BRAVES: DECADE'S DARLINGS; SERIES SCHMERIES; '90S CASE CLOSED AND YANKS TRAIL.

Byline: John Lowe Detroit Free Press 

You'll hear a lot of talk that this World Series will show whether the Atlanta Braves or New York Yankees are the team of the decade.

The team of the decade was decided a year or two ago. It has to be the Braves, by a mile.

In first-place finishes, the Braves beat the Yankees 8-3.

Unfortunately, too many critics and observers put too much weight on what happens in October and not enough on what happens in April through September. So you'll be hearing that the Braves have to win their second World Series championship of the decade - and match the Yankees' total - or else the Yankees will be the team of the 1990s.

``It's really a reward to play in the postseason for all the hard work and the journey that you make during the regular season,'' said Mets right-hander Orel Hershiser, who has made it to the playoffs seven times and the World Series three times, winning the '88 Series with the Dodgers. ``The regular-season prize is a very satisfying prize. The postseason prize is surreal. When you ultimately win it, you realize the odds that you've overcome.

``It's almost like winning the lottery. You realize that any of the teams that made it through the regular season to the postseason could have done this.''

In baseball, the toughest thing to win is the 162-game march of the regular season. The Braves of the '90s have been the masters of it. Year-in, year-out, they outperform everyone else. In the last seven full seasons, they haven't just won their division - they've had the best record in the National League.

According to this team-of-the-decade debate, the Braves have been an unsuccessful October team because they have won only one of their four World Series appearances.

Hold it. More than ever, it's a feat just to reach the Series.

By beating the Mets in the league championship series this week, the Braves reached their fifth Series since 1991. They are the first team to play in five Series in a 10-year span since three factors arrived to make such a run of excellence more difficult: the amateur draft (which began in '65), the playoff system (started in '69) and free agency (born in '76).

Had the draft existed when Joe DiMaggio and Mickey Mantle turned pro, they probably wouldn't have become the cornerstones of the continuing Yankees dynasty. They would have been drafted high in the first round by a lowly team like the St. Louis Browns.

Whenever those dynastic Yankees teams of the 1920s through the 1960s finished with the best record in the regular season, they went directly to the World Series. Perhaps Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, DiMaggio, Mantle and their Yankees cohorts wouldn't have made so many Series had they been required to face another division winner or a wild-card team in the playoffs.

To reach their five World Series this decade, the Braves of manager Bobby Cox have had to win eight playoff series: five league championship series, and - under the enlarged format adopted in 1995 - three first-round series.

``I don't know how anybody can expect to have a run like this,'' general manager John Schuerholz said. ``It's too hard to do.''

Everything good that has happened to the Braves stems from the commitment by Cox - when he was general manager in the late '80s - to build the team around young pitching.

By 1992, the Braves had a strong enough staff that Greg Maddux, a free agent eager to play for a World Series champion, rejected several million more dollars from the Yankees to sign with the Braves. (How would this decade and World Series have looked with Maddux as a Yankee?)

Before the '90s ended, Maddux and fellow aces John Smoltz and Tom Glavine all could have left Atlanta as free agents. The Braves paid to keep all three.

``The real reason the Braves are who they are is that they re-signed those three pitchers,'' said Scott Boras, Maddux's agent. ``They decided they weren't going to go young, and that they would stay with veterans in that area. That decision, made in '96 and '97, gave them an entire new half-decade of grand success. Otherwise, they've cleaned house since '94 and '95.''

Soon after losing to the Yankees in the '96 Series, the Braves essentially had to give away two everyday outfielders, David Justice and Marquis Grissom, to Cleveland so they could afford the three pitchers. The only everyday Braves left from the '96 Series are third baseman Chipper Jones, first baseman-outfielder Ryan Klesko and catcher Javier Lopez.

Lopez has been out since midseason with a knee injury. Slugger Andres Galarraga and closer Kerry Ligtenberg missed the season. The Braves kept winning.

``The Braves have got a handle on what it takes to put a winner together, but the main thing is that the nucleus is so solid with the pitching,'' Hershiser said. ``When they have a good offensive day, they know they're going to win because their pitching is consistent. When they have a bad offensive day, they still have a chance to win. And when they have a great pitching day - which they have a really good chance of having because of the staff - they're going to win.

``So that's why you see such decimating injuries to that team, and they still continue to win 100 games. It's based on pitching, which is 80 percent of the game.''

Having a good rotation usually is the same thing as having a good team. In the Braves' case, it's the team of the decade.

ATLANTA BRAVES vs. NEW YORK YANKEES

Game 1

at Atlanta Saturday, 5:05 p.m.

TV: Ch. 4

CAPTION(S):

Photo

Photo: Bobby Cox has been a key figure in Atlanta Braves' great decade, as general manager and manager.

John Bazemore/Associated Press