Notes

By BILL PLASCHKE

Oct. 11, 1998 12 AM PT

During the season, there was talk that this might be Indian Manager Mike Hargrove’s last.

Not because he was going to quit. No, believe it or not, because he was going to be fired for not doing more to inspire his players.

Two weeks into October, however, he is again the most popular man in town.

The locals are praising him for his work in Game 2 and 3 Indian victories in the ALCS.

He masterfully used six relievers in just the right spots to hold the Yankees scoreless over the final 5 1/3 innings of Game 2 . . . then replaced big-bat Jim Thome with pinch-runner Enrique Wilson at first base in the 12th.

Anybody else think Thome would have scored from first on a bunt?

“I don’t know how much of a roll I’m on,” Hargrove said in typically deadpan fashion. “I think a lot of times good players, obviously, will make decisions a lot easier to turn out right.”

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Bill Plaschke

Bill Plaschke, an L.A. Times sports columnist since 1996, is a member of the National Sports Media Hall of Fame and California Sports Hall of Fame. He has been named national Sports Columnist of the Year nine times by the Associated Press, and twice by the Society of Professional Journalists and National Headliner Awards. He is the author of six books, including a collection of his columns entitled “Plaschke: Good Sports, Spoilsports, Foul Balls and Oddballs.” Plaschke is also a panelist on the popular ESPN daily talk show, “Around the Horn.” He is in the national Big Brothers/Big Sisters Alumni Hall of Fame and has been named Man of the Year by the Los Angeles Big Brothers/Big Sisters as well as receiving a Pursuit of Justice Award from the California Women’s Law Center. Plaschke has appeared in a movie (“Ali”), a dramatic HBO series (“Luck”) and, in a crowning cultural moment he still does not quite understand, his name can be found in a rap song “Females Welcome” by Asher Roth.

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