Baker Likes His TV

It seems as if Dusty Baker has been around baseball since Abner Doubleday didn’t invent it, or at least since Walter Johnson retired.

Not quite, I know. The long-time manager after being a long-time player is a mere 62. As the current boss of the Cincinnati Reds, Baker is leading his third club, following stints with the San Francisco Giants and Chicago Cubs. He has taken all three of them to the playoffs and has played in the playoffs, too. For a guy who broke into the majors in 1968 it was refreshing near the end of the season, with the Reds out of it, to hear him say he spends his Octobers in front of the TV set, eyes on the playoffs and World Series if his teams are not playing.

You’ve got to like that in a man who has been around the game as long as he has been. Don’t know whether Baker watches on one of those extra-large, ultra-modern wall TVs, an old faithful color set, or even one of the last black and white TVs in American with rabbit ears. He watches, even if it is not nearly as exciting as being part of them.

“You get spoiled,” said Baker, sitting in his office at the Great American Ball Park during the Reds’ last homestand when it was too late for his team to catch either the Milwaukee Brewers, this year’s champs in the National League Central Division, or the wild card St. Louis Cardinals. “Most of my career I was in the playoffs. It’s the toughest thing for me to face.”

A player or manager of a different temperament might tune out a playoffs he wishes he was part of, but this indicates how much Baker still loves the sport if he can get past his disappointment to watch other teams play in the most meaningful games of the season.

In 2010, the Reds were one of the pleasant surprises of baseball. After years of lowly finishes, they captured their division title. That was a glorious day in the home locker room. Champagne was sprayed, players whipped out cigars, and they whooped and hollered for a good hour after the last out. First baseman Joey Votto won the NL Most Valuable Player award and it looked as if something big and long-term was brewing in Cincinnati.

The Reds never regained the magic this past summer, though, and they concluded 2011 with a losing record.

“Nobody is more disappointed than me,” said Baker of missing the playoffs.

But baseball is a big part of his essence and while he might be nursing hurts he doesn’t take it out on the game. If they’re still playing high-caliber baseball in October, Baker wants to watch it, even if he can’t be directly connected.

“I like it,” he said. “I love it.”

In 2010, when the Giants won the World Series for the first time since they moved West from New York in 1958, it felt special to anyone who had ever worn the Giants uniform. Baker managed that team from 1993 to 2002 and even won 103 games one season with the Giants. It may surprise Cincinnati fans, but Baker’s allegiance to the sport overrode his allegiance to his team and he actually attended a few games in the Bay area when San Francisco topped the Texas Rangers.

Even those of us who can never hope to be part of a World Series beyond getting a shot at buying a ticket, or turning on our own televisions, the World Series is special. Imagine if you have had a taste.

“I was there as a player, a coach and a manager,” Baker said. “It’s about the quest, as well as the victory. It’s not like going after the Holy Grail, but it’s pretty close.”

And although Baker, like the rest of us, does age, it never gets old for him chasing another playoff spot.

“It hasn’t gotten old for Joe Paterno,” Baker said of the 84-year-old Penn State football coach. “And it hasn’t gotten old for me.”

If Paterno is his role model, guess that means Baker won’t be ready to retire from the dugout for another 20 years or so.