Buck Showalter talks managing in a pennant race, valuing MVP candidates, World Series favorites

00:00:10
Speaker 1: One of my favorite people in this great game of ours is the man joining us now on foul territory, Buck Showalter. I could listen to you talk baseball book at nauseum forever, and I appreciate you taking the time to be with us. It looks like you're home in Dallas. I don't know where you are, but it looks like you're home.

00:00:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, thanks for being so busy. I'm just so busy. Well, you could be a traveling man. I don't know, but this is the best time of year.

00:00:33
Speaker 1: It's the best time of year because postseason is upon us. But these final two weeks of the season can keep a manager, a general manager, a president of baseball offs up at night. Take us back to your prep time in this moment, what was the most difficult time. Let's say that you are a manager that has you're still not quite in the postseason yet, but you know you're going to get there.

00:00:55
Speaker 3: Well, you know, there's nothing tougher I think in baseball. Then closing now to that season, you know it's like that games just inch by and now you're watching every score.

00:01:05
Speaker 2: You try not to.

00:01:07
Speaker 3: It's really tough to close out a really good you've had this great season. Then all of a sudden, you just now it looks like you're going to make October. But you know that you have to finish the business because the math just doesn't do you know there.

00:01:20
Speaker 2: You know there's four different I say a lot, there's four ways you manage.

00:01:22
Speaker 3: You manage in spring train in a certain way, you manage the regular season a certain way, you manage in September a certain way, and then you manage a little differently in October with a sense of urgency.

00:01:33
Speaker 2: So it's uneasy.

00:01:36
Speaker 3: It is because the sense of urgency that you want to have to finish it off and never take anything for granted. While you've got a lot of people around you telling you how great you are. But you know, in a week's time you can be you know, a horse's rear.

00:01:52
Speaker 4: But if you are a good manager, can't you keep the team fresh and ready to go? Because it's all in the manager, right.

00:02:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know fresh? What is fresh?

00:02:02
Speaker 3: The last time you were fresh air was when you got out of the car in spring training.

00:02:06
Speaker 2: That's the last time.

00:02:07
Speaker 3: That's what people I used to talk to John Harball in Baltimore about. I said, you guys play once a week man with an off week. That's what people that haven't been in the arena don't get. What you know, you have different degrees of percentage. Nobody's one hundred percent. That's gone a long time ago. I told a player one time, I said, you know, you realize you're ninety percent. It's better than his one hundred percent. And it's just you have different And that's why the mentality and emotions are so important in a clubhouse, and people that haven't been in the arena just don't get it.

00:02:47
Speaker 2: For sure.

00:02:47
Speaker 4: For sure, what do we what do we? What do we need to see from teams that are eight games up, ten games up? Saying what you were talking about, Like everyone's told you the whole season you're so good, Like look at the Phillies. Yeah, I get it, they're trying for that number one seed. But what do we need to see from them as not as far as like Rob Thompson, but as far as a team, because you want to get guys those days off. I don't attribute to anything too many days off whatever, that's beautiful at the end of the season, But what do you need to see from them? If you're watching the game day in and day out.

00:03:29
Speaker 3: You know what's tough, Eric is you can have a physical day off, but I think you got to be careful about checking out mentally and emotionally for too long. You know, I think the help is what you're looking for people physically, but trying to mesh the emotional and mental sharpness and not lose that edge. That's why you see a lot of teams get hot and last and get in the last day or so and they carry it over and teams that have kind of turned off the faucet with the ten days two weeks to go have.

00:03:59
Speaker 2: A little trouble turn it back on.

00:04:02
Speaker 3: That's why, you know, the teams I like right now are the teams what plays a lot now all seasons. The guys that grind and put the ball in play. And you look at certain teams that don't strike out much, they're tough on starting pitchers. The great starting pitchers I've had, the sures Ers, the the Groms of Randy Johnson's, the Shillings, the guys that they hated were the guys that would foul off their pitches and make them do it again, Like they would rather face a guy that's going to strike out one hundred and seventy hundred and eighty times. They know if they make their pitches, he's out.

00:04:31
Speaker 2: Now.

00:04:32
Speaker 3: If they make mistake, the ball ends up where the grass doesn't grow. But they don't like facing as they called them the sand flees. Randy Johnson hated all these guys, I call them the Jeff rebel ays that would play against him, Randy Vallardi, Gerald Williams. These guys, I wouldn't say, wore him out. But he didn't care about the three and four hole hitters. He want to know about how do I get these eight to nine hole hitters out?

00:04:58
Speaker 2: Buck?

00:04:58
Speaker 5: How much is managing change without the forty man roster you mentioned September, but now they only have the twenty eight man roster. And you were a big frontponent of this. How much has it changed because you can't give guys day off anymore. You can't give guys you know, oh we so we clinched. Let's give guy three days off because you don't have the players to do it.

00:05:16
Speaker 2: That's a big change. Aga. That's a good point. The two players.

00:05:19
Speaker 3: You're taking a pitcher and maybe a position player, and you're really not impacting your club that much.

00:05:26
Speaker 2: Let's face it you go to in a double header, they give you another player.

00:05:31
Speaker 3: You know, I always felt like you should just stay with the twenty five or whatever.

00:05:35
Speaker 2: It takes away from.

00:05:36
Speaker 3: The general manager and the manager and a coaching staff that can manage their team and their roster. You know, we've kind of now it's kind of robotic. I mean, wait a minute, this guy, let's send him down. Get another arm up here. You know, a guy sent me a couple of weeks ago a playoff, I mean a roster from them. I think, I don't know. In the early eighties they had thirteen pitchers all year, all year. Well that was back when they had a long reliever or now, we're not going to get into back when they play. Nobody wants to hear that. But there's something different here. And the roster manipulation is something that goes on all year, but it.

00:06:14
Speaker 2: Is a big change now.

00:06:15
Speaker 3: It is a big change because a lot of clubs want to look at young players and get a feel for the off season.

00:06:21
Speaker 2: But you really can't do it that much anymore.

00:06:23
Speaker 1: Managers have so much more responsibility book, you know better than anybody than just writing in a lineup. I mean, you have to manage personalities, and you have to be a psychiatrist and a psychologist and a counselor and all of the things. And I really believe managers have special relationships with players. How do you value if you had to vote on a most Valuable player, how do you value that player? Because it's not just about the statistics, which is what we're doing right now with Aaron Judge and Cal Rawly, But how do you make a decision over the one of those guys?

00:06:54
Speaker 3: Well, I do because I've got to vote, and I want to get into who I'm voting with, but it's just Player of the year, not an MVP of each league. And I got to tell you I'm leaning towards Raleigh because of the position he changed he plays, And I'm getting around your question with he's you know, won a Gold Glub last year.

00:07:11
Speaker 2: He's a plus defensive catcher.

00:07:13
Speaker 3: AJ can answer that better because some of the people that win gold Gloves aren't necessarily great. The fender the way they evaluated don't get me started. So but he you know, my question is would Aaron Judge do the things he's doing offensively? Was he was catching? I think it's one hundred and thirteen games as of today. You know, would he, you know, be able to handle a pitching staff, would he be able to throw runners out with gear on? Would he be able to do the same thing in a very pitcher friendly ballpark? Would he be able to do the same thing if he was traveling like the Seattle Mariners have to travel maybe the worst travel in all of baseball. I try to look at all those factors that play into to the value of a player. And he's also having an historical that I don't know if anybody will ever match again.

00:08:02
Speaker 2: But you know, Judging is a great player.

00:08:04
Speaker 3: I mean, you can make a case for him, and Schwarber's having a great year, and of course Otani, But.

00:08:12
Speaker 2: I don't know.

00:08:13
Speaker 3: There's a lot of ways, a lot of as you well know, that you impact a club. One of the ways, when I'm looking at a player in off season, I go, will he make his teammates better?

00:08:23
Speaker 2: I'm putting him on our roster.

00:08:25
Speaker 3: And you can ask a lot of people that have had him the year before and make the right phone calls. I'm not so sure the phone calls are being made, because sometimes the phone call is getting away of a pure analytical study if you throw a little crimp in the plans because of something that a clubby or a parking attendant, or a teammate or an ex coach may tell you.

00:08:48
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00:09:14
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00:09:39
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00:09:49
Speaker 5: Hey Buck, That's why I never want any gold gloves because you wouldn't vote for me. You were too busy looking at the analytics.

00:09:54
Speaker 2: So it's cool.

00:09:55
Speaker 5: Not only did you never hire me as a player, you also never voted for me for a gold glove.

00:09:59
Speaker 2: So I get it.

00:10:00
Speaker 5: Good school, It's fine.

00:10:01
Speaker 2: It's under the next you duck me. That's okay.

00:10:06
Speaker 3: I tried, and that your agent kept telling you that you didn't want to play in New York.

00:10:11
Speaker 2: I'm kidding. You would have could have played anywhere.

00:10:13
Speaker 5: I would have come back and played for you in New York. But the last few years, I would have had a great time. I would have caught twenty games on one knee, Buck, I would have been the best twenty game player of all time.

00:10:24
Speaker 2: Oh, don't get me going, all right?

00:10:25
Speaker 3: You know, have you shut a j I want to talk to you about catch your interference.

00:10:30
Speaker 2: There's a there's a team that has nine of them this year.

00:10:33
Speaker 3: And I just they're a team that's lost three games this year because of catcher interference, and I.

00:10:38
Speaker 2: Just don't get it.

00:10:40
Speaker 3: I don't get how if you're teaching something that leads to catch your interference, you're teaching it wrong. Okay, catch your interference. The other day a guy had a guy buried one, two, and the ninth in it, and catch your interference led to them basically losing the game. I know what I would tell as the catching instructor and the player. I know what I would ask them, you know what what's going on here? And what do you think?

00:11:02
Speaker 2: AJ? What is that all? Back?

00:11:03
Speaker 4: Back up?

00:11:04
Speaker 5: I think I had one catcher's interference in my career, and it was when Placido Polanco threw the bat on a pitch out and it hit me and I got called for catchers interference. I'm like, how is that catcher's interference? He threw the bat at me, But that's a different thing. But back up, who is the umpire?

00:11:20
Speaker 2: Who's the umpire? I don't know.

00:11:22
Speaker 5: I actually don't remember who the umpire was because I didn't get ejected, which I'm just shocking.

00:11:27
Speaker 4: I don't remember, but.

00:11:29
Speaker 5: I was like, I didn't know that was a rule. If he lets the bat go and it hits me, So why don't I just pick a bat up and chuck it at the first basement. If it hits him, I get first. That'd be awesome, right. If I'm in two strikes, just throw my bat backwards like that'll work.

00:11:42
Speaker 2: Umpires wrong there. I wish i'd have been there.

00:11:45
Speaker 5: Well anyways, anyways, But yes, catchers interference is a thing because they try to get too close and they try to steal that low strike right back up. You got to only got to back up a few inches. It's not like you're backing up a couple of feet. Back up a couple of inches and you can still steal it. But all the catchers reach out so far.

00:12:01
Speaker 2: Now, poor can't happen. Can't happen.

00:12:08
Speaker 4: It's because Bucket's because the people that it's because the people that created this style of catching have never lost a season or not made the playoffs by one game. They've never lost the play that one last playoff game by one run because they don't see the value in that one single run that could have been prevented had you just scooted back. They don't see it. They haven't been in the trenches. It's hard to it's hard to. It's hard to tell them that. And those are the people that are dominating that discussion and they find value in it.

00:12:43
Speaker 2: Did you guys, Alana, Eric, Eric and aj did you guys see it? In the sixth inning, last now of the Padre game?

00:12:50
Speaker 3: Someone sent it to me uh Man on second I believe, two outs, long single to right field. Arah sits it over there and the catcher's running its second. Not that he's necessarily glow, but most catchers are well manny Man. He's the own deck hitter, and we used to talk from spring training about the own deck hitterer having to relay a sense of urgency to the runner. I know as a third base coach when a guy comes around, you know there's a play on a trail runner. You're going through the plate, through the plate, through the plate. And this guy was kind of jogged in the last three steps and the run they didn't ross got thrown out at second and they didn't get the run by half a step and that's that. Last night, it didn't bite them. But those those are the things that Eric is talking about. The little you know, one half a foot that kept them from scoring a run.

00:13:36
Speaker 2: They didn't.

00:13:37
Speaker 3: They didn't allow the run because the rout was made a second you know, the own deck kitterer has a job to do, and Manny knows that.

00:13:43
Speaker 2: I'm surprised he was taught.

00:13:45
Speaker 4: He was clearly not taught properly when he first got called up by his manager. So maybe maybe that's what it was. It wasn't Manny's fault. His manager when he was a rookie exactly didn't didn't drill it into him all right as a manager.

00:14:00
Speaker 5: It happened in the Braves game last night too, the Braves game yesterday. I don't know why Zuno tried to go to third, but actually the the guy who was running was the I forget who was on deck. It might have been PROFI was like, hurry. He was actually telling him to hurry up, and he missed it by you know, a foot too. But I don't know why it was. If you want you so crazy, shouldn't.

00:14:18
Speaker 3: Have gone, remember you and Eric, you remember how that used to be taken care of in the clubhouse when that guy got back to the dugout or in the clubhouse. Oh my god, that was my RB. I just think I could have been your rb I, your grett to your.

00:14:33
Speaker 5: Moment, right yep, go Nope, never have it either. I could't go to the Hall of Fame if it wasn't for that one rb I, you.

00:14:45
Speaker 4: Know, and Dieter wouldn't have had the moment had you not brought Evan Meek in the game. Buck, But anyway, we're gonna we're gonna move on to show Hao Tani. Show Hao Tani kind of insinuated that, you know what, we're having to discussions about possibly playing the outfield in the postseason, possibly throwing out bullpen, like they're saying they're discussing everything. Would you, as a manager have enough trust to put somebody one out of the bullpen, which he's never done in the big leagues. Two go catch some fly balls in the outfield in the playoffs in the playoffs, which he's never done.

00:15:23
Speaker 3: Also, that's a good question, you know, without us being there and knowing him like they know him, and Dave Roberts is obviously a great, very good manager and knows his players. I've been saying for a couple of years when people ask me about Otani.

00:15:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always thought that.

00:15:42
Speaker 3: I would d h him and make him the closer where he hits for eight innings and that way he could impact your game every night as a hitter and a pitcher. And I think he would be a really good closer. You know, we talked about that with Zach Britton years ago and Jim Johnson. You know, a lot these teams that are searching for a closer, they need to just start looking at their starters in the minor leagues and develop one. You can't do that, but I've always thought, and then today I see something about him maybe pitching out of the bullpen. I said, well, geez, there's a novel thought. But you know, the rules and with the d H and putting him in the game and all the other stuff make it very uh, you know, attractive to make him a closer.

00:16:25
Speaker 2: I mean, what do you guys think it can't happen.

00:16:29
Speaker 4: No, it can't happen. Alana would cry if something would happen to her show Hey. But you also can't do it because because if something happened, you don't you don't want to lose show Hey in the game and then he has to come up and hit in the tenth. We don't have the zombie runner at second base anymore. I don't think it's if.

00:16:48
Speaker 1: There is one person that could probably do it just based on talent alone at show he Tani. But I still don't want him out there. I don't want him coming out of the bullpen. I don't want him in the outfield.

00:16:59
Speaker 3: No, Well, let me ask you, a lon, what's more of a physical risk him pitching past the fifth inning or closing one inning a game?

00:17:07
Speaker 2: About every three.

00:17:08
Speaker 1: Days pitching past the fifth inning.

00:17:12
Speaker 2: So that's what he's doing now, So you're actually doing him a favor.

00:17:16
Speaker 1: But they're not letting him go past five right now, Buck, They took him out. He had no hitter through five, and they yanked him because they didn't want him to the sticking to that script.

00:17:25
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you know when that script breaks and the teleprompter doesn't work anymore, that's when you get to really see some interesting things.

00:17:35
Speaker 4: Buck, Who is it? Who are the best teams? And you're watching who do you think is going to be facing off in the World Series? And you can't, I checked, you can't pick two National League teams to face off in the World Series.

00:17:48
Speaker 3: Well, I know who I like and pull for a little bit because I love how Toronto's doing it. They're a pain for a pitcher. They grind every you know, they don't strike out much. They put the ball in play. They they're fun to watch. I like the Brewers. I think the type of game they play plays in the off season.

00:18:07
Speaker 2: Now.

00:18:08
Speaker 3: I also like the Padres from that standpoint, I think they're another team if they just get in. You know, once you get that monkey off your back of just getting in, there's a certain relief and uh but you know, how do you keep that edge? I think Toronto's for real, and everybody kept thinking, you know, they wouldn't be able to hold on. Guess what, At every turn, they're answering a lot of questions, you know. I know Chris Bassett, I know Max Shurser, I know Kevin Gosman. I mean, these guys they're competitive. They're baseball players that happen to be pitchers. There's a lot of pitchers that are just baseball players because they're on the team, so to speak. But these guys are baseball players who happen to be pitchers. And I mean you would play in a sandlot with them.

00:18:52
Speaker 2: So I like where they are.

00:18:54
Speaker 3: I like the Brewers and the game they play. I think it plays in a in a series. They just grimed on you too much. And I think the Padres a little bit of a sleeper too. I don't think people understand how good they're pitching.

00:19:07
Speaker 2: It is at times.

00:19:10
Speaker 5: It's because you're like a lot of your You're you're like a homer for Manny Machado like Alana is for the Dodgers.

00:19:16
Speaker 2: So we get it.

00:19:17
Speaker 5: It's okay, we get that's why you like the Padres.

00:19:21
Speaker 2: We totally understand. Okay.

00:19:23
Speaker 5: So I'm sitting here in Cincinnati before I let you go, and there's one, two, three players out here with no shirt on, no shoes, just shorts, just walking around the outfield. Is that something that you had ever seen when you're managerial days of just guys walking in the outfield with basically nothing, no clothes on except shorts.

00:19:42
Speaker 2: Let me ask you a question. Are they barefoot?

00:19:46
Speaker 5: All they have on shorts?

00:19:50
Speaker 3: You know, Adam Autovino told me that sold me on that he would go out and walk barefoot.

00:19:55
Speaker 2: Can y'all explain me that whole thing?

00:19:57
Speaker 1: Because Autumn is operating on a different level called grounding. It's like supposed to be this like natural sensation of your feet touching the grass, and it's supposed to give you like some sort of healing and and all of the things some like like voodoo.

00:20:14
Speaker 3: Okay, is that the same thing these these guys on the PGA tour they're putting and they have to walk the line and feel it in their feet.

00:20:22
Speaker 4: That's a that's actually something they're actually feeling.

00:20:25
Speaker 1: It the slope of the of the you know, here's that's aim point.

00:20:33
Speaker 4: That's a point book.

00:20:35
Speaker 2: Okay. I'm just trying to you know.

00:20:37
Speaker 4: That's what.

00:20:38
Speaker 5: Hey, that's what That's what one of your good friends does sometimes, except Demark might go forward with him.

00:20:43
Speaker 4: I don't know.

00:20:43
Speaker 2: I'm just saying these Shambeau.

00:20:48
Speaker 4: I got.

00:20:50
Speaker 3: I got a conversation with him the other day. He's a beauty. I love the guy. He doesn't really care what you think if you don't like the way he goes about golf, and hey, that's okay. I'm I'm okay with it. But anyway, you know, the whole thing in the outfield whatever, who cares? There's enough battles that are more important. Who really cares? I mean, you know all the stuff about you know, I basically had to enforce stuff that owners wanted enforce.

00:21:14
Speaker 2: That's what people miss, you know. Stein Mary was one way.

00:21:17
Speaker 3: Colancelo was similar, so was Peter Angelo's Tom Hicks the owners.

00:21:22
Speaker 2: You know.

00:21:22
Speaker 3: Last the first time I really got to an owner that kind of didn't care was uh was that was Steve Cohen. So basically, as a manager, you're just enforcing the rules that the manager that the owner wants. You don't like them, You're not working.

00:21:37
Speaker 1: What's the weirdest thing that somebody made you enforce that You're like, this is a non issue. You don't have to say the manager, but like, this is a non issue, Like what are we doing? Like this is the this is what is on the top of your mind.

00:21:50
Speaker 2: I got to tell you.

00:21:50
Speaker 3: One of the keys this is going to sound crazy line, one of the keys to turn it around a little bit in Baltimore was when I got Peter Angelo's to Okay, y'all gonna think I'm crazy, But when I walked in and I talked to him about important it was to the players and whatever. You know, if it's important to the players, that better be important to us, I told him, And rather or not, we were just because we were brought up a certain way.

00:22:15
Speaker 2: It shouldn't matter. I mean.

00:22:16
Speaker 3: And when I walked into clubhouse and told them that we could have trimmed, well manicured goates, you have thought that I had delivered the holy grail. Oh my gosh, there's a new sheriff in town.

00:22:29
Speaker 2: Now.

00:22:30
Speaker 3: The problem now is what is a neat well trimmed I mean. Marqukus's beard would grow. You could hear it grow. He had to shave twice a day. I mean, he goes, Buck, I shaved this morning. What are you talking about? And I would always have the players police it, and it was a little bit better that way.

00:22:52
Speaker 1: Always a pleasure.

00:22:53
Speaker 2: Buck. We love Yes, thanks for being here. All right, y'all make it simple. It's baseball, okay, more I would do it some blurring