With Dusty, you take the good with the bad

Dusty Baker's four-year tenure as manager of the Cubs was one of the more eventful in recent team history.

Baker blew into town in November 2002 and actually had to temper expectations, telling people that, "My name is Dusty, not Messiah."

The Cubs came within five outs of going to the World Series in October 2003, and that really marked the beginning of the end for Baker. He was accused of not settling his team down in the eighth inning of Game 6 of the championship series against the Florida Marlins, who erased a 3-1 deficit with 8 runs.

Baker is a complex and fascinating human being. He's charming, well read, intelligent and able to make anybody he talks with 1-on-1 feel like a million bucks.

He's also defensive, touchy, stubborn and decidedly old school when it comes to accepting some of baseball's modern thinking, especially with statistical analysis.

Let's take a look back at Good Dusty and Bad Dusty during his time with the Cubs as he brings his Cincinnati Reds to Wrigley Field tonight.

Good Dusty

Attitude: When Baker got to Chicago, the Cubs were coming off a 67-win season. Baker immediately infused a positive attitude throughout the organization. Under Baker, the Cubs posted their first back-to-back winning seasons in three decades, in 2003-04.

Trust: Remember those old T-shirts, "In Dusty We Trusty?" You might be able to find a few on eBay nowadays. Those shirts were popular in the clubhouse among players, most of whom loved Baker.

No fear: Perhaps Baker's finest moment with the Cubs came in September of '03, when he let it be known that NL Central bully Tony La Russa and his St. Louis Cardinals no longer would rule the roost.

His target one day was pitcher Matt Morris, who openly rooted against the Cubs making the playoffs.

"If he thinks it's been on so far, he's got a whole decade full of what's coming," Baker said. "Like I've said, we don't start nothing, but we ain't taking nothing."

The Cardinals indeed might have a whole decade of the Cubs coming, but Baker won't be around to enjoy it if it does happen.

Bad Dusty

Base clogging: A few years ago in spring training, I asked Dusty about the importance of walks and on-base percentage.

His response lives in infamy.

"I think walks are overrated unless you can run," he said, just warming up. "If you get a walk and put the pitcher in a stretch, that helps, but the guy who walks and can't run, most of the time he's clogging up the bases for somebody who can run.

"Who have been the champions the last seven, eight years? Have you ever heard the Yankees talk about on-base percentage and walks? Walks help. They do help. But you aren't going to walk across the plate. You're going to hit across the plate. That's the school I come from."

And it's a school that should lose its federal funding. The more runners on base, no matter how they get there, the better a team's chances to score.

It's interesting to note, though, that Baker's Reds entered Monday leading the NL in walks and were fourth in OBP.

Enabling: In the middle of the 2004 season, Cubs players began feuding with TV announcers Chip Caray and Steve Stone. Instead of coming out and saying the focus should be on the field, Baker sat silent. (Later that season, he walked off a postgame show because of what he felt -- and in fairness some others agreed -- was unfair questioning.)

On a trip to Philly, Baker said, "You're either for us, or you're against us."

I asked him if Stone and Caray were for or against the Cubs.

He didn't answer.

The situation turned into a messy sideshow, becoming more magnified when the Cubs blew a wild-card lead and failed to make the playoffs. Caray and Stone were gone after that season, and Baker got a reputation, fair or unfair, as a manager who lets his clubhouse run wild.

Riding them hard: No one will ever be able to prove if Baker helped to hasten the injury woes of Cubs pitchers Mark Prior and Kerry Wood by running up pitch counts down the stretch in '03.

Wood steadfastly refuses to blame Baker, and most likely a series of factors led to the injuries both promising pitchers suffered.

But Baker seemed oblivious to the need to monitor the workloads of pitchers, saying things like, "When you're young, that's the time you work." That's contrary to ample evidence that young pitchers need to be monitored carefully.

If there's any consolation, Baker lately has talked of "pitch efficiency" with his Cincinnati Reds pitchers.

Maybe he's coming around.

Lineups: Lenny Harris leading off? Neifi Perez anywhere near the top of the order?

Enough said.