Former Braves PC Leo Mazzone honors Bobby Cox with epic stories

00:00:04
Speaker 1: While we get ready for our next guest, I do want to spend a minute talking about Bobby Cox, who passed away at the age of eighty four over the weekend. A legend in our sport in a variety of ways. Super successful as not just a manager, he was a GM. He had just an illustrious career, super well respected, real talk ejections, all time leader in a category that probably will never be passed because of all the replays. Now, is anybody going to get to one sixty two? I feel like iname.

00:00:38
Speaker 2: Aaron Boone's is gonna be the closest, and.

00:00:39
Speaker 1: He's probably at what like forty I'll look it up while we're chatting. But anyway, Bobby Cox thoughts on the late great and obviously you spent some time in the Braves organization. Was he around?

00:00:50
Speaker 2: He was?

00:00:51
Speaker 3: He was.

00:00:52
Speaker 2: He was awesome. He'd come in and just sit in Freddigan's Austin Snit's office and talk, come in sit in the gout with us.

00:01:00
Speaker 3: He was.

00:01:01
Speaker 2: He was awesome to talk to. He was one of those guys. I wish I would have got to play play play for him, because I think it would have been awesome. The stories I heard about spring training. He'd come to spring training and he would be around. So I just I think it would have been really cool to get the opportunity play for him because the way he treated the players, and he would literally just say, hey, just make sure you were ready to go for the game. That was kind of ready to go for the season. That was a big spring training speel. The only thing Bobby and I would have not not agreed on was he did not like kids in the clubhouse. He was very anti kids in the clubhous And so I'm thankful that Freddy eventually let my kid into the clubhouse and then kind of other guys got to bring their kids in the clubhouse. Sure, but Bobby was As a matter of fact, Ken Griffy Junior allegedly was supposed to sign with the Braves one time, but because of the no kids in the clubhouse, he did.

00:01:44
Speaker 1: Not, right, I remember you told that story.

00:01:46
Speaker 3: So listen.

00:01:48
Speaker 2: That was the one thing we would have had a problem with. But other than that, every story I heard about him. Had to wear your hat forward, had to show the a, had to put your glasses on the back, had to wear a VP top for batting practice every day with pants. You had to look the part. There were days, trust me, where I was like, gosh, can we just wear shorts? It's a thousand degrees in Atlanta? Can we just wear shorts? But it was a brave way, and so you had to get you know, the short pants and all that. But nothing but respect for Bobby Cox and his family, all the people that came after. You know, a Snit and Freddy Gonzalez. There are both Bobby Cox disciples. He's gonna be missed. He was an awesome gentleman and uh truly you know, not only a blue Jay. People forget he was a blue Jay, but probably I mean, he'll go down as I don't want to to mean, the best praise manager of all time. I would say, yeah, yeah.

00:02:33
Speaker 1: He let the players play like you're saying.

00:02:34
Speaker 4: Hey, like he had to.

00:02:36
Speaker 2: I mean, I had there so many stories ready for Shipper and those guys, Yes, we have the story Andrew. They would say, hey, Bobby, he's he said something to me. Bobby, he wouldn't even know. They were like, Bobby be like sitting over there, not even paying attention. And some player would come in and say, hey, Bobby, did you hear what the Empire said, and he just run out there and get ejected for no good reason.

00:02:55
Speaker 1: Well, let's ask Leomazoni about it. I hear he's ready to go Braves Hall of Fame or longtime pitching coach Leo. It's great to have you on. Thank you so much for joining us and for just doing some public appearances right now to share stories about Bobby. I think it's important, especially for the youngsters out there, even teenagers who really didn't experience any bravest baseball with Bobby Cox. So first off, sorry for your loss, and can you just start it off with I don't know, maybe your favorite Bobby Cox story, just to tell everyone how amazing he was.

00:03:26
Speaker 3: Well, I think that well career rise. My favorite story is was when he committed said he was going to turn offensive ore ended organization to a pitching one. So naturally I like that type of philosophy, right, But you know, some of the greatest stories were, you know, he had a feel for everything. You know, it's hard to describe. You can't teach what he had, you know, and it was a great communication with players, front office, the farm system. I worked very closely with him from eighty six to ninety one or to ninety in the player in the farm system with pictures developing pictures and this sort of thing. So, but Bobby was a guy that had a great sense of humor, you know. I mean there was a lot of times when uh, you know, well, for example, you know, we were in Wrigley Field and we had a tough day and it was knockdown, drag out four four in the eighth and Bobby said to me, he goes, you know, Leo goes, I'm gonna have to have a coffee. This game's driving me nuts. I said, you can't have coffee, Bobby. I said, you know you're going to have a heart attack. You know, you don't need caffeine. And he goes, yeah, I do. He goes, what would you like? I said, well, the way this game is going, I'd like to have a beer, and he goes, he called up and said, send me down a coffee. And sending Leo down a beer, the clubhouse kid said what he goes, put the beer in a in a paper cup with a lid on it. You know. So we get coffee and I got a beer sitting on my hand, you know, and I'm looking around and Bobby says, we'll drink the damn thing, you know, And I said, well I will, but I can't chug it. I said, it's supposed to be coffee. Well, we end up winning the game five to four, okay, So he didn't say nothing. I didn't say nothing. Next day, I mean, I know he's superstitious. So the next day we're in a tie game again, and here he goes, send me down a coffee, Send Leo down a beer. Here comes to coffee, Here comes the beer. We brought in Kent Murker in relief in the bottom of the ninth and the Cubs back up catcher was Hector Villanueva at the time. He takes Mark deep, we lose, and Bobby tore up the lineup card and threw it at me and said, that's the last beer you'll ever have, and it's duck out. So you know, I mean, just stuff like that. I mean, he was the manager that when I first got there, Hey, Leo, put your thinking cap on. I said, yeah, what's up? He goes, well, he said pitcher could come up with the bases loaded to the silver thing with two outs, we got decide where the pinch hit or not. It was a fifth inning when he told me that, and I sat there and went, I'm locked in on the fifth right. So anyhow, things like that. But here's what Bobby did extremely well. He made you feel important. He made everybody feel important, regardless of whether you were a player, coach man, the farm system, people at the ballpark, the guys taking the tickets, everything, grounds crew. And he had time for everybody, so you know, and that rubbed off on everybody in the clubhouse. And you know, his clubhouse to me, was the way it should be run. You know, I mean, it's it's it's our place, and I think it's a personal place. And I don't think anybody, you know, should stick their nose in it, to be perfectly honest with you, and that's the way he wanted it. So you know, if you had music, you know, go ahead and play music, but put some earphones on. He says, the guy next to you might not like her, not like it. The other thing was dress codes. You know, when I was there, the coaches had to wear sport coat, tie dress slacks when a play. During the player's time, it was a sport coat, golf shirt and slacks. And he says, we play like champions, and we're going to look like champions, and so that, I mean, that was just part of it. There were so many different things. You know, there's a lot of time he never he always had the players backs, you know, a lot of times when he had something to say to a particular player, a particular pitcher. You know, we didn't even know it. Half the time. Most of us didn't even know it. And the only one that knew it was whoever he was talking to in himself. And so therefore, if we lost a game, it was never the player's fault, you know, it was his. And then if we won, he pointed direction to all the guys. So just a great, great man. And I knew he was something special real quick, because you know, I'd spent twenty four years to minors and then ended up with eighteen and the Big Lee. And I had a couple of guys, a couple of people that were great teachers and taught me a lot, Bobby being the head honcho, but I also had about two hundred people that taught me how not to do it. And uh uh so with Bobby, you knew right away that you were with somebody special. And how about this, you know, going to spring training putting the pictures first. I mean, how many times do we all go to spring training you guys know, get the pictures off field? Why get them done to me too? So wait and get some real work in that, you know. And that wasn't the case pictures. No shagging in spring training. If you would, if you went and got your work done, you were done. You were rewarded for being efficient. No eye wash, you know, no I washed. No running crazy things with their with all this stuff that they do now. I mean even then I knew that they were. Some teams were running pictures in the outfield with parachutes on them and all that sort of thing. I mean, none of that stuff. It was just pure baseball. And every time a free agent came over and they said, man, wish we'd have got here earlier, you know. And it's like mad Dog, you know. And one time we're in Pittsburgh early in nineteen ninety three when when mad Dog was with us, and and Bobby saw him in the in Pittsburgh in the hotel room, you having breakfast. Ob says, what are you doing? He goes, what do you mean? What am I doing? He said, get your butty out of here and go to the golf course. Go play golf, he goes, You want me to go play? He said, go play golf, he said, get away from get away from everything that that that you have to put up with, and go through and get out and relax for a little bit. Well, you must, you know, you must have hit the lottery when when he told him, Matt so, you know so those types of things, you know, treated you professionally, he respected you, he respected the game. But he could also put the hammer down when he wanted to. And that's when you want to get out of his way.

00:10:02
Speaker 5: Big dog. You know how it is, man, We're always hungry, and how do we get our food? We don't want the stuff that makes our bellies hurt. We go to Hello Fresh. We find out specifically what we love to eat. And guess what, Kratzy, I know it helps you out the household. Wifey is happy and the kids are extra happy.

00:10:19
Speaker 4: I'm good at two things. Cookie is one of them. But not trying to choose what we're gonna have. I've gone fifteen meals so far and they haven't given me one repeat meal. There's so many to choose from, and they can make it easy for me.

00:10:32
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I think the best part of it is is for me. I'm very particular. I'm trying new things and I'm really really liking these things from HelloFresh. Go to HelloFresh dot com slash ft ten FM now to get ten free meals plus a free breakfast for life one per box with active subscription. Free meals applied as discount on first box New subscribers only, varies by plan. That's HelloFresh dot com slash ft ten FM to get ten free meals plus free breakfas us for life. Who wants that? I know everybody would love that.

00:11:03
Speaker 4: Where would where would Bobby if he were a manager now exactly how you two were on the bench before, with you rocking and him doing what he did. Where would he struggle as a manager in today's game? And where would he excel over other managers that he is the Hall of Fame manager.

00:11:21
Speaker 3: Well, he would excel of handling pitching staffs, There's no question about that. You know he would in other words, you know, for example, you talked about pitch counts, you know, and all this stuff. You know, and you know I used to have a clicker, you know, and you the pit the button because Bobby was the last one to put pitch counts or how hard you were throwing up on the board. He didn't want it up there, and so and I loved it too because on that clicker I used to cheat on it a little bit, you know. For example, you know, glad to throw first pitch, change up, guy, pop it up. You know I ain't counting that one, you know. So it got to be where here's the genius A max He had a max out inning and we said, okay, nobody knows what a max out ending is. I talked to coaches, managers everywhere the max out ending or what what? He had a max? Yes, that max out ending was this. Hey, Leo, Gladyn's going out for the seventh inning, right, is he going to max out? I said, yeah, he's going to max out. That means he's going to max out his efforts. Okay, okay, Leo, we're gonna this is his last inning and we will Uh pitch count doesn't matter, he said, he really doesn't matter. He said, he's we're taking him out. Then another example would be Leo's Gladving going out for the seventh thing, is he going to max out. I said, no, he's on normal effort. He goes, okay, then we're not taking him out and pitchcount doesn't matter. So if you look at that and the pitch counts and the amount of effort they put, you know what, wouldn't it be amazing to tell pitching staff that today and nobody would blow out and everybody would continue on with her pitch. They would pitch and not throw. So you know, he had that understanding about the amount of effort you put on pitches to make to get the end result that you wanted and to get some touch on the ball. You know. So he was a pitcher's manager, but he was also a player's manager, of course, you know. But he would nobody could carry his you know what when it came to handling pitching staffs, which was a blessing to me, that's for sure.

00:13:25
Speaker 2: Leo Wull. Anyone ever get ejected as Bobby as much as Bobby Cox did. It was the biggest You're like, we're playing the brains for three games. We know Bobby's getting run at least once in these three games.

00:13:35
Speaker 3: Well, you know, you know, a couple of starting pitchers got him ejected a few times. I know Maddis is he one time Glavit was pitching and and most of the time he was about balls and strikes that he got ejected over. But uh, Maddis was charting charton Glavin's game and Glavin Bobby goes, Glad, how's his strike zone? Glab says, ah, I'm working with him. He said, we'll be all right, and he says, okay. So now he walks in to talk to Maddox, who's doing the chart a mad dog. How's glad strike zone? Bobby, this umpire stinks. He's not calling nothing. He won't give Glab nothing. And Glavin heard him and he said, you know, you're just getting him thrown out next inning. You know that, don't you. Maddix goes, yeah, I know, and he's laughing his butt off, you know, and sure's heck the next inning, boom ball one. Here he comes. You know, where was that pitch? Here we go, here we go. So but then there was a lot of time. But you know what was amazing the that the young person hold nothing against him. Everybody used to say, oh, if you're nice to the umpires, maybe you'll get some calls. That was a bunch of bs. You know, you gotta let you don't let somebody know if you if you're not happy with them. And then there was you know sometimes when you know, uh, Jerry Crawford would come over and say, we can hear everything you're saying in the dugout, Bobby said, and your pictures are hitting the target except the catcher setting up a foot outside. So we had a lot of fun with it, you know. And and the man and the umpires loved you, so yeah, it was you knew he was gonna it was coming up sooner or later. And but basically, I think, as you as well know, it was basically over balls and strikes.

00:15:16
Speaker 4: All those divisions in a row an hour in the era where the Dodgers are just the best team. Nobody can beat the Dodgers. Do you feel like the Dodgers even hold a candle to what your team Bobby's team did during that span of straight division championships because they haven't even reached it yet. I think they just reached ten straight division championships.

00:15:39
Speaker 3: Right, No, I think if I think, if you guys sit down, you you you all are real baseball people. Look at the pitching rotation stayed together for eleven years, I mean Maddix, Glavin and Smoltz and then whoever else came in. You know, do you think you think a pitching can make five hundred starts in a row and not miss a starter with Bobby and I together, that we the starter's average making one hundred and forty one hundred and sixty game starts. I mean, of course not they. They can't stay with you. The read on the pitching end of it, You know, you cannot. You cannot realize for fourteen years in a row and the health of the pitching staff, which the manager has a whole lot to do with. But it was they were never abused, and we use common sense and how we use them so, but it would with Bobby and I. It was more often less exertion, that means, get on the mound, more often, throw with less exertion, make the ball, do something without maxing out your effort than the seventh inning when you need something in your tank. It's there, Okay, Now it's less often rock and fire, throw it as hard as you can and beat the catcher up behind home plate and all this sort of thing. And then I don't know about how you feel as how they say up now would drive those guys nuts. I mean, maddi'sould walk off the mount. I'm gonna tell you that, would they would?

00:17:07
Speaker 4: Would a pitcher be able to do that nowadays? Would a pitcher be able to come into your organization and you're running and you say, it's okay, less exertion. We know you have it in the tank. We know you can throw ninety to ninety. You know we can throw ninety eight miles an hour. We went, you just sent ninety to ninety two. Can a player in today's game do that and still keep his job? Or he gets sent to trimplea within two starts.

00:17:32
Speaker 3: He didn't get to keep his job because you know, I talked to a couple of the agents who are good friends of mine, and they said that they had a pitcher that came out of college and the kid went twelve and seven in high A ball with low low walks, good strikeouts, hits, printing's pitch underneath it two point eight four era. So he comes to bring training this year looking for a you know, go to at least double A. They send him to low A. Okay, And so then they wanted to know how come you're sending this kid to low A? They said, Well, until he hits ninety two on a consistent basis, he's gonna have to he's gonna have to stay in low A. Can't move him up. That's just one example of how lousy pitching is developed today and how it's handled today. You try to take a guy, one of the guys out when we were all playing and coaching and they had a no hitter going, you know, I mean, what do you think would happen? There would be a fight on the mound. And the other thing is what really bothers me is they take a picture out four and two thirds five Dings hasn't given up nothing yet, but boy, what a great job. I mean, it's it. It really insults my intelligence, to be perfectly honest with you, how pitchers are handled. Okay. But the other thing is, it's like Bobby and I used to say, and this is true. You know you're asking about today's game. He said, Leo, you and I wouldn't last two weeks now, And I think that's very true. But the bottom line is this, I can't understand why people wouldn't listen to how Bobby cocks handled his pitching staff. Besides the team, of course, I'm always about pitching, and also how we work together to keep have a throwing program where you were on the mound more often learning your craft. And then how he handled the pitchers and didn't abuse him. You put that all together and everybody stayed healthy for record a record amount of time. And if nobody wants to listen to that, that's their problem.

00:19:36
Speaker 5: Cratzy, real simple man. When you're looking for the best seats available where you had a big dog.

00:19:42
Speaker 4: Seekeek super easy because they give us everything you need. You can look at all that. You can look at where you're going to be sitting. I got to sit at a certain spot. I want to be able to see a whole field. I don't need to be close to the field. Got to be a little higher out of the sun. I'm boogie that way.

00:19:57
Speaker 3: Of course you are.

00:19:57
Speaker 5: And guess what, you have a big family and sodo, so you have to decide right away. You got to do something quick. This is real simple, it's affordable, and it's fantastic for a big family like yours and mine to get seats available as soon as possible. Now, yeah, you need a code I got that for you too. You can use code territory ten for ten percent off your next set of tickets at seat geek. That's ten percent of any tickets with promo code territory ten. Make sure you click the link in the description to download the app and have the code automatically added to your account so you can use it later. With over thirty five million downloads, seat geek is the number one rated ticketing app.

00:20:35
Speaker 3: Thank you, seat geek LEO.

00:20:38
Speaker 2: What would Bobby have done if John Schultz came in and said, Hey, here's the lineup for today, and I need you to pitch this guy.

00:20:43
Speaker 3: No matter what, what.

00:20:46
Speaker 2: Would Bobby have said? If John ure Holl's watching, he goes, Bobby, here's.

00:20:49
Speaker 3: The look leader, Get out of here. He's so easy to get out of here, because I do remember one time where general manager John, who they got along great. Believe me, John come in one time early in his when he was with the Braves and after a game and we lost a tough game, and he went in to talk to Bobby and you saw you heard something and then from John left, you know, because he's because he wanted to talk about why this or why that, and Bobby says, you got to give me twenty four hours. He said, I'm telling you before you come in and ask me why we did this or why we did that. But don't get me wrong. He and Cherles became very close, and it was a chain of command that was hard to bring. You couldn't break third chain of command, that's for sure. And that's another successful thing for the Braves was the chain of command. You had Ted Turner the owner, you had standcasting, you had John Cherls, you had Bobby Cox, you had coaching. Everybody stayed intact for a long time. Everybody worked together with the farm system to get to develop pictures, players, et cetera. Okay, so therefore and it was real baseball. I mean, look, I watched the last two games with the Braves and the Dodgers because I always like thought the Dodgers and Braves games were something special. And uh, it's a it's a different ball game when it comes to pitching, and you know, it's like Scooba went down, you know, I mean, everybody get broke. They're blowing up because they try to throw the ball, storing hard that they can't see straight. And then when you watch somebody pitch and you look at their mechanics. Agent, I like to ask you, ag when when did if a right handed pitcher is thrown a pitch okay, and his back leg flies to the first base side instead of a follow through to where you're setting up, when did that start? Or a left handed pitcher his left back leg flies to the third base when we we always wanted our head are up going straight to where you were setting up. That's not They don't even come close to that anymore. I mean, and you know what max effort, How hard can you se? Yeah, it's max effort, how hard you can throw? And you know what, I guess nobody cares that there's you know, you set records now for guys blowing out. But here's what the problem is, too, is these kids are being taught that now from the time they're twelve years old all the way up. So therefore, when you asked me earlier that you get your point across with more oftenliss exertionion, they wouldn't know what the hell you were talking about. To be honest with.

00:23:27
Speaker 2: You, true, I'm not even gonna we need small time in on this because he's Tommy John Effort King not me. I'm just I'm just here to listen to the stories. Leo. It's been a rough week, and it's been a rough week in Braves Country, not only with Bobby but also with Ted Turner. Do you have any Ted Turner stories you can share?

00:23:46
Speaker 4: I don't.

00:23:47
Speaker 2: You weren't there yet when he managed, right were you there when he now? Remember he did the cat and people were stuffing the money in their shirts and he did the roll the ball down the line with the nose trick with Tug McGraw.

00:24:00
Speaker 3: You know, it's spring training, you you know, the coaches would sit outside the dugout and uh so we're playing a spring training game. We're getting hammered, you know, and uh, Mike Blecki's getting hammered. Mike Blecki to me, we he revitalized his career in Atlanta, and uh what he did was, uh he had made the club. I mean, he was on the team, but he you know, we're just trying to get him through an inning or so. And I felt this tap on my shoulder and it was Ted. He goes hey, Leo, and I said, yeah, Teddy goes in that guy pitch. I said, Ted, he's on our team.

00:24:31
Speaker 6: He goes, uh, well, all right, okay, you know so anyway, and then one time he came flying across behind the dugout in West Palm Beach and had his entourage with him, and I.

00:24:44
Speaker 3: Heard him holler, okay, nobody picked their nose. We're on TBS today at one o five, so everybody watched themselves. But he was a great guy. And before our work First World Series, he said, he came in and told us, he said, I want you guys to go out and have fun because I'm not firing nobody. So things like that. And the great owner of a guy that lets you do your job, Bobby Cox, lets you do your job. Uh you know, then they didn't tell you how to do it. If you got you get it done. This is what you're here for. This is what we hire you for. So we got it done for a long time. And like like you guys said earlier, is that is the Dodgers close to that yet not yet? Not yet, not at all.

00:25:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just an incredible, incredible run. And and I could listen to the stories all day.

00:25:40
Speaker 2: Uh we kind of colors you think if you wore one of those whoop things or like the the orror rings. How many colors you think you burned every year with the.

00:25:50
Speaker 3: You know, I didn't even know I was doing it half the time, but you know, TVs made it great, you know, I mean, you know, locked in. I didn't know I was doing it half the time. That half the time Bobby would look at me, Look, you're driving me nuts. Okay, so what am I doing? I don't know what I'm doing any good and so, but we had a lot of fun with it. I didn't know we were doing it half the time, and I did it from the time I was a kid. So it's just when your wheels are turning, people do things different. You know. My wheels were always turning, trying to make sure I wasn't missing anything. And the bottom line was I used to tell the pictures all the time. Guys, here's the only goal I have for you. Go to the post when it's your turn, and the rest will take care of itself. And in the meantime, I'd be sitting there work making sure that everybody. The health factor was the big thing for me because I knew with the talent that we had, if they stayed healthy, we weren't going to lose and we weren't going to have a losing streak either with the horses. We were running out there in a five man rotation, you know. And also, can you imagine a picture coming to Bobby or and saying I'd rather come back a day early than be set back a day that's you. You have a picture in mine in today's game, that would ever say that? I don't think so. I think the two best pictures actually in the game today are in Los Angeles. Listen, they're both from Japan. That's true.

00:27:11
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, the only one I can think of is Yamamoto, who's like in the postseason. I'll pitch every day if that's gonna win it for us. But it was such a unicorn performance for him. Well, Leo, this was great. Thank you so much for sharing the stories. I know you pop up on some other shows too. And then I know you're gonna deliver some of this at the funeral.

00:27:29
Speaker 3: Yeah. Great, it'll be a light presentation of Bobby's funeral. But Bill, we'll get we'll get him, we'll get him laughing. I was just down his house two weeks ago and we were telling stories, and you know, and the first thing he said when I got through the door, he was pointing, he was trying to say it, and and his wife Pam said, let Leo get through the door before you get him as vodka and club soda. So we had We had a great time, and I've been I've saw him a lot in the last few years. I go down every We drove from South Carolina to his house at least twice a month, and it was great therapy for him. But to be perfectly honest with you, it was great therapy for me.

00:28:06
Speaker 1: Oh I can imagine. And also, I mean he overcame a lot in the last I know, five six years I've been following and all the health struggles and how he would overcome them. So there's a lot of great articles out there right now too. Leo, thanks again, really appreciate it. Apologies, you know, thinking about you and the whole family there for the loss, but it really means a lot to share.

00:28:25
Speaker 3: Thank you. It means a lot to us too, And you know it's nice talking real

00:28:29
Speaker 1: Baseball exactly, that's what we do.