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
Just because you can hit, doesn't mean you know how to play winning baseball, ... That's what I'm trying to instill here, and it's not easy to do in the short time I've been here.
I said, 'At times,' ... It's not an overall, long, extended, everybody issue. It's at times. There's a difference. If I contradicted myself, I'm sorry. It's at times. You've seen it. I've seen it, too. At times. Those are isolated incidents.
I said, 'Well, maybe you need to read it.
Our guys are busting it every day. We're not getting it done.
Our greatest cause of concern would be day-after-night games,
I was joking with him -- I think he's a third-degree black belt, and I think some of his reactions came into play there.
Juan has a pretty good idea of when to run. There were quite a few guys who had green lights last year. It's just a matter of them running. I gave guys the green light a lot, but sometimes I was a bit upset when they didn't run. A real base stealer can run better when he feels he can run versus when you tell him to run.
I talked to him the other day because he was pressing a little bit already. I told him to just relax. It's the same game he played in Venezuela. We have to eliminate the pressures of the amount of people and TV and radio, simplify things and say, 'Hey, man, it's baseball.
I talked to him the other day, and he said that's the best he's felt. We want to continue on that same progress and not have an interruption of any kind.
I talked to him last night and this is the first time he's been in a playoff situation. I just told him to go enjoy it.
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.
It came at the right time. Michael, the last couple of days, came through with some heroics.
It certainly doesn't help the situation. It's a period of adjustment (for Jones), changing leagues. You got to give it some time.
It could be anything, ... Preferably, it's a six-inning arm, but we don't know. It could be a couple of innings.