Winning at work and at home
Braves General Manager John Schuerholz is ready for another title run BY BILL SHANKS  | | Karen and John Schuerholz stay active throughout the year, but find peace in their new "empty-nester" townhome. (Photo by Fontaine Lewis.) |
He is arguably one of the most successful executives in the sports history, and for the past 14 years he has made the Atlanta Braves winners. But John Schuerholz is more than the suspender-wearing executive you might see at a Braves game. He is also a husband and a father. “He’s a great dad,” says wife Karen Schuerholz. Schuerholz met Karen Wiltse when he was apartment hunting in Kansas City, Mo., back in 1975. Three years later, they were married. “When I told my girlfriend that [John and I] were getting married, she said, ‘Well that’s a match made in heaven,’” Karen says. “She remembered coming to my house once and hearing me say, ‘Let’s wait until the end of this inning before we leave.’” Karen, an athlete and a physical education major in college, had fallen in love with Schuerholz, a rising baseball administrator, who, in 1981, would become the general manager of the Kansas City Royals. John Schuerholz led the Royals to their only World Series title in 1985, and by the late ’80s he was one of the most respected executives in the game. But when Stan Kasten, then president of the Braves, called in the fall of 1990 to offer the Royals leader the GM’s job in Atlanta, he was hesitant. “It was gut-wrenching,” Schuerholz admits. “We loved Kansas City; we loved living there. We loved our neighbors, our home, our neighborhood, our schools, our church and our friends.” Luckily for long-suffering Braves fans, Schuerholz accepted the offer. Fourteen years later, the Braves are on a historic run of success with 13 straight division titles and one World Series championship. But the leader of the Braves is somewhat a mystery. Unlike many sports figures, he’s simply a man with a job, and even though he goes about it quietly, Schuerholz gets it done. “I keep things to myself,” Schuerholz admits. “Then when I do something I’m happy to explain it. But I’m contained.” His reserved manner does nothing to help reporters trying to figure out his next move with the Braves roster, nor does it assist agents negotiating with him. It also gives him a slight edge over other executives when he’s discussing a big trade—Schuerholz is not someone you want to play poker with. “That’s just my natural inclination,” Schuerholz says. “But it works for me.” To think that Schuerholz is always on guard is incorrect. He has a quick, dry wit and a sense of humor that encourages his staff to enjoy the important duties they have to keep the Braves on top. “He’s one of the funniest guys that I’ve ever met,” says Herk Robinson, who worked closely with Schuerholz in Kansas City for 20 years before following him as the Royals GM in 1990. “He’s quick and he’s brilliant. John is smart as a whip. He is a great person and a great competitor.” “People I work with will tell you I like to make things loose and easygoing because we demand a lot out of people when we’re working,” Schuerholz says. “It’s fun to make them laugh and let them enjoy being where they are.” “He’s more serious at home,” Karen admits. “He leaves everything at work and just comes home and is quiet, except when we’re with friends.” That may be the most surprising aspect of Schuerholz’s life—his ability to separate the responsibilities of his job from his home life. He’s obsessed with winning, and at work, that is his main focus. But when he walks into his north Atlanta home, he’s able to put the job aside. “It’s not hard for me because that’s my nature,” Schuerholz says. “I’ve never been someone who sort of initiates blurting out, ‘Here’s what happened to me today. Here’s what my day was like.’ I’ve never done that in my life. Maybe I inherited that from my father, who didn’t speak much either about his workdays. When I come home I’m either watching our team on television, and even if I’m involved in some activity around construction of our team, I’m pretty relaxed.” Schuerholz says reading helps him unwind, and when he’s playing golf decently, it helps take his mind off baseball for awhile. But over time, he’s been able to delegate many of his responsibilities to his staff, enabling him to have a relatively normal life, sometimes unusual or even impossible for most baseball executives. “He’s great at involving a lot of people in the decision-making process,” says Schuerholz’s Assistant General Manager Frank Wren. “I have great confidence in the people who work for me and I place great trust in them,” he says. “Everyone’s going to give their very best effort on our behalf at all times.”
 | | Schuerholz congratulates Braves pitcher John Smoltz, another integral part of the team's success in the last 15 years. |
“I don’t think because it’s baseball it’s any different than any other job as far as how it’s handled at home,” Karen says. “I think no matter what your job is, you can come home and be a dad and a husband. He’s done that very well.” “There are a lot of successful young businessmen who dedicated themselves to their careers and had to sacrifice time at home, hours with kids, hours with wives, and family fun vacations to get to that point,” Schuerholz admits. “I’ve gotten to that point and I’ve sacrificed a lot of those things too. Karen’s had to carry the load as the general manager of this house.” “I’m a very independent person,” Karen says. “I didn’t need to have him there every minute of the day to answer all my questions, except when I’d get in a bind and he’d have to bail me out. He’s so level-headed. I draw strength from him. I tend to focus on something small, and he sees the bigger picture.” Early on, Schuerholz was able to spend some time going to daughter Gina’s soccer games and piano recitals. (Gina, now 31, is an elementary school teacher in Cobb County.) But when his son Jonathan was born in 1980, Schuerholz was a bit more established, enabling him to spend even more time with his son, who excelled at soccer and baseball. “When he could stand up with a bat in his hand, I was throwing batting practice to him in our house or outside or wherever,” says Schuerholz. “I tried to make it a point to carve out time intentionally. I spent more time with Jonathan because [baseball] was what I knew and what I was comfortable with—and it was fun watching.” Jonathan developed into a star baseball player at The Lovett School in Atlanta. He then went on to have a good career at Auburn before the Braves drafted him in the eighth round of the 2002 draft. Critics said it was a classic case of nepotism, but Schuerholz says he had nothing to do with the decision. “The Braves scouts came to me and said, ‘We’re going to draft Jonathan,’” Schuerholz recalls. “I said, ‘You just draft the next best player on that board for this organization. I don’t care if it’s Schuerholz or Smith. Whoever it is, you take him.’ I was hands-off completely.” The younger Schuerholz heads to Double-A this season, two steps away from the major leagues. His dad knows how tough it is to make it to the majors, so whether it happens or not, Schuerholz is already proud of his son. “He’s a tough kid,” Schuerholz says. “He’s dealt with it very well. From college, they called him ‘Daddy’s boy’ and all that stuff. But he’s already made it, as far as I’m concerned. There are so few people who play professional baseball at all. I didn’t. It takes good God-given ability, a good work ethic and some good fortune. It would be great if he makes it to the major leagues, but he’s a professional baseball player and a lot of people on this earth don’t do that.” Seeing his son play in the major leagues may be a thrill for Schuerholz, but he feels he may still have some thrills left of his own. As he enters his 15th season as the Braves GM, he is more determined than ever to see this team win its second World Series title. “John Schuerholz is as good a competitor as you’ll ever be around,” says Dayton Moore, the Braves director of Player Personnel and one of Schuerholz’s most trusted assistants. “He’s going to be a Hall-of-Fame general manager. He’s got tremendous character. He flat out does not want to lose at anything.” “I don’t have quite the resiliency I used to have after long nights or long home stands or long summers of baseball,” admits Schuerholz, who turns 65 this October. “I don’t bounce back, to be honest, physically or mentally or emotionally as well as I did before. So it’s a little more challenging. But I’m still obsessed at winning. I want to do all that I can and be as detailed as I possibly can in finding a way to win. But once that task has ended, I try to be as normal and psychotic as I am.” “Just normal,” his wife says with a laugh. Bill Shanks is the author of the new book on the Braves scouting and player development philosophies, “Scout’s Honor: The Bravest Way To Build A Winning Team.” He hosted and produced a weekly television show on the Braves minor league farm system called “The Braves Show.” The Waycross native has also been a TV Sports Director in Brunswick and Macon. Shanks can be reached at thebravesshow@email.com.
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