Rose Has Winning Look as Manager

When Pete Rose the player talks about Pete Rose the manager, he often harkens back to his early days with the Cincinnati Reds and Sparky Anderson.

“There was one thing I learned from Sparky, and it was very important,” Rose says. “Everyone on the team is an individual. You don’t treat Dave Concepcion like Dave Parker. You don’t treat Dave Parker like Tony Perez.

“Some guys need to be kicked in the butt, some need to be patted on the back and some need to be left alone.”

In his first full season as the Reds’ player-manager, Rose has drawn the spotlight more for his achievements on the field than in the dugout. His pursuit of Ty Cobb’s all-time record of 4,191 hits has overshadowed a successful and promising managerial career.

In August 1984, after a 5 1/2-year absence, Rose returned to Cincinnati, where he grew up and where he played the first 16 years of his 23-year career. He walked into a mess.

The Reds had finished last in 1982 and ‘83, losing as many as 101 games in ’82. Personnel was in disarray, and his predecessor, Vern Rapp, had left a legacy of unhappy and confused ballplayers. (Anderson, by then, was managing the Detroit Tigers, having left the Reds after the 1978 season along with Rose, who joined the Phillies).

Rose took over on Aug. 16, and the Reds finished with a 19-22 record, fifth in the National League West.

“What managing boils down to--other than handling people--is nine innings of situations,” Rose says. “When a situation comes up, you just have to pick the right guy for it.”

It is a job for which Rose has been preparing himself all his career. A devoted student of the game, he took advantage of every opportunity to learn its intricacies.

“Wherever I played, 16 years in Cincinnati, five in Philadelphia and half a season with Montreal, I always thought like a manager,” Rose says. “I just wasn’t making the decisions.

“When I was with the Phillies, and I wasn’t playing, I used to stand next to the Pope (then-Manager Paul Owens), and ask him a lot of questions,” Rose says. “I figured if nothing else, he’d want to get rid of me, so he’d put me in the lineup. It was the same with Bill Virdon in Montreal. We always talked about managing.”

While in the field, it is often impossible for Rose to make all the split-second decisions required of a manager, but he has help there, too. Coach George Scherger, whose minor league managerial experience dates back to 1947, is constantly at Rose’s side in the dugout. And Jim Kaat, the 25-year major league veteran, handles pitchers.

“Pete has done a great job of managing this year, and he’s got some very good coaches surrounding him,” says Reds third baseman Wayne Krenchicki. “When he’s out there playing, he can’t worry about everything, like when to start warming up a pitcher. But Kaat’s good at that. When it comes time to make a change, all Pete has to do is look down at the bullpen and decide who he wants.

“And Scherger does that with the guys on the bench. He lets them know when they might have to pinch hit or go into a game.

“Of course, Pete has the last say on all those things, but usually the players are already available to him,” Krenchicki says.

Dave Parker, the team’s RBI leader, says Rose has “the potential to be an excellent manager when he can put 100% into it. It’s hard to be a player and a manager at the same time, but he and George share it.”

Parker says Rose has developed a great rapport with the players. “He shows them he’s willing to go the extra mile,” Parker says. “That part of the job he’s got well in hand.”

Rose would have it no other way. While some managers chose to remain aloof from players, Rose says he can’t operate that way. He wants the players to be his friends, and if that doesn’t work out, “well, maybe I’m not such a good manager.”

“Parker calls me dad, and Gary Redus and some of the other guys sometimes kid him. ‘Why don’t you give him a big kiss?’ they say. Like Dave Parker needs to try to get on the good side of me.”

Still, Rose says he knows his players “respect the things I’ve done in baseball. And I can never remember playing on a team where a guy didn’t like me.”

Krenchicki calls Rose a “very easy-going” manager. “He wants you to play hard and enjoy it. It makes it easier to give 110% if you’re having fun. We really haven’t had too much fun around here the last three years,” he said.

Some of Rose’s players have expressed fear that the attention surrounding his Cobb chase may have a draining effect on him. But neither Krenchicki nor Tony Perez, one of Rose’s closest friends, see any detrimental effects, and Parker thinks it has been good for the team.

“From the very first day of the season and every time we go into a new town, there’s a tremendous amount of media pressure,” Krenchicki says. “It’s the Pete Rose story in St. Louis and San Francisco and on and on and on. But there has always been this kind of pressure on him. He knows how to get the job done.”

Perez, a longtime teammate on the powerhouse Reds teams of the 1970s, also says it’s been exciting. “Every time he gets another hit closer, I’m just like everybody else. I can’t wait to see him get the hit and break the record. It’s been a lot of fun.”

Parker says the record “actually has been a good diversion for the club. We’re going down the stretch, trying to catch the Dodgers, and I think’s it’s been easier to go out and approach the game.”

A great deal has been made of Rose’s “Charlie Hustle” image and the motivational effect it might have on the club. Some of it is true, but Rose is no “rah-rah” manager.

“He treats us like grown men,” Parker says. “He knows his job, and we know ours. The fact that Pete does everyday what he has done through two decades turns other players on automatically.

“Pete’s really a dollars and cents type of guy,” he said. “If you want to get something out of the game, you’ve got to put something into it. And frankly, a lot of guys have chosen to play this game for what they can get out of it.”

There are two theories in managing that Rose discards. One is that the toughest part of the job is showing players their roles, and the other is that great players make lousy managers.

“I’ve always heard the toughest thing is to get guys to know their role,” Rose says. “That’s not tough. The toughest part is getting them to accept it.”

As for having one managerial strike against him already as a great player, Rose says: “My philosophy on players with great careers who don’t become good managers is this: If you look at Frank Robinson, for example, then you have to look at the teams he had. He never had very good players. I had good players, they just weren’t playing good when I came here.”

Rose believes the turnaround came partly as a result of his work ethic. But he also recognized that the players weren’t having any fun. They weren’t even allowed a television set in the clubhouse or a case of beer on plane flights.

“I can’t see the harm in a television set in the clubhouse. If I want the players to get to the park early, how can I expect them to sit around and do nothing in the clubhouse? Now, if the game comes on and they’re watching ‘Guiding Light’ or ‘Days of Our Lives,’ the TV comes out.

“As for the beer, what harm can it possibly do to have 24 beers for 25 guys? These are adults. Now, if we had a case of beer for one guy, that’s different.

“I’ve got men here who make $2 million, and I can’t treat them like kids.”

At least, Rose says, he hasn’t had to deal with drug abuse on his team.

“I don’t worry about it,” he said. “If there’s a guy in my clubhouse or a guy on the team with a problem, then I worry about it. But I can honestly say I’ve never seen anybody do drugs, and you can tell when they’re on that stuff. I’m not an expert, but you see them getting to the ballpark late, they hit the ball and run to third base, things like that.”

Rose says if he spotted a problem, his first concern would be for the individual.

“I would concern myself with anything that would make the team not play as good,” Rose says. “That could be anything. . . . But if it did happen, it would be happening to a friend of mine, and you try to help a friend with a problem.”