THE ORIOLE WAY--PERFECT PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT
by Rick Benson (with bio info from Wikipedia)
Baseball in Baltimore is filled with many great players and memories. The ability to build and sustain a championship caliber team throughout much of the 60s through the 90s and again during the current Buck Showalter run is due to what became known as the Oriole Way. A lot of things go into play to make up the Oriole Way. It starts with baseball instruction being taught consistently throughout all levels of the organization. It continues with an unapologetic obsession with working on and executing the fundamentals. Not surprisingly, there was a tremendous amount of coaching continuity throughout the organization; even at the major league level where opportunities to manage with other teams elsewhere were often declined.
Also a long and distinguished list of baseball executives such as Paul Richards, Lee McPhail, Frank Cashen, Harry Dalton, Pat Gillick, Hank Peters, Larry Lucchino, Roland Hemond, Scott Malone, Frank Wren, Kevin Malone, Doug Melvin, Lee Thomas and Andy MacPhail all cut their teeth in the Orioles organization.
Long time Hall of Fame manager Earl Weaver spent twelve season managing in the minors before his 17-year sting with the Orioles. Weaver enjoyed tremendous continuity in his coaching staff, which deserved much credit for the team’s on-the-field success. Third base coach Billy Hunter logged 14 years in Baltimore before going on to manage the Texas Rangers for a year and a half before a 17 year run as Towson University’s baseball coach and athletic director. Pitching coach George Bamberger had 18 20-game winners during his ten seasons in Baltimore; including a record four in 1971. Bamberger had two more twenty game winners during two different stints with the Milwaukee Brewers and was replaced by Ray Miller; who had five more Orioles pitchers win at least 20 games under his tutelage—Mike Boddicker (20) in 1984, Scott McGregor (20) and Steve Stone (25) in 1980, Mike Flanagan (23) in 1979 and Jim Palmer (21) in 1978.
Catcher Elrod Hendricks served as bullpen coach after ending his playing his playing career in 1979 and held that position for 28 years before suffering a stroke and passing away in 2005. First base coach George Staller (nine seasons after six as a minor league scout) and Jim Frey (eight seasons after managing in the O’s farm system) rounded out the remainder of the early Oriole Way crew.
But perhaps the best embodiment of the Oriole Way was the father of baseball’s Iron Man; a man who spent 36 years in the Orioles organization as a player, a scout, a coach and manager---Cal Ripken Sr. Senior, as people throughout the organization respectfully called him, never worked for a different parent ball club. He was an Oriole through and through.
Ripken joined the Baltimore Orioles in 1957 as a minor league player. As a manager in the minor leagues for 13 years, Ripken won 964 games, and later compiled a 68-101 record managing the Orioles during the tough times on 1987 and 1988. Several of his students, including Jim Palmer, Eddie Murray, and most prominently his son Cal Jr., went on to Hall of Fame careers. In 1963, at the age of 27, he became a full-time manager with Fox Cities. From 1963 through 1974, he managed Fox Cities, Abderdeen (1963–64,66), the Tri-City Atoms (1965), the Miami Marlins (1967), the Elmira Pioneers (1968), Rochester (1969–70), the Dallas-Fort Worth Spurs (1971), and the Asheville Orioles (1972–74). As a manager in the minor leagues, Ripken oversaw the development of Palmer, Murray, and Rich Dauer, among other Orioles. In addition to normal coaching duties, he would also at times be responsible for driving the team bus, or even fixing it. During 1969–70, managing a Class AAA team, he would conduct baseball clinics for the Red Wings players. Cal Jr. would always listen to these; he found them "boring" but did learn some useful baseball skills in them. Although Ripken always considered Aberdeen, Maryland, his home during this period, he and his family lived all over the country as he moved from city to city. In 1975, Ripken served as a scout for the Orioles.
In 1976, Ripken finally reached the major leagues when the Orioles named him their bullpen coach. Halfway through 1977, he became the third base coach for the Orioles when Billy Hunter was hired to be the manager of the Texas Rangers. Ripken served in this role through the 1986 season. During this time, and even later when he became a manager, he would pitch batting practice and hit fungoes before games. He would be one of the last members of the team to leave after games. Ripken could be tough on the players he coached, enjoying using the term "lunkhead" when talking to them, but he would always make time to answer any questions they had about the game. Doug DeCinces, who played under him through the 1981 season, recalled, "He was the dictator of that regimen, instructing us on everything down to how to wear our socks. He said, `Take pride in your appearance and you'll take pride in your game. The Orioles experienced great success during this time, reaching the World Series in 1979, which they lost to the Pittsburgh Pirates in seven games. Four years later, Ripken earned a World Series ring as the Orioles won the 1983 World Series in five games over the Philadelphia Phillies.
In 1981, Ripken got to coach his own son as Cal Jr. reached the major leagues. He always downplayed the father-son relationship, saying in 1981 spring training, "There isn't any father-son relationship here. I managed 14 years in the minors, including 1967 right in Miami, and saw hundreds of kids. They're all my sons, more or less. On this field or on this club, my son is just another ballplayer to me. I have a job and a life and so does he."
Immediately following the 1986 season, Weaver retired for good, and Ripken was named manager of the Orioles. In 1987, Ripken became the first—and only—father to manage two sons simultaneously in the majors, as his son Billy was called up at the All-Star break. Ripken managed Cal Jr. and Billy for the first time on July 11, in a 2–1 loss to the Minnesota Twins. Ripken inherited an aging team with little help coming from the farm system, The Orioles finished sixth in the American League East at 67–95, setting a team record with 51 home losses.
Ripken stressed "patience" to begin the 1988 season, saying, "We can't just go from the bottom to the top in the snap of a finger.” But after the Orioles lost six consecutive games to begin the 1988 season, Ripken was fired. Several years later, he said, "It was very difficult to accept. I had been in the organization. I had worked my way up to the big leagues. I spent my life with the Orioles." The move "hurt" and "bothered" Cal Jr., but he worked through it and remained with the team for 13 more seasons, the rest of his career. Billy switched his number from 3 to 7, saying, "I just didn't want to see anybody else wear it.
Following the 1988 season, the Orioles again named Ripken their third-base coach. Speaking at the Annual Ripken Fan Club Banquet, general manager Roland Hemond said, "[1988] was a tough year for the Orioles, a tough year for me, and a tough year for the Ripken family. There was a lot of trauma, and I respected them for the way they handled it. I will never forget it." Brady Anderson, who would play for the Orioles from 1988 through 2001 and hit 50 home runs in 1996, credited Ripken for helping him make it with the Orioles: "I'll never forget earlier in my career how Cal Sr. stayed with me, trying to help me become a better player when it might not have been the fashionable thing to do within the organization. Ripken remained with the team until after the 1992 season, when he was removed from third-base coach duties as the Orioles wished to give younger coaches opportunities. The Orioles offered him the brand new position of coordinator of minor league field operations, but he declined, disappointed at being removed from third base. Ripken maintained that he was not retired, but he would never coach professionally again.
The Baltimore Sun wrote, "Most Baltimore fans couldn't define the term exactly, but they liked that it implied reverence for the sport and the skills needed to play it well." Hendricks, who kept in touch with Ripken throughout the years, said "He was baseball and baseball was him.” Sam Perlozzo, who like Ripken spent many years as a third base coach, said "When you were around him, you didn't say much. One reason was out of respect. The other was because you could learn from him, no matter how long you had been in the game." Since his death, no Oriole has worn Cal Sr.'s number 7, although the number has not been officially retired.
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