Episode 13: 1995 Atlanta Braves

If you’re a baseball fan in October 1994 you’re angry, disgusted, and sad. Why? Because the players’ union went out on strike on August, 12, 1994, and the owners cancelled the season and the World Series in September. This is the eighth work stoppage in 23 years. You feel no sympathy for either side. The owners are bloated billionaires determined to suppress a free labor market. The players bank an average salary of $1.2 million but turn their backs on underpaid minor leaguers who seek their help.

This is when 28-year-old Tom Glavine, Atlanta’s star southpaw and future Hall of Famer, emerges as one of the leaders of the strike. Before the strike Glavine was known for winning the Cy Young in 1991 and for winning 20 games or more for three straight season. Now Glavine is one of the most visible members of the union negotiating team. Articulate, calm and collected, Glavine often is the player who speaks to the media. To much of the public Glavine becomes the most familiar face of the strike.

The strike ends on April 2, 1995 and the shortened regular season begins in the last week of April. Fans resent the owners and players alike for defiling the game they love. And if you’re an Atlanta Braves fan, your resentment is focused on one player in particular — Tom Glavine. During opening day introductions Glavine hears a rising chorus of boos.

When reporters ask Glavine what he wants to say to disgruntled fans, he answers, “Tell them if they don’t come out they’ll be missing a helluva team.”

And so the Braves were. This is the story of how Tom Glavine pitched his way back into the good graces of Braves fans, and how the ‘95 Braves clinched their first world championship on the best performance of Glavine’s career.

Source: “None But the Braves: A Pitcher, A Team, A Champion”, by Tom Glavine with Nick Cafardo, HarperCollins Publishers, 1996

Fans felt betrayed by the cancellation of the last six weeks of the 1994 regular season, the playoffs and World Series.

(l-r) Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz and Steve Avery. The ‘95 Braves had three Hall of Famers in their rotation.

In 1995 Major League Baseball was bruised and battered from the labor war that caused the cancellation of the '94 season. Fans were disgusted. As a prominent member of the union negotiating team, Atlanta Braves star southpaw Tom Glavine was an easy target for public anger.