Leadership in Coaching: The Success of Dusty Baker

I am a Cubs fan and while he was with the Cubs, I wanted to strangle Dusty Baker for mismanaging the Cubs’ pitching staff. That was twenty years ago and with things like pro sports, I don’t hold grudges. He was just the wrong manager at that point in time.

Or was he? Am I judging him off of a small sample size of games where he made few decisions and most of what happened was due to the actions of the players? While people remember the ‘Bartman incident’, few tend to remember after that foul ball that the Cubs booted a routine grounder that would’ve been a double play or Sammy Sosa wildly missing a cut-off man, both of which contributed to the opponent’s rally. Bartman got blamed, Dusty’s decisions took the blame, but Dusty didn’t commit those errors nor was there anything he could do to stop them.

And now he’s managing in the World Series for the Astros. The cheating Astros who likely won a World Series by blatantly breaking rules–doing it egregiously enough people were fired for it though they didn’t vacate the title (they should have). The Astros did one thing right in the aftermath–they hired Dusty Baker.

Why? Because Baker has a long-lasting reputation of personal integrity. A writer on ESPN’s website wrote about his personal experience with Dusty as a manager. Go read it. Skim the stuff on this year’s Astros–focus on Baker’s actions with the Cubs, how he treats his players. (Thanks for coming back) Read those quotes about the lengths he went to on behalf of his players. Did you catch the important quote?

Glanville’s assessment of Baker: “He lets you change him, openly trying to grow. And he pushes you to do the same.”

Baker is in his seventies, an age where stereotypically coaches are ‘stuck in their ways’. Wow.

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For me, this matters a lot. A couple years ago I was privileged to attend leadership training with the USMC and a big emphasis there was doing the right thing, figuring out when/how to change, and never accepting something simply because that’s the way it’s always been done…tradition is for ceremonies, not solving problems. When I got back, I implemented some of those ideas–seriously, if it works for Marines then it’ll work with sports…. But if you do not immediately win or see success from those changes, you doubt yourself–especially if what you did previously was successful. (I know better–but everyone has moments of doubt…I have lots of them)

Baker’s story re-emphasized for me the importance of adaptation, that the game changes, the people around you change. He’s shown he can grow and learn–he’s completely different now with handling pitchers… I wonder if he ever thinks like I do “Boy, I wish I’d known this stuff 5-10-20 years ago…I would’ve been such a better coach for my athletes” or does he take the “Well, screwed that up, learned the lesson, won’t make that mistake again” approach?

Baker’s story reaffirmed my belief that coaching is about people. It is about relationships. Glanville’s comment that Baker became the first guest on his podcast because of the difference he made–that’s leadership, that’s a long-term effect. Even after leaving the Cubs, Glanville stayed in touch, so that the relationship went from player-coach to mentor-mentee and then to friends. You don’t hear that with players staying in touch with managers very often…except when the manager is Dusty Baker.