They’re Too Tough in the Justice Dept.

If the Atlanta Braves win the National League pennant--and it’s looking more like an “out” price every day--you might say it was because Justice prevailed.

And we all know justice is on a long losing streak in this country, of late.

The Braves would be winning because they had Justice on their side.

We all recall the Shakespearean injunction in “King Henry VI, Part II”: “What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted! Thrice is he armed that hath his cause just. . . .”

Well, in the case of the Braves, thrice are they armed that have their right fielder, Justice.

There may be instances where justice is blind--in courthouse statues, for instance--but in the batter’s box this Justice has eyes like a hawk.

This surely is baseball’s chief Justice. David Christopher Justice, bats left, throws left. In his three seasons with the Braves, they have won two pennants. He leads the National League in runs batted in with 104, is second in home runs with 36 and has hit seven home runs in his last 14 games.

He has Cooperstown written all over him. He has batted in 341 runs in a little more than three seasons. He has gotten better every year he has played. He might be the most devastating second-half player in the game today. And a major reason the Braves come from behind like a stretch-running Derby colt.

They were playing .460 ball as of June, 1992, but ended up with the pennant and a .605 winning percentage by October. In that stretch drive, Justice hit 11 home runs and drove in 30 runs in the last 40 games. He’s harder to get out in September than a poor relative.

In a way, this is a poetic Justice. To a scout, “good-looking ballplayer” refers to a man who hits the curveball or who looks good striking out. In the case of the poetic Justice, it refers to his seemingly having been signed for the role right out of Central Casting. At 6 feet 3 and 200 pounds, he has leading-man good looks. A real-life Roy Hobbs. You might say Justice is fair.

He stands at the plate very upright, no crouch or coil a la Rickey Henderson. He holds the bat over his head, rather like the Statue of Liberty with her lamp. His feet are close together--but when the ball arrives, he attacks. The bat drops, the weight shifts and the swing is as pure as mountain ice.

He sat in a locker room at Dodger Stadium the other night, preparing for the game in which the Braves would lop one more game off San Francisco’s lead, and he considered the pennant race and the Justice of it all, particularly why he has such fall surges:

“I think I’m mentally prepared late in the season. I’m not pressing. I have a pretty good idea what I’m about. I think I am streaky. I get in these streaks where you can’t get me out. Then, there are games where you can’t find me.”

Does he feel that his erect stance with the bat held over his head like a Roman candle presents a lot of strike zone for the pitcher? A Rickey Henderson crouch presents a pitcher with a keyhole to get the ball through, by comparison.

“There’s no doubt my straight-up style gives the pitcher a nice target,” he says. “But I have far more power that way. The bat speed is crucial. You’ve got to get the bat through there--and the faster it goes through, the farther the ball goes.”

There is no doubt he is a hustler. A man of average speed--he stole only two bases last season--he nevertheless grounded into only one double-play in 484 at-bats. That’s one, as in one more than none. This Justice does not move slowly. Justice is swift going down to first.

Right field is the Justice Department for the Braves. Their attorney general wears No. 23 and is armed and dangerous. He threw out Orlando Merced at the plate in the seventh game of last year’s playoffs. The Braves scored three runs in the bottom of the ninth to win the pennant.

So, it would seem that Justice must be served. But the league might feel like that lawyer who got a wire from his client, “Justice has triumphed!” and immediately wired back, “Appeal at once!”

The National League knows exactly how that fellow felt. If it could appeal this Justice, it would. And if, as the poet says, mankind thirsts for Justice, you can bet the 13 other teams in the National League do. It’s a contradiction of terms but in this case they have to feel they are all victims of Justice.