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're going through a real tough stretch now. We've got to find a way against two tough pitchers the next couple of days to try and get out of this.
He's healthy. Sometimes he's not swinging well and other times he runs into some hard luck. It's a combination. I can see him getting frustrated. He needs one or two days and he'll get rolling.
We're going to give him as much playing time as possible this week, so we can make up our mind. I'm sure when you get to this point in your career you consider all the possibilities, and I'm sure he's doing some evaluation of his own abilities. So, yeah, these are important days for him.
There are days when you don't have your premier stuff,
Usually you come right in and face 'live,' but you get into bad habits because you're trying to protect your hands and protect your bats. Basically, this is more for the pitchers the first couple days than the hitters. The main thing is, you hope they can throw strikes.
The last couple days Michael has come up with some heroics.
It's just the last few days that he's been complaining that he can't run. Hopefully, it won't be too long. It doesn't appear too serious.
You spend this many days with the guys here. You live and die with them. You hate to see them go. To the best of my knowledge right now, nobody is leaving unless somebody just makes you an offer you can't refuse. Right now, they're here.
I love my daughter, but she had me on couscous and fixed me pastas and made me eat oatmeal every morning and what else, turkey burgers, turkey bacon, and that kind of stuff. So she wants her dad to live a long time, and I do, too.
You don't want to get beat, number one, and you hate getting shutout, number two, and even worse, no hits.
That's the reality of it. Everybody has a big two or three. The health of those big two or three ... there's a lot riding on it.
I'm not a guy that sits around and does nothing.
The only thing that's in my control is to win ballgames and God is always taking care of me.
I love sharing my knowledge of hitting with others. Now coaches and players at all levels can learn my systematic approach to hitting a baseball with more consistency, mental strength and accuracy.