Dusty Baker

Johnnie B. "Dusty" Baker Jr. joins Lost Ballparks to discuss his new book, Crossroads, and reflects on his early years with the Atlanta Braves, being mentored by Hank Aaron, sitting in hotel rooms with "the hammer" and Satchel Paige listening to unforgettable stories. He also takes us inside one of the most iconic moments in sports history, standing on deck as Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth's all-time home run record in Atlanta in 1974. Dusty offers a deeply personal perspective on Aaron's historic achievement, the racism and death threats Aaron endured during the chase, and one unforgettable moment that happened as Aaron crossed the plate.

Transcript

SPEAKER_06 0:00

Even though I was a kid at the time, I vividly remember a couple things about the 1977 National League Championship Series between the Dodgers and the Phillies. Both of them happened in game two at Dodgers Stadium. In the fourth inning, Phillies pitcher Jim Londborg intentionally walked Steve Garvey to load the bases, bringing 28-year-old Dusty Baker to the plate.

SPEAKER_09 0:19

And Baker trying to put the Dodgers ahead. One and two the count. Hit one on the left field. Mike Bigon back to the load.

SPEAKER_06 0:31

As Dusty rounds the bases and heads back to the Dodgers docking, the second thing happens. Teammate Glenn Burke raises his head in celebration. Dusty slaps it. And in that spontaneous moment, baseball gives the world what is believed to be the first ever recorded high five.

SPEAKER_09 0:48

Dusty Baker comes out. It's another salute for the fans. Would you believe two grand slam numbers for the Dodgers in two nights? And Don's sitting on the bench, mighty happy at the way Dusty got a hold of that one.

SPEAKER_06 1:01

Dusty would go on to win the 1977 NLCS MVP. Today, at 77 years old, Dusty is reflecting on his life in baseball and beyond in his new book, Crossroads. Dusty Baker's my guest on this episode of Lost Ball Parks. Dusty Baker with his new book, Crossroads, is my guest on Lost Ball Parks. Dusty, how are you? Pretty good. Can you hear me? Yeah, perfect. Okay, man. I'm anxious to get into some of the stories that you talk about in the book, but before we do, I'd love to start with um a question familiar to folks who have listened to Lost Ball Parks for some time, which is tell me about the first big league game that you ever attended as a kid.

SPEAKER_04 2:27

Well, it was Little League Day, and uh it was at the Coliseum while Dodger Stadium is being built.

SPEAKER_12 2:35

This is Los Angeles, where a longtime dream of big league baseball suddenly came true two years ago. And here's the Coliseum where over two million fans visited the temporary home for the Dodgers as a testimonial to baseball's excitement and thrills.

SPEAKER_04 2:49

And uh I remember uh we sat way up at the top, and uh all the kids from Riverside Little League, and every ball that went up, every ball that went up in the air, uh looked like it was gonna go out of the ballpark. And uh and I remember that uh uh Wally Moon, his famous moon shot over that uh that high left screen out there. Yeah, because left field was to what 250 down the line, I think. Yeah, exactly. And they had a big old screen up there. It was like the wall in Boston, except it was a screen.

SPEAKER_06 3:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 3:27

And Wally learned how to hit that ball over that screen out there, at least on that screen. It was called a you know, the Wally Moon moonshot.

SPEAKER_06 3:35

Your mom was a big influence on your life. She taught you to cook, to sew, and appreciate music. She would take you and your siblings to classical music concerts. Uh, and at the time you were you were smiling, but I don't think it was because of the music, was it?

SPEAKER_04 3:49

No, it was because I was sitting on the other side of my mom, and my brother or sister was on the other side. So I'd always have my earpiece, you know, coming out of my transistor radio uh on my right ear, so my mom wouldn't see it. And uh I was listening to I was listening to Vince Cully and the Dodge games.

SPEAKER_11 4:10

One thing the outfielders have to do tonight, after all the rain we had, is the basis through the infield, the outfielder must charge it. Otherwise, the ball will die on the wet grass and cause troubles.

SPEAKER_06 4:19

Your dad coached your little league teams growing up, uh, and you may have been the coach's son, but I think it's fair to say that you absolutely did not get coach's son preferential treatment.

SPEAKER_04 4:32

No, if anything, I got I got quite the opposite. I mean, um, my dad cut me when I was eight, uh, nine, and ten for having a bad temper and a bad attitude, which I did. You know, like I struck out and I threw my bat up against so that was called slinging the bat back those days. And uh then my dad cut me, I had to pay for his friend, and the next time let a ball go between my legs, and I threw my glove down, stomped on it, and my dad cut me again. And the last time I didn't even want to play. I said I was gonna quit and get a paper out, and uh I didn't want to play. And uh, so my dad said, no son of his was gonna quit uh anything. Uh uh, you're gonna see the season through, and he had too much money invested in me at $9.99 uh uh cents in that Ted Williams series and roebuck glove. He wasn't gonna let you waste that investment, was he? Oh no, yeah, he had too much money invested in me. But anyway, uh, you know, my dad, you know, he was uh he was firm but fair. And uh most of the time, if I got punished for something, not most of the time, uh all the time, you know, I I I deserved it because you know, you know, as a little kid, it was fun to be bad unless you got caught, you know.

SPEAKER_06 5:49

In high school, you were a multi-sport star. You played football, basketball, excelled at track and baseball. The last day of the 1967 draft, you had just completed your senior year of high school. Your phone rings. And like the title of the book, it was a crossroad for you.

SPEAKER_04 6:08

Well, um, I didn't have a very good year in my senior year. I hit like 229 to scout you're like, hey, you know, hit a home run for us, and I was trying to do things that I wasn't capable of doing. And uh I was just a low-line drive ground ball speed guy with you know, that was skilled. And uh I didn't even think I'd get drafted. And then uh I got drafted by the Atlanta Braves, and I had prayed that I wouldn't get drafted by the Braves because I didn't want to go, you know, to the South. I mean, that's when, you know, we had civil unrest and uh uh riots and they were calling the dogs out and fire hoses and everything. Yeah, you know, uh, you know, trying to trying to enforce integration. And so uh that's the last place I wanted to go. But that ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me. I I grew up, and you know, I learned that there's good people everywhere, and I got to meet you know, the great Hank Aaron and all the guys on the on the Braves that took Ralph Garr and myself under their wings.

SPEAKER_06 7:12

Yeah, I want to talk about your relationship with Hank Aaron and and Mena, such an important part of the book and an important part of your life. But but first, that year uh for your birthday, your mom gave you a gift uh that you will never forget, right?

SPEAKER_04 7:29

Yeah, well, she gave me $20, uh, the use of the state of the Rambler station wagon, the streets would recline all the way back so you could sleep in it, and two tickets to the Monterey Pop Festival Festival for my buddy and I, Gary uh drill, you know, whom my mom really trusted that I wouldn't get into trouble because Gary was like class president, most likely to succeed and all this stuff, you know what I mean? And uh, which they were right. You know, we went down there for the weekend. We had a flat tire on the way down, had to change the tire because the tires are bald. And uh, you know, we had a great time.

SPEAKER_06 8:06

I was looking back at who played at the festival that year. I mean, some of the greatest music acts of all time were there.

SPEAKER_04 8:12

Yeah, yeah, I mean, I didn't know it. I just heard some of them on the radio, you know, Booker T and the MGs, you know, they had Mamas and the Papas and Grace Slick and Jeff Sonair playing, they had Jimi Hendrix, they had T-Bone Walker, you know, who my dad liked a lot. And it was a very, very mixed and eclectic uh uh group of musicians. Yeah. And uh, I mean, it was like they're talking about the summer of love. I mean, there was that's what it was. And uh it was a summer of love and also a summer of a lot of you know unrest in our country.

SPEAKER_06 8:46

And it was also the summer of the Braves trying to sign their speedy 18-year-old draft pick, but they had to go through your mom, who was handling the negotiations for you. In August, the Braves were in Los Angeles to play the Dodgers, so they flew you and your mom down to work out with the team at Dodger Stadium.

SPEAKER_04 9:05

So they flew my mom and I after the draft uh down to LA. I mean, I guess they knew I was a Dodger fan. And uh I worked out you know, before batting practice in Dodger Stadium at 18 years old. They give you a uniform.

SPEAKER_06 9:20

You got a uniform?

SPEAKER_04 9:20

I mean, it doesn't have a number or a name on the back, but oh yeah, they they call me no number that you know, and uh the fans, and I was a little skinny kid, and uh, you know, I I was I was working out taking bat practice, took infield, and I was like, man, this is the first time I've been on a big league field because when I was a kid, I I sat way the heck up there, and here I was on the field.

SPEAKER_06 9:43

That day, Felipe Alu gave you one of his bats.

SPEAKER_04 9:47

Oh, yeah. Do you still have it? Yeah, I still have it because my mother kept it. My mother kept everything. You know, she kept uh, I mean, pictures, she kept my uh some of my uniforms, my Marine Corps uniform. My mom kept everything. And uh she about probably about 15 years ago, you know, I went over to my mom's and and she gave me that bat back. And uh it was a long bat, like 36 inches and crazy 38, 38 ounces. I mean, it's a log. I still got the picture when I asked Felipe, you know, when he signed the bat. And uh we're sitting in the dugout, and and he signed a bat, and I have it in my uh in my trophy case right now.

SPEAKER_06 10:26

Such a great story. And on the bus ride back to the team's hotel after the game, you're sitting next to Hank Aaron, and at some point your mom your mom pulls Hank aside and gives it to him straight.

SPEAKER_04 10:40

Oh yeah. She said, Take care of my boy as if he was your own son. He said, Yes, Miss Baker.

SPEAKER_06 10:46

In your book, you mentioned that if that if you go back and look at your baseball cards from the first few years that you were in the league, you won't find one that shows you smiling. You talk about being angry, and no one could blame you. In the minor leagues, uh there was a time where you were taking a trip to Ray Winder Field in Little Rock, and this would be 1967. And somewhere along that nine-hour bus ride, the team stops for food. Uh and as you get ready to leave the bus, you feel a hand on your shoulder.

SPEAKER_04 11:17

Yeah, and it was Cito Gaston. And Cito told me, you know, he was older than me, older than me and Ralph. A couple years older than Ralph, but probably four years older than me. And uh he he said, No, son, he said, go sit down, boy. He said, uh, you know, you can't get off the bus here and go get food. You let one of the white players get it for you. But uh, it wasn't only that incidence, there were quite a few incidences, and also that was uh, you know, the sign of the times, you know, and mom, my mom being a black studies teacher, you know, we had the you know the books around. Um, well, she wasn't a teacher yet, but we always had books, and and she ended up being a black studies teacher. But, you know, we had you know books by Eldris Cleaver and H. Rap Brown, and uh, you know, I wanted to change my name and you know, John the Muslim uh said at the time, uh, because that was a that was a serious time, and there were times when when when you had to choose one side or the other. And you know, smiling for pictures and and having an afro wasn't wasn't the sign of the times. I mean, that was a very, very, you know, tumultuous time in our in our country.

SPEAKER_06 12:25

At the game that night in Little Rock, you are heckled relentlessly. A group of people were in the stands and they were saying some awful racist things, uh, horrible things. After the game, you called your mom. Do you remember what you told her?

SPEAKER_04 12:39

Well, actually, I started crying. I started crying right there on the spot. And uh Sido Gasson told me, hey man, you know, like uh I'll take care of you. And Ralph Gar was and left, and he was from the South, and uh they and and and and Cito was from Texas, and they were probably a little more used to that than I was. But uh I told my mom I wanted to come home. And she says too late, because then at that time, if you were a pro in one sport, you were a pro in all sports. That was the Jim Thorpe law, where now you can be a pro in one sport and in football and and then come to college and play basketball or baseball. And so my mom said, No, you can't. And so I um went back to the hotel, and like I said, uh Cito said he'll take care of me. Then I found out the next day that all those people heckling me, you know, I figured what Dale Lassa was on a Thursday, and all those people heckling me on Thursday. Well, at the park on Friday, I found out that all those people were from the mill institution next to the ballpark.

SPEAKER_06 13:45

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_04 13:46

And they were just litting them out for the day to kind of get every Thursday, they would come to the ballpark and they sat down in right field. Well, I didn't know this then. Yeah, you know, and I was like, I was like, man, what have I gotten into? And then you're, you know, like I had never seen swamps, I'd never seen uh trees growing out in the middle of the water. You know, we had read about lynchings and hangings and all kind of stuff. So I was like, I was like, well, but I learned a lot, taught me a lot.

SPEAKER_06 14:14

Hall of Famer Billy Williams, uh, who shares your birthday and is a good friend of yours, joined Lost Ballparks a few years ago and spoke about playing in the South during the 1960s.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

Well, it it was really difficult, and I think uh I've told this many a time, and and those kind of things you like to forget about. You can talk about them, but uh people who would have, and you know, that's one of the reasons why I elected to go home because I wanted I didn't want to play the game anymore. I got bored of whatever thing that was going on because I couldn't afford the hotel. I was a wonderful one that was dropped off at night. I was the first one to be picked up before we go to the game. So it was uh you know, you're trying to fight the baseball, you're trying to fight the pitches out there. You're trying to fight the nation. So I like to uh forget about baseball for a while because you know, when I left uh Alabama, I knew where I could go, when I could go. But uh when you went off to play a game of baseball, you thought it would change because you were on a team with a lot of uh white players.

SPEAKER_06 15:18

Breaking into professional baseball as an 18-year-old is challenging under any circumstance, but for black players of that era, it meant doing so while facing segregation, uh racism, and constant hostility.

SPEAKER_04 15:31

My last years of high school when we moved to Sacramento, where there's only two blacks in high school, me and my brother. And so and so we went through a certain amount of hassles, you know, before I went to the South. It wasn't uh, you know, to the degree uh that that it was then, but like I went from one one world to the complete opposite world. But it was kind of it was kind of cool too to go be forced to live in the all black section and and always have a uh old lady or old dude that that would take care of you, always had a mama that would cook for me, you know, because these, you know, the older ladies, they, you know, I mean, they were like my mother.

SPEAKER_06 16:09

Because when you were playing in a different city, black and Latin players weren't allowed to stay in the team hotel. So a lot of times you had to stay with a host family uh on the other side of town.

SPEAKER_04 16:19

Yeah, exactly. And uh, you know, the blacks and Latins, that's why we got close, especially like Greenwood, South Carolina, you know, went to live behind Mama's Soul Food Kitchen, which was which, you know, you create a society and uh you know of your own and you create things to do. And that's why a lot most of the Latin and black players were always got along because uh, you know, they're always with us, even though the Latin players were still accepted more than than we were accepted being American-born.

SPEAKER_06 16:49

A year after working out with the Braves at Dodger Stadium, wearing a jersey with no number, you made it to the big leagues. Your first at bat came at the Astrodome.

SPEAKER_08 16:58

From the Astrodome in Houston, the Astros game of the day is on the air. This afternoon's game between the Astros and the Atlanta Braves is brought to you by the Joseph Split Brewing Company, Milwaukee, and other cities.

SPEAKER_06 17:13

What do you remember about the Astrodome in 1968 and that first at both of the Aaron?

SPEAKER_04 17:17

Well, they called me up for September. I mean, because I came out and well, I had to go to college in the offseason or else you're drafted. If you didn't have 15 units per semester, you were drafted uh, you know, in the Army and sent to Vietnam. You know, I led the team in hidden, even though I didn't have enough at best to qualify, uh I might have been uh one of the top guys in the league. Well, I got called, you know, to the big leagues. And uh I thought about what Hank told me that if I had confidence enough to be in the big leagues by the time my class would have graduated from college, well, my class was only a sophomore or junior at that time, you know what I mean? And I was like, well, maybe I made the right decision because like I didn't know if I had made the right decision or not. But um, again, I prayed on it, and that's the answer, you know, that I got. But it was uh, you know, uh my first games in the Astrodome. And uh I remember I'd never seen AstroTurf before. And uh uh I was like uh I think I was facing Mike Quayar.

SPEAKER_06 18:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 18:20

Uh yeah, that and I got an infield hit, and uh man, I had I ran halfway down left field line, and you know, I mean the guys were all happy for me, and like I said, they treated the guys on the team, you know, Bob Astramani, uh uh, you know, Cleve Boyer later, uh Bob Euchre. They, you know, they called Ralph Garr up too at the same time. And so we were at the big leagues at the same time. Um, um, you know, the same day, we were in the same draft.

SPEAKER_06 18:51

And now, after Houston getting a chance to play at the Astrodome, you head to San Francisco to play at Candlestick Park.

SPEAKER_07 18:57

It is a cool and crispy in San Francisco, California, where the baseball fans are wondering what has happened to our Giants. NBC Sports presents baseball's game of the week, today from Candlestick Park.

SPEAKER_06 19:10

During batting practice, you were introduced to Willie Mays. You were admiring his McGregor baseball glove.

SPEAKER_04 19:16

Correct, because Bobby Bonds was on my dad's little league team in Riverside. Yeah, and Bobby was playing for the Giants at the time, so you had that connection. Yes. Oh yeah, oh yeah, big time. And so, man, I met Willie around the cage, and uh Bobby said, You want to meet him? I said, Oh, yeah. I mean, Bobby was good to me. I was my homeboy, and um, I was admiring his glove. And he says, Uh, you like this glove? I said, Yes, sir. He took it off his hand and and he gave it to me. And uh, even before that, though, before we got on the field, Mike Murphy, the longtime clubhouse attendant for, I don't know, 40, 50 years. He just retired a couple years ago.

SPEAKER_06 19:54

Yeah, he was on the podcast a couple years ago.

SPEAKER_04 19:56

Oh, right. Hey, Murph, Murph wouldn't let me in the clubhouse. And and uh, and uh and he met me at the door and he goes, Where are you going, kid? And I said, I'm on the team. He goes, I'm on the team too, get lost. And so I I'm staying outside and I'm waiting on somebody to come by. And so Mr. Busby came by, the outfield coach, and he goes, he says, uh, Dusty, what are you doing out there? I said, This guy won't let me in. And he goes, Murph goes, he's on the team. So they start calling me 14 because they said I look 14 years old. They see this little skinny kid is on the team. Are you really serious? Yeah, and so as lo and behold, about 20, 25 years later, there I was, uh, you know, on the same team as well, but maybe not that long, maybe 20 years later, the same team as Murph, 19 years. And uh Murph was a clubhouse guy. And then uh uh Murph was uh clubhouse guy when I was a coach and a manager, and then he used to say I was the boss, and I'm like, nah, you're the boss, Murphy. You always and uh you know he'd always call me Johnny B. You know, he'd say from Sack of Tomatoes, that's what they used to call Sacramento. You from you from Sack of Tomatoes. I said, Yeah, I guess I am.

SPEAKER_06 21:15

So And that day in 68 at Candlestick, you picked up your second hit off a legendary future Hall of Famer.

SPEAKER_04 21:22

Yeah, off of Juan Mayor Shaw, but that was that was the infield hit too. Yeah, you'll take it though, right? Well, that's what I hey, that that was my game at the time because I didn't hit home runs. I I was 170 pounds. And uh, but I could hit, I could hit and uh and I could run. And so I hit another another infield worm beater and and beat it out for my second hit.

SPEAKER_06 21:45

Listen, one of my favorite parts of that story, just a year earlier, Santa Clara University had recruited you to play basketball. And while you also worked out, and while you were there, you also worked out with the baseball team. But the baseball coach didn't think you were ready for the college level. So fast forward a year and you get that hit off a marischell to lead off the top of the ninth that day uh at candlestick. And at some point, Santa Clara's basketball coach Carol Williams picks up his phone and calls his friend, the baseball coach. What did he say?

SPEAKER_04 22:15

He said, hey man, remember that kid you said that couldn't play? He says, uh, yeah, uh that kid that went to play baseball. He says, Let's turn the radio on. He he's the center field for the Braves against the Giants, and uh and he couldn't believe it.

SPEAKER_06 22:30

In August of 1968, the Braves announced that they were signing Sacho Page. On the road, you and your buddy teammate Ralph Gar would uh at night would sit in Hank Aaron's room with him and and Sacho Page and uh and and Tommy Tommy Aaron. Hank's brother.

SPEAKER_04 22:47

Oh, Hank's brother, yep. What an experience. Tommy was just as close to us, or maybe closer, because Tommy was like uh like our big brother, where Hank was like your father-uncle type, you know what I mean? And uh, I mean Tommy took care of us, I mean, big time. And uh, you know, we we'd go to Hank's room, and then um uh, you know, Satchel be telling stories, and then Hank would tell him, Well, why don't you question us lying? That's what he's telling him all the time. And he'd always swear he wasn't lying, and then and then we start laughing. We didn't care if he was lying or not. And then and then he would always like um, I you know, people would give him fishing gear all the time, and and I was in charge of carrying his fishing gear. And he would promise me that he'd give me some at the end of the year. He never gave me not one rod, and he had about a hundred rods. And um, he used to call me Daffy all the time. And I said, My name is not Daffy, like Daffy Duck. I said, My name is Dusty. He goes, I know what your name is, Daffy. And so he would take me in the bullpen and he had this duffel, like a little, like that old school basketball little bag with the handle on it. Oh, right, yeah. And he had a catcher's glove, and he had like a saw-off two by four, that's the width of the plate. And so he made me go down there and catch him. And I don't know how how old he was then, but he would throw strike after strike after strike, and then, you know, he would tell me to not put it across the plate, the width of the plate, put it long ways on the corners. And then he started hitting the corners. I mean, just uh with that two by four. And uh, and he and he didn't believe in in putting ice on, you know, like he put heat on. Yeah. And he told me, stay out of the training room. That's what he told me. And uh, I mean, we had some laughs. I mean, you don't know he didn't know if he was telling the truth. It didn't matter. No, it didn't matter, man. It was just I wouldn't train that for nothing.

SPEAKER_06 24:55

In 1973, Hank Aaron was closing in on Babe Ruth's all-time home run record, and the context surrounding that chase is impossible to ignore. I mean, here was a black man playing for a team in the Deep South on the verge of surpassing one of the most revered records in American sports during a very turbulent time in the civil rights era. Uh, the attention that Hank was getting that year was overwhelming. I think he received nearly 900,000 pieces of mail that year alone, and a lot of it hateful. Your locker in the clubhouse at Atlanta Stadium was right next to his. Now, I don't think he ever sat you down and showed you some of the death threats, but every now and then you would find one of them crumpled up on the clubhouse floor.

SPEAKER_04 25:36

Yep, I was on one side and Ralph was on the other side. So I was on the left side and Ralph's on the right side of Hank. And uh I mean we could tell his eyes would get like cold steel and he would like just throw it on the floor and go to the training room. I mean, he never really, you know, he was like your your your parent that had a bad day at work but would never tell you about it.

SPEAKER_06 25:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:57

And uh, but I could tell something's wrong. But uh it it really uh you know made him concentrate uh even harder, you know, than normal. I mean, I mean this guy's concentration level is beyond compare, but it it seemed like those letters just sort of drove him from instead of having the effect that they wanted it to have on him, it it did drove him to you know to excellence. And uh, you know, he had a bad sciatica uh uh and a bad back and a bad knee. And I mean, but he'd walk in limping and then walk out and and play like a young chicken and then come back in limping again. I mean, he was uh uh his focus um and his desire was, you know, and perseverance was beyond compare.

SPEAKER_06 26:49

So the Braves opened the 1974 season at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati.

SPEAKER_00 26:54

The Major League Baseball season opened today with one question on fans' minds. How long before Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves would hit his 714th home run, tying Babe Ruth?

SPEAKER_06 27:05

Wasting no time, he comes to the plate in the first inning. You're on deck, Dusty with the best view in the house. What do you remember about that moment?

SPEAKER_04 27:14

I remember. Yeah, Jack Billingham threw him a slider. 3-1 first.

SPEAKER_14 27:48

The record they've done that couldn't be raped, has got been raped by Henry Heron.

SPEAKER_04 27:55

He told me that what he was gonna do to it because see he had total recall of almost every situation. Uh and if you faced a guy one time, and then this is what he used to always tell us that, you know, you may not understand, but you have to retain everything that you that you see and hear and feel. And so uh, you know, I remember after that that they wanted him to play the next day, but he wanted to break the record in Atlanta. I think the commissioner was Bully Coon at the time. And uh uh, I mean, he was adamant about about breaking the record at Atlanta.

SPEAKER_06 28:31

It happens four days later. The Braves are back in Atlanta Stadium, bottom of the fourth.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

Al Downing a lefty, working with a two-run lead. He's given up only one hit, a double to Dusty Baker in the second. Aaron is on deck.

SPEAKER_06 28:45

Hank comes to the plate to face Dodger pitcher Al Downing. He's sitting on 7-14. Downing's first pitch is in the dirt, and as he gets ready to throw pitch number two, we pick up the call from the great Vince Goliath. And in a way that only Vin Scully can, he summarizes the moment beautifully.

SPEAKER_03 29:15

What a marvelous moment for the state of Georgia, what a marvelous moment for the country in the world. A black man is getting a standing elevation in the deep south and breaking a record of an all-time baseball medal. And it is a great moment for all of us, and particularly for him.

SPEAKER_06 29:37

After he rounds the bases and is walking back to the dugout, Hank's mom runs across the field and holds Hank close.

SPEAKER_03 29:45

And as he left the home plate area, his mother came running across the grass, threw her arms around his neck, kissed him for all she was worth.

SPEAKER_06 29:56

But there was more to this than meets the eye because and I had never heard about this until I read your book.

SPEAKER_04 30:01

Well, you know, uh, his mom was protecting Hank and uh the hammer because like they were death threats. If he broke the record, they were gonna shoot him that that night. And so uh, you know, his mom was hugging on him not only because she was happy, but she was she was protecting her son, and if something happened, she'd rather have it happen to her than happen to him.

SPEAKER_06 30:24

She was using her body as a shield.

SPEAKER_04 30:27

Yeah, and so I mean that's that's uh you know, that's what you know a great parent that you know that loved their kid would do. And uh but fortunately for us, nothing nothing happened. It was a cold, cold night, and uh everybody left, and I was the next hitter up. Here's Dusty Baker as the game gets underway. I heard all these, you know, the seats were old and kind of clankety, and I could hear them. I turned around and there was about half the people were gone.

SPEAKER_13 30:57

What a moment, and what a night, and what a thrill for anybody involved.

SPEAKER_04 31:03

But hey man, we went uh we went on and uh, you know, we had a pretty good year that year, and uh I mean we really could hit. I mean, we if you couldn't hit, you couldn't be on the Braves. So that's how it was.

SPEAKER_06 31:16

Honestly, Dusty, I could spend three or four hours talking with you about this book, Crossroads. We haven't even scratched the surface of the drama of the 1977 NLCS, the 1981 World Series, the 81 All-Star Game in Cleveland at Municipal Stadium, the earthquake during the 89 World Series, your remarkable managerial career that culminated with the World Championship in Houston in 2022, or some some of the incredible personal stories along the way, like sharing a smoke with Jimi Hendrix, uh having a barbecue with President Obama, so many other stories. But I'll leave it there and let folks read about it and your new book, Crossroads, which is out right now. Grateful that you wrote this one, Dusty.

SPEAKER_04 31:58

Yeah, and I've been pretty lucky to uh to be in those situations. I mean, I didn't choose to be in those situations. I I just happened to be there. And uh, you know, one after the other, you know, not name-dropping or anything. I was just chosen, you know, to be in those situations, and I'm just, you know, sharing that with the uh, you know, with the people.

SPEAKER_06 32:22

Yeah, thank you, Dusty. I really appreciate the time today.

SPEAKER_04 32:25

All right, man. I'll see you later.

SPEAKER_06 32:27

All the best to you. All right, late. Two-time All-Star, gold glove winner, two-time silver slugger, three-time NL Manager of the Year, won a World Series as a player with the Dodgers in '81, and as a manager with the Astros in 2022, won 2,183 regular season games as a manager. That's good for eighth all-time. Uh and on a personal note, after the interview, I uh I reminded Dusty of a moment from about 10 years ago. My son Rylan and I were at a ballgame in San Diego when we happened to run into him on the concourse. Uh my son Rye was wearing a Montreal Expos hat. And Dusty stopped to talk with him for several minutes about the Expos in baseball and took a picture with us. And it may have seemed like a small gesture at the time, but I mean it wasn't to my son and to me. More than a decade later, he still talks about that encounter. So thank you, Dusty, for that and for this uh interview today. And uh I know it's been a while since our last episode, so if you're hearing this, thank you for taking the time to listen to our special conversation with Dusty Baker. I truly appreciate your support and looking forward to uh talking with you again down the road.