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I am a die hard Braves fan. Memories of watching the Braves with my grandfather who loved them so. My husband and I religiously have watched them, that is until the past three to four years. I had always had such pride in our organization for the intelligent way they ran the Braves and put teams together. Well, I am afraid we lost that intelligence. I know that it is a business and not just a "sport" and that sometimes you have make more of a business decision than a "sports" decision, but over the past several years, the decisions that have been made have made no business or sports sense. You can not have a team in sports that cannot produce both offensively and defensively. In baseball defense does not just mean fielding, you have to have a pitching staff and with all we had to go to trying to rely on two pitchers as true starters, it just can't be done. I truly believe that the trades we have made over the last 4-5 years were far better trades to the other teams than for the braves. We traded away alot of good ball players that we should have kept, especially for what we got in return and we have kept players that should have been traded 4-5 years ago. Now, we are "stuck" with them because they have basically no high trade value, we would have to trade them and an even better prospect or two just to make the trade. I am sorry to say that I now watch the Braves very seldom, because it just sickens me to watch what we have knowing what we could and should have at this point - we should still be one of the top two teams to beat day in and day out. And I am so afraid that the fall is not over because they have put themselves in a position as an organization that it is going to take a pretty expensive procedure to put the Braves back in a contender position. I can only hope and pray that the "powers to be" really think out their off-season moves and keep who they should and shed who they can't and don't need to keep while there is still a "market" for them, even if we have to delve into our upcoming prospects once again. Just please, please I pray keep the best of what you have - day in day out players, not ones that "had a name" in the past, Jones, Hampton, Kotsay you have to shore up the ranks now or it is going to be a long road back, and more and more fans will be turning them off and tuning them out, especially with what it costs to take a family to a ballgame these days.
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