Sports Illustrated's Online Vault is pretty much the greatest thing since sliced bread, and periodically we'll be taking a look back at a memorable story. This week's article was originally published June 4, 1984 and written by Steve Wulf.A wise man said once said 'if you don't learn from history, you are bound to repeat it.' Or something like that. Anyway, many Braves fans have been saying with the recent Smoltz debacle, that this is just like what happened with Phil Niekro. Knucksie being before my time as a baseball fan, I decided to take a look back to see how similar of a situation it really was.
Both 40+ year old pitchers, check. Spent 20+ years with the Braves, check. Trememdously popular with teammates, check. Teammates griping to the media after they left, check. Very active in charities in the Atlanta area, check. Future Hall of Famers, check.
Niekro and his knuckle ball, while being three years older his first season after leaving the Braves than Smoltz will be, pitched four more seasons after he left the Braves, making one more all-star team. Nobody thinks that Smoltz will pitch that long, but it certainly wouldn't surprise anybody if he had a couple of more good seasons before riding off into the sunset.
"Unceremoniously booted out of Atlanta" 6/4/84 by Steve Wulf
Hat tip to the great folks over at Rowland's Office for the link
No comments:
Post a Comment