Maddux, Glavine Should Be Busy

If this series goes the maximum five games, Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine will have pitched four of them. The Atlanta Braves will employ a four-man rotation if they advance to the best-of-seven National League championship series and the World Series, but Manager Bobby Cox said he did not want to risk losing the best-of-five division series without two starts apiece from his aces.

“In a short series, I think we need to take advantage of their talent,” Cox said.

If the Braves do not sweep the series, Maddux will start the fourth game, and Glavine the fifth, if it’s necessary, each on three days’ rest.

The Braves left Kevin Millwood off the roster for this series, and sent him to their Florida training complex, where he is scheduled to pitch twice so that he can be ready to start the fourth game of the NL championship series.

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Dave Mlicki, pitching today for the Houston Astros, is something of an accidental starter. He started the season with the Detroit Tigers, who lost 96 games, and the Astros traded for him only because he was all they could get for Jose Lima.

“The trade was primarily about two non-performing assets,” Houston General Manager Gerry Hunsicker said. “We had a pitcher who had dug himself into a pretty deep hole with little chance of digging himself out. I think Detroit felt the same way. It was a proverbial change-of-scenery trade.”

Mlicki went 4-8 with a 7.33 earned-run average for the Tigers and 7-3 with a 5.09 ERA for the Astros. He starts today almost by default, with Pedro Astacio and Carlos Hernandez out for the playoffs, Roy Oswalt slowed by a strained groin and Shane Reynolds unavailable because he pitched Sunday. Still, Mlicki is thrilled to pitch in the first postseason game of his eight-year career and grateful for his rescue from the Tigers.

“In Detroit, I felt like I was treading water,” he said. “The more I tried, the worse it got. I got over here, and it was like a breath of fresh air.... You come to the park knowing you’ve got a great chance to win. I think that just rubs off. It’s fun again.”

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The Braves, swept by the St. Louis Cardinals in last year’s division series and by the New York Yankees in the 1999 World Series, ended a seven-game postseason losing streak.... Houston catcher Brad Ausmus, a career .258 hitter, is batting .407 (11 for 27) against Maddux, the four-time Cy Young Award winner. Ausmus hit a two-run home run off Maddux on Tuesday and threw out two runners trying to steal.... The non-sellout crowd of 35,553 included former President George Bush and his wife, Barbara. Said Maddux, “That was awesome, to get a chance to pitch in front of a former president, whose son is doing an outstanding job.”