Dusty Baker
Dusty Baker
Johnnie B. "Dusty" Baker, Jr.is an American Major League Baseball manager and former player. He is currently the manager for the Washington Nationals. He enjoyed a 19-year career as a hard-hitting outfielder, primarily with the Atlanta Braves and Los Angeles Dodgers. He helped the Dodgers to pennants in 1977 and 1978 and to the championship in 1981. He then enjoyed a 20-year career as a manager with the San Francisco Giants, Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Reds, and now Washington Nationals. He...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth15 June 1949
CityRiverside, CA
CountryUnited States of America
We were a lot closer before I got here. When you play 18 times against teams that have been long-time rivalries, and then it's against my former manager and my confidant before I came here, it increases things.
We're going to miss him big time but we know we're going to get him back, too.
When I look at my score sheet and I look at theirs, I'm kind of outmanned, ... I've never been in that situation in September. It's just one of those years, I guess.
He doesn't say it, but it's on our minds. The thing is he wants to pitch as many innings as he can to win.
He needs to hit. We want him to start hitting, and all our pitchers from now on will go as normal.
I talked to him. He's tired of it, too. You could tell he was a little distraught about the whole thing. He wants to pitch. He wants to pitch with nothing wrong.
Stealing isn't just speed. Most of it is knowing the pitcher and knowing what a guy does. He might dip his head before he goes to the plate or he might drop his hands slightly before he goes to the plate or his feet are narrow when he goes to first or he might slide-step.
Just a sad day on the pitching side.
Marshall has shown control and poise. He has a very good delivery, and it looks like he has three pitches he can control pretty good. He doesn't seem in awe of being here. I'm very impressed.
He's going to have nerves -- that's natural. Hank Aaron told me when I came up, 'It's natural to be nervous. Just don't be scared.' You wouldn't be human if you weren't nervous. But after you throw that first pitch or two, your nerves subside and it's the same game.
It's the same with pitching. You talk to Greg Maddux and I'm sure he has a game plan, but he also sometimes can feel when a guy is looking inside or if a guy is looking for something else or it depends on which pitch he takes and how he takes it. Some guys get it early, some guys get it late, some guys never get it.
I'll use the DH as long as I can until the end of spring, when the pitchers will be going far enough to hit. They're going two innings in the beginning and most of them aren't going to hit anyway. Once they get going four, five innings, I'll start using the pitchers. Initially, I'll try to DH whenever I can to get guys at-bats.
The Cardinals have a fine team, a real good team. We'll come out next year and try to get the lead or at least stay close -- and stay healthy. They're No. 1 or 2 in pitching, and that shows you how important pitching is. We get our starting pitching healthy and we'll be all right.
If you rescue him every time, you'll have to rescue him all the time. If you leave him out there, you learn about them or they become a pitcher by coming through. He can say, 'I can handle the situation,' but until you've been in the situation, you don't know if you can handle it or not.