Leadoff: Schuerholz’s latest award puts him in elite Atlanta group

John Schuerholz shows off the Braves’ clubhouse to the media before the opening of SunTrust Park last year.

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

Credit: HYOSUB SHIN / AJC

John Schuerholz shows off the Braves’ clubhouse to the media before the opening of SunTrust Park last year.

Good morning. This is LEADOFF, today’s early look inside Atlanta sports. 

It's a distinguished group, the past winners of the Atlanta Sports Council's Lifetime Achievement Award: Hank Aaron (2006), Vince Dooley (2007), Billy Payne (2008), Ted Turner (2009), Tom Cousins (2010), Bobby Cox (2011), Dominique Wilkins (2012), Chipper Jones (2013), Tommy Nobis (2014), Tom Glavine (2015), John Smoltz (2016) and Arthur Blank (2017).

The Sports Council announced Tuesday that John Schuerholz will join that prestigious list as winner of this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award, which will be presented at the Atlanta Sports Awards show June 7.

Schuerholz, the Braves’ general manager from late 1990 through the 2007 season, was the architect of teams that won 14 consecutive division titles, five National League pennants and the 1995 World Series. After stepping down as GM, Schuerholz served as team president until March 2016. He has been the Braves’ vice chairman since then.

He was inducted into the Braves Hall of Fame in August 2016 and into baseball’s Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., in July 2017.

Schuerholz “forever changed Atlanta Braves baseball” and “embodies all that the Lifetime Achievement Award stands for,” Atlanta Sports Council President Dan Corso said in a statement.

The annual Atlanta Sports Awards were created by the Sports Council in 2006 to recognize excellence in local high school, college and professional sports.

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