When you think of the great Atlanta Braves players, names like Hank Aaron, Dale Murphy, Chipper Jones, and the legendary trio of pitchers come to mind. But when it comes to managers, there's only one name that stands above the rest: Bobby Cox. The Braves announced on Saturday that Cox has passed away at the age of 84.
Robert Joseph Cox was a humble man in a high-profile job, someone who managed to resist the universal impulse for self-promotion. He was a cleats guy through and through, taking great pride in being able to wear those cleats to work every day. Born on May 21, 1941, in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Cox began his baseball career after graduating from Selma High School in California's San Joaquin Valley, signing with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1959.
The Braves acquired Cox in 1966, but he didn't make his big-league debut until the Yankees signed him in 1968. "My only claim to fame as a ballplayer actually was I got a chance to play with Mickey Mantle," Cox once said with characteristic humility.
When bad knees ended his playing days, Cox turned to managing. Ted Turner hired him to lead the long-suffering Braves in 1977, and Cox managed the team from 1978 to 1981 before returning to Atlanta as the team's general manager in 1986. In between stints, he managed the Blue Jays for four seasons, finishing second in the American League East behind the World Series-winning Detroit Tigers in 1984 and winning the division the next season.
After four years as the team GM, Cox returned to the dugout in 1990 as the Braves skipper. He then led the team on a magical run of 14 consecutive division titles from 1991 to 2005. That included the Braves' unbelievable "worst to first" season in 1991, when Cox's team was below .500 at the All-Star break but nosed ahead of the Dodgers after the season's 160th game.
"The city was on fire, it was full of energy," Cox recalled. "I would ride to the ballpark and people on 75 would be honking their horns, they would recognize me, and this guy would look and his horn would honk, and they would honk and they would honk all the way into the city. I never seen a city energized like that."
In 1995, the Braves won Cox's only World Series championship, beating the Cleveland Indians at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. It was the crowning achievement of a managerial career that will forever be remembered as one of the greatest in baseball history.