DUSTY BAKER (Courier Photo/J.L. Martello)
May 31 marked the beginning of the festivities celebrating another African-American heritage celebration at PNC Park. I was pleasantly surprised to see so many African-American “families” together not only just out to take in a ballgame but to enjoy themselves as a unit.
Also, it doesn’t hurt to have the legendary Pittsburgh show band “House of Soul” live on the main stage at the Pirates ‘Friday Night Block Party’ with saxophonist Calvin Stemley and the “horney horns” along with the rest of the band including one of Pittsburgh’s finest R&B vocalists Wayne Barber not only carrying a tune but running with it; even the Cincinnati Reds faithful joined along with the Pirates fans participating in the very lively pregame show. It was fitting that the band mirrored the headliner “Kool and the Gang” who were scheduled to appear in a post game concert after Saturday’s game.
Well, boys and girls, Saturday did not go as well for yours truly because I missed my 3 p.m. 56C Lincoln Place-McKeesport chariot (actually the bus was five minutes early) and I was compelled to call an urban based cab, (jitney) to transport me to Downtown. My “limo” driver turned out to be none other than the infamous Jimmy Giles who used to run a pool hall over on Frankstown Avenue in Homewood.
I zipped into the press cafeteria to grab a bite to eat before I exited to go to the field to chat with Cincinnati Reds Manager Dusty Baker.
By the way, Mr. Baker is one of the most gracious and conscientious players and/managers that I have ever had the pleasure of sitting down with; the other two were former St. Louis Cardinals manager Tony LaRussa and number one of course was and still is the late Pirates skipper Charles “Chuck” Tanner who will always remain at the top of my “interview” food chain.
DUSTY BAKER (Courier Photo/J.L. Martello)
Mr. Baker even walked away from the batting cage to do the interview.
One of the first questions on my list was did his ballclub have revenge on their mind because the Pirates had swept the Reds earlier in the season?
Baker said, “these things [sweeps] happen, they kind of beat on us earlier in the season. Anyway I mean we would have liked to have a early season sweep but right now we want to get back to .500 against them as well as keeping our road record at .500. We’re at .500 now but that series set us back when we came in here and got swept. We started the season at 1-7 and 2-7 on the road. But this is about right now. Right now you gotta beat em because they have a really good team and they [the Pirates] are in the way of our quest for a championship. The reason why our road record has improved is because our guys aren’t walking a lot of people. When you’re not walking people you have a chance to get them out. And we have a strikeout [based] staff. Sometimes pitching gets better just because of the natural progression of the season. When you start the season your pitchers aren’t conditioned to go more than seven innings max. It’s really tough when you leave spring training, you can say and think that your team is ready but most of the time you’re wondering if you’re ready or not.”
We also talked about the Pirates youth and strength but one question remains and that is the question mark about a team once they are put in the pressure cooker of the postseason.
When asked about the recent 2nd half collapses Baker said, “there’s no panic in our team. We have a lot of confidence and it also helps that we have been there before. Our team knows they can play and they know that they are good but they don’t walk around acting all cocky; they just go out and take care of business. They don’t only work hard on the field; they work hard in the weight room and do the right things off the field.”
Recently, Reds outfielder Donald Lutz pinch hit in St. Louis when the Reds played the Cardinals. Lutz became the first German-developed player to appear in a Major League Baseball game. The Reds notes also pointed out that Lutz was the second graduate of the International European Academy to play in the majors the other being IF/OF Alex Liddi of Italy. With the participation of African-Americans being at a decade’s low, I asked the Reds skipper about Mr. Lutz.
“What strikes me as being odd was that I heard we had a big German that could hit but I had no clue that he was going to be Black. His dad was in the military and he eats German, speaks German but he acts like one of us. It’s going to take a while for African-American participation to grow. We have seen some players coming out of the Urban Youth Academies here in the U.S. I hope it doesn’t take too long because they got some boy’s out there that can play.”
Game notes: The Pirates lost the Saturday evenings game 2-0 but fans didn’t totally lose out because after the game “Kool and the Gang” showed off. They even had me semi-bouncing around though not too much because it is not proper media “etiquette” to be dancing in public, but I still dug the show.
Your comments are welcome.
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