Rooting for Dusty Baker, Despite the Astros
The percentage of baseball fans outside of the Houston area who would enjoy an Astros World Series win is infinitesimal. Not only have the Astros’ players been largely unapologetic for their unpunished role in their self-imposed scandal, but they also seem to relish playing the heel. They’re about as easy a team to root against as any in recent baseball history.
Yet, if the Astros win the 2021 World Series (a big “if” to be sure, but as of September 24th, Baseball-Reference had them as the odds on favorite), part of me will be happy. Dusty Baker is one of the best managers in the history of the sport, and it would be a great addition to his (what should be) Hall of Fame resume. His career has been largely unheralded in comparison to his contemporaries, in part due to the absence of a ring. It would be a welcome perception change for a great baseball lifer. He’s an easy guy for whom to root.
A Managerial Record of Success
It’s impossible to comprehensively cover a managerial career approaching two and a half decades-long, but let’s do a quick review of Baker’s managerial track record.
Baker started his career in 1993 with the San Francisco Giants, inheriting a 72 win team. In his first year, the team won 103 games, losing the NL West division on the season’s final day to a 104 win Atlanta team. If you’re thinking there was a major roster overhaul in San Francisco in the winter of 1992-1993, there wasn’t – Barry Bonds was the only significant addition – Bonds’ 9.9 WAR on the season certainly helped, but not to the tune of the 31 games the team improved.
After three down seasons with an increasingly horrid pitching staff (a problem that cost GM Bob Quinn Sr. his job), the Giants won the NL West in 1997, and somehow won 89 games in 1998 – no small feat considering all five starting pitchers had a below league average ERA. The team dropped to 86 wins in 1999, in part due to Barry Bonds missing 60 games due to injury, but Dusty and the Giants bounced back in 2000 with a 97 win season and another division title. In the next two seasons, the Giants would add two more 90 plus win seasons and a World Series appearance, losing in Game 7 in the 2002 World Series to the Angels.
Baker faced a ton of criticism and backlash for his game management in game 6 of the 2002 series, a game in which the Giants blew a 5-0 lead. Baker pulled Giants’ starter, Russ Ortiz, with that 5-0 lead and four Giants’ relievers went on to blow said lead. It’s not the manager’s fault that four relievers were unable to get eight outs without allowing five or more runs. Regardless, Baker’s contract was not renewed in the offseason.
Dusty wasn’t unemployed for long as he was hired almost immediately to manage the Chicago Cubs in 2003. Again, he inherited a horrible team as the 2002 Cubs won only 67 games and finished dead last in the NL Central. Yet also again, Baker led an impressively quick turnaround and led the Cubs to a division title in his first season. Of course, as I‘m sure you remember, the season ended with a Game 7 loss in the NLCS to the eventual World Series winners, the Florida Marlins. How much you’d like to blame Steve Bartman for Dusty’s misfortune, I’ll leave it up to you. The Cubs would miss out on a Wild Card spot by three games in 2004 and then had down seasons in both 2005 and 2006 in large part due to injuries to Mark Prior and Kerry Wood (something we’ll return to in a minute). Dusty’s contract was not renewed after the 2006 season.
Baker moved on to the Reds in 2008 and – tell me if you’ve heard this before – inherited a bad team. In his first two seasons, with a horrid pitching staff, the Reds improved slightly winning 74, then 78 games. Then in 2010 with an essentially league average pitching staff (102 ERA+), the Reds won the NL Central. After a down year in 2011 with another poor pitching staff, Baker and the Reds won the NL Central again in 2012, ending the season with a five-game loss in the NLDS to the eventual champion Giants.
The Reds followed that up in 2013 with an appearance in the NL Wild Card game which they lost to Pittsburgh. After the season, despite posting a 509-463 record and two division titles with the Reds, Baker was unceremoniously fired. If you’re curious, Baker’s successors – Bryan Price, Jim Riggleman, and David Bell – have posted a combined 527-657 record and zero division titles for the Reds since.
Dusty moved on to the Nationals in 2016 this time upgrading and inheriting an average team, as Washington had won 83 games under Matt Williams the year before. With Daniel Murphy as the only significant roster addition, the Nats won 95 games and the NL East in 2017 under Baker. They improved slightly in 2018 with a 97 win season but lost in the NLDS to the reigning champion Chicago Cubs. Once again, the thanks Dusty received for turning the Nationals into a powerhouse was another pink slip.
As I’m sure you know, the Astros hired Baker to manage their team in 2020 under what can best be described as complex circumstances. After many departures from what would be considered normative behavior, the Astros entered the 2020 season as MLB’s public enemy number one.
It would be easy to think that unlike his previous managerial stints, this time Dusty inherited a talented roster. However, Gerrit Cole and Justin Verlander, who combined for 14 WAR in 2019, were effectively non-members of Dusty’s Astros. Cole left for New York and Dusty had Verlander for one game. Dusty inherited a good roster, but not the juggernaut that won the world series, even with (cough) advantages.
Despite the Houston players seemingly loving the role of the heel, Dusty has managed to keep the Astros rolling both with wins on the field and with a drama-free environment off of it. After a slow start to the very unusual MLB 2020 season, the Astros rallied and eventually reached the ALCS, losing in seven games to Tampa Bay. The Astros lost with the tying run at the plate in game seven after falling behind in the series 3-0, and falling behind in Game Seven 4-0. So far this season, the Astros are on pace to win 97 games and the AL West, and are legitimate World Series contenders.
Of course, it’s too early to write a finished copy of Baker’s managerial resume, but he currently ranks 12th all-time in managerial wins and has a career .534 winning percentage. Of the 11 managers with more wins, Bruce Bochy is the only one not in Cooperstown, and the winning percentage is a virtual tie with Tony LaRussa’s and just a tick below Joe Torres’ .538. Assuming the Astros aren’t going to blow a seven-game lead with a week to play, Baker has also won eight division titles in 23 full seasons as a manager, a similar ratio to LaRussa’s.
Baker is the only manager to reach the postseason with five different teams and has managed in a record nine pressure-packed Game Sevens. If only one or two of those Game Seven bouts landed differently, the perception of Baker’s career would be markedly different.
Dismissing the Critiques
If you’re thinking Dusty has been a poor post-season manager, I’ll remind you that his career post-season winning percentage is higher than both Billy Martin’s and Mike Scioscia’s and is very similar to Joe Maddon’s (Maddon is 32-35 in the postseason, Baker is 31-37.) We can do away with the “can’t manage in the big games” trope.
He also has taken much criticism from the analytics crowd over the years, as being too “old-school”. Whether or not that was the case almost thirty years ago when his career began is hard to say, but if you think he’s too old school now you may want to check your ageism card. In 2021, Houston is tied for both the fewest sacrifice bunts in MLB and the fewest intentional walks issued. Additionally, Astros’ starting pitchers have also thrown a grand total of 4 innings this season after reaching 105 pitches.
Speaking of which, Baker has been criticized for ruining the careers of pitchers by overusing them. The cause of all pitcher’s injuries is multi-factorial of course, and Mark Prior has said publicly that the issues with Cubs’ pitchers’ arm troubles were not Baker’s fault. Additionally, if we’re blaming managers for injuries to pitchers who had brief peaks with high innings totals then flamed out after arm trouble, let’s have a talk about Tony LaRussa sometime because that list is a long one.
Don’t misunderstand: Should the Astros win the 2021 World Series, I’ll be watching with a clenched jaw and white knuckles. Yet I think after a little time passes, being glad for Dusty Baker will outweigh feelings of resentment for the heels. Dusty has been a great manager for decades, but for the most part, isn’t seen in the same esteemed light as some of his contemporaries. It’d be nice to see that change.
-Jon Rimmer
