Now, Braves Have Two Managers : Who’s Going to Have the Final Word, Cox or Tanner?

One week ago they loved Bobby Cox in Canada. Today they don’t love him so much anymore because he has gone off and left them high and dry.

Atlanta’s Ted Turner still loves him, though.

Enough so that he was all set to make him both general manager and field manager of his embattled Braves less than two weeks ago before he got so impatient that he signed Chuck Tanner as his bench boss instead.

An obvious question arises now that Cox is the Braves’ new general manager and Tanner their new manager.

Since their new jobs will overlap to some degree in certain areas, such as player trades, will Cox or Tanner feel he has to have the last word?

Each insists not, saying they will work together for the collective good of the Braves.

Reassuring as those words sound now, Turner, in his desire to bring Atlanta its first pennant, may have created a monster instead and unwittingly set up a conflict he didn’t bargain for.

To begin with, there’s the question of salary.

Cox’s new five-year contract with the Braves will earn him $350,000 a year or close to $1.8 million. That’s a nice boost from the slightly less than $200,000 a year he was earning to manage the Toronto Blue Jays but nowhere near the $500,000 a year Tanner is getting on his five-year contract with the Braves.

The situation isn’t entirely unlike the one in hockey which existed with the New York Rangers not so long ago.

They hired Herb Brooks as coach for $250,000 a year. Craig Patrick, the Ranger general manager was making $125,000, and when Brooks came aboard, he had to take a cut even from that figure.

Periodically, you’d hear Brooks cite his unhappiness with not having complete control over decisions about player personnel. Two and a half years later, it didn’t matter anymore because Patrick fired Brooks.

Cox claims it won’t really matter whether either he or Tanner is perceived as the Braves’ “boss,” and he’s absolutely right there since the actual boss is Turner.

“Whatever has to be done will be done collectively,” said the Blue Jays former manager. “Not only by myself and Chuck, but by everyone in the organization. Ultimately, I’ll have the final say,” he added pointedly.

Tanner didn’t argue with that at all.

“We’ll work together as a team” he said. “Bob will have the last say. He’ll be the captain of the ship. We wanna put a ring on the finger of (Braves board chairman) Bill Bartholomay and Ted Turner and it’ll say ‘World Champions.”’

All this is noble and high-sounding, but I was there when the Rangers introduced Brooks to the media after signing him and I remember how he and Patrick said basically the same things Cox and Tanner are saying now.

Turner’s original idea was to sign Cox as the Braves GM and manager. His real first choice for general manager was Pat Gillick, who has that job with the Blue Jays now. But after getting the Blue Jays’ permission to talk with Gillick and offering him the moon in 1978 to replace the late Bill Lucas, Gillick turned him down.

By one of those ironic twists, Cox was one of those who recommended Gillick to Turner.

Now Gillick isn’t thrilled over the way Turner went about hiring Cox away from the Blue Jays, whom he led to their first American League pennant this season and whose contract with them doesn’t run out until Dec. 31.

Turner is completely in the clear, though. He got permission from the Blue Jays to talk with Cox, who said over and over during the playoffs with Kansas City last week that he was perfectly happy in Toronto and had no desire to leave.

What happened was this:

After the regular season ended two weeks ago, Turner asked the Blue Jays permission to talk with Cox for the purpose of making him his GM and manager.

The Blue Jays have a policy. They never stand in the way of any of their who are offered another job.

Turner was told he was free to meet with Cox, but since Cox was involved handling the Blue Jays in the playoffs, they suggested the Braves owner wait until after the playoffs.

Turner agreed. In the meantime, Tanner was fired by the Pittsburgh Pirates. Several clubs were interested in hiring him and Turner, who had no assurance Cox would accept his offer, began getting antsy. He faced the possibility of losing Cox and Tanner.

You know the way he operates. He’s a mover. When he gets an idea, he likes to put it into motion. Not tomorrow or the day after, but yesterday.

So he went out and hired Tanner and gave him $2.5 million for the next five years and it was announced Tanner’s authority would go beyond the field.

Now that he had Tanner, Turner didn’t forget about Cox. He isn’t a man who forgets. Not when it has to do with business, the business of trying to make the Braves truly “America’s Team” like they’re called on Turner’s network.

So again, Turner called and asked the Blue Jays for permission to talk with Cox and again they gave it to him. Not that eagerly this time.

Cox said at a news conference in St. Louis Tuesday to announce his return to the Braves--whom he managed from 1978 through 1981 before being fired by Turner--that he fully expected to sign another contract with the Blue Jays when he met club president Paul Beeston and Gillick last Friday.

But then they told him about Turner calling again and he talked with the Braves owner over the phone for two hours.

For two years now, Turner has been saying that firing Cox in the first place was the biggest mistake he ever made. Turner is a pretty persuasive talker. Cox always liked him, even after Turner fired him, and he listened to what he had to say.

The more Cox thought about Turner’s offer, the more it began appealing to him. What clinched it was geography as much as money.

Cox lives in Marietta, Ga., about 20 minutes from the Braves’ ballpark. He enjoys being with his family as much as possible. He’s 44, and that had something to do with his decision, too.

The Blue Jays give only one-year contracts. Turner was offering him five, which would bring Cox to 49. He would have to work only a few more years after that and he could be with his family without worrying about working anymore.

Turner took the rubberband off his bankroll in signing Cox and Tanner for more than $4 million. What’s money to him?

It’s nothing compared with what he would have paid for CBS. And with Cox and Tanner, at least he can fire them some day and then enjoy the pleasure of rehiring them.