Braves’ New World: Gant Powers Cardinal Victory

The motorcycle sits alone in Ron Gant’s garage as if it’s a relic. He hasn’t started the bike in two years. He’s not even sure he has the key.

Yet every day he looks at it, relives that repulsive moment, and uses the memory as motivation and inspiration in his baseball career.

It is this remembrance Saturday afternoon that flashed through Gant’s mind in the first inning while rounding the bases, and again in the sixth, knowing that this time he left the Atlanta Braves with their own haunting memory.

Gant, now the Cardinals’ left fielder, hit two home runs and provided all of the offense in St. Louis’ 3-2 victory over the Braves in front of a frenzied record crowd of 56,769 at Busch Stadium, giving the Cardinals a surprising 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven National League championship series.

“I don’t think they know what hit them,” Cardinal outfielder Ray Lankford said. “The Braves have been a great team over the years but there comes a time when you’re going to hit a brick wall. Sooner or later, things are not going to go your way. That’s what’s happening right now.

“We’re on a roll right now and taking full advantage of it. I think they thought we’d win maybe one game, but look at us now, we’ve jumped right on Ronnie’s shoulders.”

Gant, who let his teammates know before the game how badly he wants to beat his former team, hit a two-run homer on a changeup off Brave starter Tom Glavine in the first for a 2-1 lead. And to show it was no fluke, he hit a fastball for another homer off Glavine in the sixth for a 3-1 lead.

It was all Donovan Osborne needed--yielding seven hits and two runs in seven innings. Mark Petkovsek rescued him in the eighth, and Rick Honeycutt and Dennis Eckersley closed out the ninth for the Cardinals’ victory.

“Everybody in here wants to win,” Cardinal outfielder Brian Jordan said, “but I don’t think anybody in this room wants to win more than Ron Gant. When you have bitter feelings toward a team, you always have those internal feelings of revenge.

“The Atlanta Braves released him. This is his chance for revenge. He wants to show the Braves they made a mistake. He walked around today and said, ‘I want this more than anything.’

“Hey, we’ll go along for the ride.”

Gant, who spent the first 10 years of his career in the Braves’ organization and figured he would never wear another uniform, says his personal mission is to torment the Braves. If he keeps hitting like this the rest of the series, they may never forget him.

“I think a lot of adrenaline and emotion took over today,” said Gant, who signed a five-year, $25-million contract with the Cardinals during the winter. “I want to make sure they pay. When I see those guys, I want to beat them bad. I want to show them what they missed out on.

“I’d be a liar if I said I wasn’t hurt. I’m not going to lie about the situation now. It hurt me very deeply because I thought I’d always be a Brave. But I never felt like I was treated fairly by the organization. I never felt appreciated there.

“Maybe now they’ll feel a little different about me.”

Gant’s career, and perhaps the Braves’ 1996 season, changed the afternoon of Feb. 3, 1994, when Gant--who had just signed a $5.5-million contract--suffered a compound fracture of the right leg while riding his motorcycle with friends in the hills near his home in Smyrna, Ga. The injury was so severe, it became necessary to surgically insert a metal rod into Gant’s leg.

“The first thing we heard was that he may never play again,” Atlanta first baseman Fred McGriff said. “They were making it sound like his career was over.”

The Braves announced they would stick by Gant--who knew that riding motorcycles violated his contract--and would pay the entire contract for the man who hit 36 homers and drove in 117 runs in 1993. They changed their mind a month later and released him, paying him $917,000 in termination pay.

“Let’s face it, Ronnie was one of the greatest players in the league,” injured right fielder David Justice said. “He did an awful lot for this organization. When he got hurt, it was like, ‘See ya.’

“Now, he’s taking that vengeance out on us.”

The Braves aren’t about to apologize for releasing Gant, and have no excuses for the two pitches he hit for home runs, but they are becoming increasingly concerned about their anemic offense. The Braves are batting .212 in the postseason, scoring only 19 runs in six games. Their only runs Saturday were produced by a sacrifice fly by Chipper Jones in the first and a sacrifice fly by rookie Jermaine Dye in the eighth.

“Our staff has been underrated the whole year,” Osborne said. “I don’t think people realized the kind of pitching we have. I don’t think people realized the kind of team we had.

“I think everybody’s finding out a lot about us right now.”

Just ask the Braves.