sign of things going in the right direction.
The never give up mentality is there. The days of when Braves teams were leading the league in comeback wins were fun times. Finishing this season on a very positive note has to be a bolster for this team heading in to the winter.