As the losses piled up one after another, the burden of unmet expectations – no matter how modest – weighed on Fredi Gonzalez.
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Triple-A manager Brian Snitker will take over, according to an Major League Baseball source.
The Braves are moving to a new stadium, SunTrust Park, to start the 2017 season.
Gonzalez doesn’t deserve all of the blame for Atlanta’s MLB-worst 9-28 start. The following year, the team sank even further.
Although it’s widely known that the Braves are in the midst of a rebuilding effort that gutted the major league team while fortifying the minor league system, Gonzalez had always been a lightning rod for criticism from fans and some media members, and he ultimately paid the price for the team’s dismal performance. He was 276-279 in four seasons with the Marlins. “And I’m anxious to get going”.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution wrote about the inexcusable error by the organization that has become the laughingstock of baseball. He met with players early Tuesday afternoon.
If there was a deserving time to fire Fredi Gonzalez, it was maybe as the team was undergoing a thought-out rebuilding process, as they began in the offseason before 2015. Subtract Freddie Freeman’s six home runs, and they’ve hit a total of five home runs in 37 games.
According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Gonzalez found out that he was sacked after receiving an airline confirmation for a Tuesday flight back to Atlanta.
The Braves lost their first nine games.
Before leaving Pittsburgh on Tuesday, Gonzalez was able to speak with many Braves players, according to the AJC. But they had another September collapse and played the Dodgers in the first round. If the answer to that was no, then fine.
Yet when Gonzalez tried to make the right moves in search of something – anything really – nothing happened.
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Receiving a confirmation for a flight home when you’re in the middle of an away series: An awkward way to learn you’ve been fired, or the most awkward? He was 434-413 with the Braves.
