|
|
Joe Lonnett thought he won $8 million.
He was the third-base coach of the Pittsburgh Pirates, a team struggling to
win a game in the mid-1980s, and, luck of all luck, he hit the mother lode in
the lottery. Thirty minutes before the first pitch, Lonnett jumped around, whooped
it up, hugged anyone he could find.
Everyone else in a Pirates uniform laughed like crazy.
The winning numbers handed to Lonnett were fakes. Pirates manager Chuck Tanner
and trainer Tony Bartirome, well-aware of the dwindling morale around the clubhouse,
hatched the plan to dupe Lonnett and then let everyone else in on the secret.
It worked.
"Right then," Tanner says, "we started winning."
Tanner chose humor to deal with a slump, the same ploy that Royals manager Tony
Peña used last weekend after the team's fifth consecutive loss. Fully
uniformed, Peña hopped into the shower, soaped himself up and emerged
by firing off cheeky and well-natured zingers at his team.
Gone, at least temporarily, was the somber attitude that permeates a team with
a prolonged losing streak. Peña learned the tricks from Tanner, his first
major-league manager in 1980 with the Pirates, and other teammates along the
way.
"Whenever you see your players going out and trying so hard and beating
themselves up, then it's time to do something to make them relax," Peña
says. "It's time to make them smile. You don't want anyone pressing too
much.
"I've been around so long that I can see when players are going through
that."
Timing is integral. So is the method. Motivating a team that sloughs through
a 162-game season takes a delicate balance among when, why and how.
"If you try to do something premeditated or orchestrated, it doesn't work,"
says Doug Rader, a former manager in Texas and California and notorious prankster.
"You do whatever's instinctive.
"A lot of it depends upon your own sanity at the time. Because what happens
is you get so wrapped up, you can lose your sense of humor. Then it's not so
nice. It's refreshing to hear Tony's keeping an even keel."
***
Peña, now in his second full year as manager, first flashed his antics
after the Royals blew a five-run ninth-inning lead last season. He walked into
a stone-silent clubhouse and turned the volume dial on the stereo 180 degrees,
sending 50 Cent thumping through the speakers.
Perhaps Peña stole the idea from Tanner, who summoned former Pirates
slugger Dave Parker into his office after a loss to Los Angeles. Dodgers manager
Tommy Lasorda had sent over a jug of wine. Tanner handed Parker glasses and
told him to liven up the clubhouse.
"I want that radio on as long as you can play it," Tanner said. "If
I don't hear music and hollering, I'm putting my foot up your butt."
They drank. They played music. They hollered.
They went on a winning streak.
Tanner was lucky. Some managers lack the timing, others the tact, to invigorate
a team.
And sometimes, the tactics simply backfire.
In 1983, a 4-3 loss to Los Angeles dropped the Chicago Cubs to 5-14. Manager
Lee Elia, infuriated with the Wrigley Field boo birds, unleashed a legendary
invective that today would send FCC Chairman Michael Powell into a conniption.
The tally: 37 F-bombs and six more dirty words in 3 minutes.
Elia's intent — to take heat off his players and draw attention toward
himself — was laudable. Its result wasn't. Chicago finished fifth in the
National League East at 71-91 and owned the league's worst pitching staff.
Mets manager Gil Hodges, however, had success placing the spotlight on the players.
Just like the second game of a 1969 doubleheader, when Hodges emerged from the
dugout in the midst of a 10-run third inning by Houston. Looked like a routine
pitching change.
Except Hodges kept walking. All the way into left field, where Cleon Jones had
lollygagged for a ball Johnny Edwards hit into the left-field corner for a double.
Hodges chatted with Jones, turned around and walked back toward the dugout.
Jones followed.
"I haven't seen a manager do that before that and since that," Jones
says. "He yanked me. You have to know Gil Hodges to really figure out why
someone would do that.
"He didn't do anything to hurt anyone. But if he thought it would help
and motivate other people, he'd do it. He knew how much individuals could take,
whether they were strong enough to take what he would dish out. Well, at the
time, I was leading the league in hitting. And if he could do that to me, everyone
else knew what they had to look forward to."
The Mets lost that game and the next, ending July at 55-44. They finished the
season 100-62 and won the World Series.
"We were motivated," Jones says.
***
That is, after all, the point of managerial antics. Motivation. Inspiration.
Encouragement. Psych up a player so much he's willing to run through walls for
you. Make him believe.
Former Toronto manager Tim Johnson tried to do so with his players. He weaved
stories about time spent in combat in Vietnam, even telling pitcher Pat Hentgen
about how he killed a girl and her little brother.
Johnson's lies were exposed, he was fired, and he now manages the Lincoln Saltdogs
of the independent Northern League.
"It was a thing to try to motivate," Johnson said last year, "and
it didn't work."
Over-the-top tactics usually don't.
"If you've got a guy who has been Mr. Nice Guy all year, then all of a
sudden, he tries to snap and throw stuff, it's kind of funny," Royals infielder
Desi Relaford says. "It doesn't have an effect. But when you have someone
like Lou Piniella, who will come in and throw stuff, then it's like, ‘OK,
he's mad.' You expect it. If he's doing it, it must be warranted."
Peña skews toward comedy. During the 1991 season, he tried to shake a
slump by walking on the field during batting practice with his uniform on backward
and his shoes on the wrong feet.
Unintentional humor works, too.
In 1999, Colorado manager Jim Leyland stewed in his office after a loss. Royals
reliever Curtis Leskanic, whose locker was next to first-base coach Tommy Sandt,
watched Leyland exit seething.
"He's ranting and raving," Leskanic says. "After 15 minutes,
he leaves the clubhouse. I go to take off my pants, Tommy Sandt looks at me
and says, ‘Don't move yet.'
"Ten minutes, Jimmy comes back in without a shirt on, just pants and cigarette.
He starts up again, ‘Another thing.' This goes on for another 15 minutes,
then he leaves. I go to take off my pants, and Tommy says, ‘Don't do it
yet.'
"A few minutes later, Jimmy comes back out totally naked but with a cigarette
with an ash about 2 inches long, and starts banging lockers and shouting again.
Finally, that was over, and Tommy said it was OK to take off my pants."
Peña chose to keep his on. Players want to be reassured. A manager's
job is to reassure. He knew when he needed to, why he needed to and how he needed
to.
The Royals are 1-2 since Peña tried to wash away the team's woes. There
are 148 games left to see whether he chose the correct method and timing.
"For Tony to go and do something like that," Leskanic said, "it
was like, OK, we're all right."
Bob Dutton of The Star contributed to this report.