ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, April 7, 1996 TAG: 9604090010
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: Jack Bogaczyk
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
The tools of ignorance? Hardly.
The derisive description for a catcher's equipment lies. Joe Garagiola and Bob Uecker went from behind the plate to behind the mike. The top three analysts for the Fox Network's entrance to baseball this summer? Tim McCarver, Bob Brenly and Jeff Torborg were catchers.
This isn't just dumb luck. Dugouts are populated with managers who once wore the mask and more, a fact that hits very close to home as Salem begins its 45th season of professional baseball Monday night, when the Avalanche may see a blizzard at Memorial Stadium.
Bill McGuire, the Avalanche's new skipper, was a catcher, as was Bill Hayes, last year's first manager from the Colorado system, and Trent Jewett the year before for the final Buccaneers summer. Stan Cliburn managed here in 1990 and '91. He was a catcher, as was the '92 manager, John Wockenfuss.
Six of the seven seasons in the '90s, the Salem skipper has been a former catcher. This season, six of the eight Carolina League managers are former members of the shinguards set, most of them backup backstops who spent as much time in the bullpen as in the dugout.
McGuire had a couple of cups of Starbucks in Seattle in 1988 and '89, then took a couple of years to find his future. He may have been nicknamed ``Moose'' with the Mariners and he may be in the Rockies' chain, but he's got a lot more between the ears than Bullwinkle.
``The reason I think you see so many catchers become managers is that the catcher is pretty much an assistant coach on the field,'' McGuire said a few days ago when the Avalanche arrived for its second Salem season. ``He's the guy closest to the manager. He's the one the manager is communicating with, the guy the pitcher is communicating with, the guy the pitching coach is communicating with.
``One other thing: He's the only one on the field who sees everybody. He watches everybody work, and he can tell what everyone on the field is doing.
``A catcher also is closest to the pitcher. Some catchers become pitching coaches, and I was a pitcher in college [at Nebraska], but I'd be an idiot to try to tell Champ [Avalanche pitching coach Billy Champion] how to do his job. Still, because I was a catcher, I do think that allows Champ and I to work closer together than if I hadn't been a catcher.''
McGuire always has been one of those players and managers who got to the ballpark about noon for a night game. He'd sit and ask and listen, then he'd either sit on his haunches behind the plate or sit in the bullpen and watch some more. He was like another important piece of equipment to a catcher - a sponge.
``I've had good managers and some not so good,'' said McGuire, 32. ``I've seen things done one way or another way, and maybe both ways work, but you pick out what you think will work for you, and then you go with it. You ask questions, not second-guessing, not why did you do it, but give me a situation and then explain your way through it.''
Those who played for McGuire with the Rockies' South Atlantic League farm club in Asheville, N.C., last summer say he's a skipper who wants to win with a dose of discipline, who wants things done properly. That, McGuire said, was a different time and a different place.
``There might be some things I'm not so lenient toward now that I was more lenient toward last year,'' McGuire said. ``This is a higher level. This is called `advanced Class A.' This is where you either go to Double A or you go home. Period. Some may say that's pressure. No, that's reality.''
McGuire said he doesn't ``take losing very well,'' which could make for an interesting summer with a franchise that has a glamorous new ballpark, but also has 15 consecutive losing half-seasons in the Carolina League.
Here's another reason so many catchers make good managers: They're tough.
Not long into this preseason conversation, one of the Avalanche stepped out of the dugout, heading toward center field, where the Salem players and staff were having their photos taken for the team program and the local newspapers. McGuire called to the player, who turned.
``Lose the earring,'' McGuire said.
``Which one?'' the player asked.
``Both of them,'' the manager said.
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: (headshot) McGuire. color.by CNB