HOUSTON — For all of Darren Baker’s life, his father had chased a championship. That was Dusty Baker’s job, from San Francisco to Chicago to Cincinnati to Washington to Houston, and he all the time did it fairly effectively. He simply by no means received the ending proper.
The harshest got here in 2002 when Darren was a three-year-old bat boy, bawling in his father’s arms within the dugout after Recreation 7 of the World Collection in Anaheim, Calif. Now he’s a minor league infielder — a peer, of kinds, along with his well-known father. They by no means discuss what’s been lacking.
“It was unsaid,” Darren Baker mentioned on Saturday night time at Minute Maid Park. “Simply me form of being in the identical area, I perceive it. You don’t do that for every other purpose. I get it. The celebs form of need to line up so that you can win.”
The celebs, on this night time, have been massive and brilliant ultimately: Jose Altuve hustling to beat out a double-play grounder within the sixth inning, Jeremy Peña following with a single, Yordan Alvarez launching a 450-foot house run to present the Astros the lead in Recreation 6 of the World Collection.
When it was over, after proper fielder Kyle Tucker sealed a 4-1 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies by squeezing a pop fly in foul territory, Baker’s coaches swarmed him in a nook of the house dugout. The location of his crowning achievement — the primary title in 25 seasons as a significant league supervisor — got here simply steps away from the scene of the Astros’ disgrace.
It was there, simply down the steps and into the tunnel, the place the Astros banged on trash cans in 2017 to alert hitters, in actual time, to the kind of pitch that was coming. Baker had nothing to do with it; he was managing elsewhere. However the cleanup — the shattered status of the franchise, the stain on its solely championship — fell to Baker.
“When he got here right here in 2020, we had the entire dishonest scandal and we had Covid,” starter Lance McCullers Jr. mentioned. “He was a stabilizing pressure for us. I want we might have achieved it just a little bit sooner for him, however he actually deserved this.”
Baker, 73, is not only the oldest supervisor to win a World Collection. He’s older than each head coach who has ever received a Tremendous Bowl, an N.B.A. championship or a Stanley Cup. He has 2,093 victories within the common season, ninth on the profession record. Everybody with extra wins than Baker has a minimum of one championship.
“I’m completely satisfied now that he’s going to get his due,” mentioned the Corridor of Famer Reggie Jackson, an adviser to Astros proprietor Jim Crane. “He’s going to get some pats on the again and cross that bridge to get elected to the Corridor of Fame.”
Baker, who donated his World Collection jersey, wristbands and even toothpicks to the Corridor, wish to preserve managing — “If I win one, I’d as effectively win two,” he mentioned — and Crane mentioned after Recreation 6 that he would discuss with Baker early this week a couple of return. Baker has the gamers’ endorsement.
“Dusty Baker’s a legend within the sport,” mentioned Peña, the rookie shortstop who hit .400 to win the World Collection Most Beneficial Participant Award. “Not simply because he’s been round. He’s had success at this sport, he brings the perfect out of his gamers, he offers you the boldness to simply exit and play laborious and let the sport care for itself. You may’t ask extra of a supervisor.”
Baker has made a profession of inspiring loyalty. He spent 19 seasons as an outfielder, making two All-Star groups and serving to the Los Angeles Dodgers win the 1981 World Collection. As a supervisor, he has led all 5 of his groups to division titles, taking time to attach on a private degree with gamers, coaches and workers.
Rob Butcher, the media relations director for the Reds, flew to Houston simply so he might be within the stands to see Baker win a championship. He didn’t inform Baker he was coming, Butcher mentioned, however he felt compelled to be there and cried after the ultimate out.
“He’s received loads of associates, however I actually don’t suppose he is aware of how many individuals wished him to win this,” Butcher mentioned. “It’s lovely. He’s the particular person that you really want your father and grandfather to be, only a real, great human being — along with being the best particular person you’ll ever meet.”
Baker as soon as smoked a joint with Jimi Hendrix. He and a Dodgers teammate, Glenn Burke, invented the high-five. He wears wristbands along with his personal likeness. He has a winery at his house in Sacramento. Earlier than the World Collection, he received a good-luck message from Snoop Dogg.
In his teaching staffs, Baker mentioned, he values variety, so every participant has a coach with an identical background: “I all the time had an African-American dude, I all the time had a pair Latin dudes, I all the time had a complicated school dude, I all the time had some nation white dudes that they’ll go discuss to,” he mentioned.
Baker’s Houston workers is constructed that manner. However for years now, he has puzzled if he actually must preserve that design.
“I informed any person 10 years in the past that the way in which baseball was going — and I like my Latin brothers — however we weren’t going to want any African American coaches, actually,” Baker mentioned. “You’re going to want both white coaches or Latin-American coaches.”
Baker was referring to the fashionable demographics of baseball, which got here into sharp focus on this World Collection, the primary since 1950 and not using a single U.S.-born Black participant on both energetic roster.
A research in Could by the Institute for Range and Ethics in Sports activities, on the College of Central Florida, discovered that whereas Black gamers represented 18 p.c of M.L.B. rosters in 1991, the share had dwindled to 7.2 p.c initially of the 2022 season. Baker and the Dodgers’ Dave Roberts are the majors’ solely Black managers.
“We’re not doing an actual good job, however hopefully we’ll preserve speaking about it,” Baker mentioned. “I’ve been saying the identical factor for like 30, 40 years. I imply, how lengthy can I say the identical factor, you already know what I imply, earlier than the change goes to return?”
Baker mentioned he hoped to stay lengthy sufficient for baseball’s variety efforts on the newbie aspect to supply extra gamers within the majors. He has survived prostate most cancers and a stroke, and mentioned these scares had made him admire life and take higher care of himself.
“I’ve received two grandchildren now,” he mentioned. “I’ve received a son, 23. It made me need to seize the day and attempt to be productive day by day. After which one factor I hear my dad all the time telling me: ‘Attempt to do the best factor.’ And generally that’s robust, as a result of generally you need to do the egocentric factor. However the best factor, no matter that’s in your thoughts, that’s what I attempt to do.”
Within the dugout on Saturday, similar to hundreds of different days, Baker did the best issues to win a sport. This one, in fact, was not like all the remainder. This one took him to the highest, and there was nothing left unsaid.
“He’s like, ‘Ask me how I like that,’” Darren Baker mentioned. “And I mentioned, ‘You’re a champion,’ and he simply hugged me. It was superior.”
Scott Miller and James Wagner contributed reporting.