Braves’ Jones Has Made All the Right Moves

If Don Baylor becomes manager of the Angels or Baltimore Orioles or Milwaukee Brewers next season, he clearly will have left a mark on Chipper Jones and the Atlanta Braves.

In his first season as the Atlanta batting coach, Baylor has had the same impact on Jones he had on Andres Galarraga when they were first together in St. Louis in 1992. Baylor, the Cardinal batting coach, suggested changes that enabled Galarraga to win a National League batting title with the Colorado Rockies in ‘93, with Baylor as manager.

The switch-hitting Jones, of course, was a productive hitter before Baylor arrived, but Baylor corrected a flaw in his right-handed swing and persuaded Jones to apply the same aggressiveness from the right side that he does from the left.

Baylor turned Jones’ focus from batting average to power, or as Jones puts it: “He reminded me that I hit third for one of the best teams in baseball and when the opposing team turned me around [to get him on the right side of the plate], I have to make them pay for it.”

In four previous seasons, Jones hit 96 homers left-handed and 12 right-handed. Only two of 34 homers last year were hit right-handed. This year, however, Jones has hit 15 of 45 from the right side and has broken Todd Hundley’s NL record for switch-hitters-- 41 in 1996. Of the four homers Jones hit in the three-game sweep of the New York Mets that virtually assured the Braves an eighth consecutive division title and the MVP award for Jones, two were against left-handers Dennis Cook and Al Leiter. That sweep gave the Braves 16 wins in their last 21 games against the Mets and 13 in their last 14 at Turner Field--”It’s a big plateau [we] still have to get over,” bemoaned Met catcher Mike Piazza--and it illustrates that if the Braves face left-hander Randy Johnson twice in a five-game division playoff, they can be chipper about their power prospects from the right side.

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The hiring of Dean Taylor as Brewer general manager and Dan O’Dowd as Rocky GM maintains a corporate-era trend toward detail-oriented executives who may not have played professionally or smoked cigars around a hot stove.

Of the 29 general managers, not including Woody Woodward, who is leaving the Seattle Mariners, only 12 played professionally and only four--Ron Schueler, Jim Beattie, Billy Beane and Ed Lynch--reached the majors.

Taylor and O’Dowd have already initiated major housecleaning, with the hiring of a manager ultimately No. 1 on their list. Milwaukee is focused on a minority hire, and speculation has centered on New York Yankee coach Chris Chambliss because he and Taylor were employed by the Atlanta organization in 1991 and ’92. However, they didn’t know each other that well despite published reports that have handed the job to Chambliss because of their supposed closeness. Chambliss may get it, but it isn’t automatic.

O’Dowd wants to hire former Detroit Tiger manager Buddy Bell, the Cincinnati Reds’ personnel director. He has received permission from the Reds to talk with Bell, but not to hire him in a Reds’ bluff to get compensation in return. Cincinnati General Manager Jim Bowden also would like to keep Bell in reserve if he loses Manager Jack McKeon, unhappy that he hasn’t been offered an extension despite the Reds’ successful season and McKeon’s highest win total in 27 years as a major and minor league pilot.

“The longer it goes, the more difficult it is going to be for them to get me back,” McKeon said. “If they don’t want me, maybe there is another team out there who wants to rebuild the way we’ve done it here, although I’d say not too many teams would want a 68-year-old manager.”