ACUTV proudly presents
On Campus with your host, ACU
Vice president and dean of campus life,
Dr. Gary McCaleb.
Here's Gary.
On campus today, we're pleased to welcome
Bill Gilbreth, Abilene in and former
professional baseball player.
We'll be talking about the recent
baseball season in retrospect, as
well as the opening of the World Series,
which begins this weekend.
Bill, thank you for being with us today.
My pleasure.
This has been an interesting season for a
number of reasons.
The Texas Rangers
gained some additional attention.
Nolan Ryan had some
outstanding performances.
I'd like to talk about those and some
interesting disappointments with a team
like the World Series champion last year,
the Los Angeles Dodgers not ever
even being in contention throughout the
year. And then as we get
on in the discussion, we'll talk about
your observations of the four
teams that did win their divisions
and in the league championship chip
series and then the
the anticipation of the upcoming series.
But first of all, you actually spent
about seven years in
professional baseball yourself
with the Detroit Tigers and the
California Angels organization.
I think it'd be helpful as we talk, as
we think about baseball and we watch
baseball games on television and
an almost become accustomed
to the level of performances
that we see on the field.
But how did you find
from the standpoint of competitive
level of performance in collegiate
baseball, which you played, and then
into a farm system and minor league
level of performance, and
then in the major leagues,
were you able to actually see a different
level of performance in those?
Most of it comes from experience.
You know, in college ball, you face
maybe four or five
hitters that are really outstanding
hitters, and then once you get down to
the bottom of the lineup, they're not
quite as good going
into
my first year pro ball.
You found that you had not only a
Greg Luzinski or a Caesar Sedano
or somebody like that, but on
down the line in the batting order.
They were just as good hitters are,
probably could do some different things
that those guys could do.
So the level of
I try and tell these guys that I work
with here in the high schools that
the older they get and the higher they
play, it's not so much more of a
gaining and physical ability, but gaining
in mental ability.
And that can make the big difference.
That's the difference that I saw.
I know that when you were pitching for
the Detroit Tigers, you had an
opportunity to pitch against the New York
Yankees and win
a game against the New York Yankees.
I think in a lot of young men's
childhood dreams growing up, the idea
of ever being able to go on the mound
against the New York Yankees would be
about as close to the fulfillment of
that dream of baseball as
anything.
Can you remember what it
was like that day on the mound and and
what happened in that game?
That you're right, because,
you know, the Yankees I grew up, the
Yankees and the Dodgers were the,
you know, my so-called team because
Mickey Mantle, Whitey Ford and Sandy
Koufax and and here I
was playing with some of those guys that
I had seen on TV or against them.
And fortunately,
the night that I threw against them,
I couldn't do anything wrong.
And
bouncing along about the seventh inning
and I had a shutout going and
two hitter and, you know, and Norm
Cash walks over to me.
And Thurman Munson, who is now
who had died in a plane crash several
years back, was the captain of the
Yankees. And he was coming up to bat.
And I'll never forget Norm was from
here in Texas.
And and he walked over and
said, now this guy's a dead
low ball hitter.
Don't throw him, you know, a low
fastball.
And by that time, my head had nearly
gotten so swelled up that, you know, I
thought I could do about anything.
And I threw him a low fastball and
it went out of the ballpark.
So I turned around to him
and he just started laughing, you
crazy left hander.
So it was a big
thrill. And playing in Yankee Stadium
and seeing those monuments of Babe
Ruth and Joe DiMaggio and
Lou Gehrig, you know, that's that's
something.
After your time with the Tigers, you also
with the California Angels.
And during that time,
they had a pitching staff
that even in retrospect, was
even after several years have gone by
to it was the time that
Nolan Ryan was on the pitching staff,
Tanana Bill Singer,
who used to live with the Dodgers, a guy
named Clyde Wright who had thrown a no
hitter. What was it like to
be a part of a pitching staff
with guys like that working out with
them, pitchers throwing
together and doing things like that?
Well, at the time, Nolan
had just come over with from
the Mets and he really
had not, you know, really got
started the way he is now and how
he's recognized now.
Bill Singer was probably the most
established pitcher on the team,
and then Frank Tanana was a rookie that
year. And arrogant,
cocky, you know, he could he could
really throw the ball.
So we had I learned a lot
from watching Nolan, especially
because of his work habits and how he
approached the game.
Hey, took care of himself,
how the little fundamental things that he
did physically enabled
him to throw a ball 100 miles an hour.
Hmm.
When when you get a group of pitchers at
that level of ability,
is there a constant sense of
competitiveness between the pitchers
or do they work together?
And is there a spirit of camaraderie at
Detroit?
I was 21 or 22
and the next youngest guy was like
28 or 29
in there.
I was just a young upstart, you know,
who happened to be doing fairly well.
And the pitchers did not associate
much. Well, the whole team, for that
matter, it was more of an individual type
deal alkaline,
who's now in the Hall of Fame.
He stayed to himself.
Some of these other guys stayed to them
selves. And you just didn't especially
me as a young person didn't go in
and, you know, buddy buddy up
with him. Whereas in California, most
of the guys were basically the same age
and there was a lot more
team oriented
at.
Very different from Detroit.
When when you are when
you realize there is a I guess almost
in a sense that day to day
competitiveness from the standpoint
of continuing to earn your spot on
the roster, are
you aware and were you aware that other
players was
there a constant thought of
being sent down
for a bad performance or and
what was the relationship between the
players and management
from that standpoint?
The big thing I noticed on that
was coming out of here and being
team oriented.
You get up there and it's everybody
for himself and you find yourself looking
in the sporting news or the newspaper and
saying, I hope this lefthanded
pitcher goofs up in Detroit
or wherever you might be if he's ahead
of you, I hope he goofs up so
that I get the opportunity to take his
place.
And you really lose a lot of that team,
you know, camaraderie that you have
in high school or college.
And matter of fact, I got reprimanded one
time because I can hit a home run
against Kansas City.
And we won the game and I started clap
and one guy said, hey, that's high school
stuff.
Don't do that.
You better take care of yourself for your
own team.
That's right.
Hmm, from the standpoint
of this particular
season, when you look back over
baseball today, do you see, first of all,
any particular differences
in levels of performance or what's
happening today in baseball from from
the time when you were up playing?
Well, the biggest difference, number one,
is the money situation.
My first year in the big leagues in
Detroit, Alkaline had played
20 years without playing a single day
in the minors.
He's now in the Hall of Fame and he had
just signed one hundred thousand dollars.
Now you've got guys that
can't even compare to what Alkaline
did, and they're making four
and five hundred thousand, you know, met
220.
And that's considered a, you know,
a good negotiating factor for their
next year's contract.
So the salary factor
is a lot better.
However, on the other side,
the conditioning factors and things
like that are entirely different.
We learn from the Puerto Ricans and the
Venezuelans who
went back to those countries
and played year round.
They came to spring training and they
were already in shape.
Whereas before it had been you go down
to spring training and you work yourself
in shape, you can't do that
anymore.
But baseball is really a long season,
isn't even as it is going to spring
training in late February, early March
and the season that extends all
the way into October.
Are you saying that it's it's still
important to use November and December
and January
continuing to play?
That's more important than the risk of
burnout or injury or anything,
arrest or recuperation?
It's a 12 month thing.
It's really important because I noticed
yesterday on the sports news
that the year Mohun
Hernandez with Detroit.
Had signed a contract with the
senior baseball league, which is
over thirty five, to go
play this this summer,
to work himself back into shape, to
try and go back and make the Detroit team
so and these guys from
Venezuela and Puerto Rico, you see Ruben
Sierra and those guys that go
down there and play all winter, they
come back and they're ready to go from
day one
in the idea of a season.
Are you. Is there a sense of pacing
yourself through that season and not
in other words, how does a person
continue to get themselves up to the very
high, highest level of performance
day after day, week after week
for that long of a season?
That's that's the big thing I was talking
about a while ago, is it's just
like you coming up here to your job or
may go into my job or anybody
else every day.
You mentally prepare yourself to go out
there in front of 50, 60000
people who might like you or
might not like you.
And that's the tough part in surviving
and in any professional
sport.
And
there are two or three little things we
hear talked about that relate to
what's happened recently in baseball.
For example, for a long
time, the Chicago Cubs played only day
games.
They just put lights in and beginning to
play night games.
Now we hear some discussion
about the difference in playing ball
under the lights versus playing the day
games. Were you aware of it?
Does that give pitchers an extra
advantage over hitters, hitters, an extra
advantage over pitchers?
What's the difference in playing a day
game and not getting a lot of times
in the day games you get what they
call a real high score,
very little cloud,
just, you know, just like it sounds
a real high sky clear,
you know, a lot of visibility
and the glare off the sun, which
is not absorbed by clouds or anything
like that, makes it very difficult to
see.
And you've noticed a lot on these
highlights of goof ups and things.
A ball hit up in the air and the guy just
is trying really to get out of the way
because he doesn't know where it is.
And it's a helpless feeling
where is not.
Things are a little bit clearer
to you, especially if you've got a Nolan
Ryan throwing 95 to 100
miles an hour out there and
and he's in the sunlight and you're in
the shadows.
It can be dangerous because
that ball gets on you so quick.
And if you don't pick it up in time,
then you could be seriously hurt at
night. It's a little easier to see.
But by the same token, you've got other
guys say they'd rather play games.
So it just depends on the person.
We take a break, then we'll be right back
and continue to talk about baseball with
Bill Gilbreth.
What is the ACU difference? For
Greg Holtz, senior drama major from
Hearst, it's the faculty.
I'm very satisfied with the education I
received here.
Not only have I learned a lot from some
of these professors, but what makes it so
nice is that they're Christians
who care about me and are willing to
spend time and talk to me
as a person.
The issue difference can make a
difference for you.
For more information, call six seven
four. Two thousand.
Continuing to talk about baseball with
Bill Gilbreth, Bill, the
the other thing that we're seeing
changing a lot is
moving from outdoors to indoor stadiums,
playing in places like the Astrodome
and a number of other places, especially
in the northern cities or
building covered which which completely
eliminates grass, puts it on Astroturf.
How much difference do the artificial
conditions make to the natural conditions
for a player?
Well, they've improved the artificial
conditions so much.
I remember my second
or third spring training.
We went to St. Petersburg and they
had just laid down what they were
calling Astroturf at the time.
And it was about like
concrete painted green.
The infielders were about halfway out
into the outfield.
And if you hit it on there, I mean, it
just it was like a rocket.
And now at least it's got some cushion
to it. And, of course,
Tiger Stadium, Yankee Stadium,
some of those older ones, you know, that
have the the grass and
the Giants and Oakland
both have, you know, the regular
grass and turf and stuff.
And I always like that better.
I don't know when, but I always liked it
better.
One controversial discussion that seems
to continue to go on is the difference
between the National League
and American League rules in having the
pitcher bat versus using a designated
hitter. How much difference do you think
that makes in the outcome of
a game?
I think.
Just for Knowland, for example.
You know, he came over
to the American League this year and got
301 strikeouts,
if he had been facing a pitcher
during all that time instead of a
designated hitter, he may have had
like 50 more and maybe even
more than that, because
you take out that weak spot
and there are some pretty good course
being a pitcher. I think most pitchers
are good hitters anyway, but that's
another discussion.
But you've got somebody in there who
might be not able
to play at that time, but he's still
swinging bat.
And that's just, you know, that's an
entirely different situation than having
to face pitcher.
Speaking of Nolan Ryan, he had a pretty
spectacular year.
He some plateaus that have never been
reached before in terms of strikeouts.
And now he's on his way towards some new
records in number, total number of career
wins.
As a pitcher yourself, how impressed are
you with what Nolan Ryan is doing?
I've always been impressed with Nolan.
And
when I was at California, I've
told a lot of people this.
He and his wife and
some of those other people out there
treated me just like I was family.
And I've always had a real deep respect
for him.
Nobody works any harder than he does
with his mechanics, his offseason
program.
I remember when we were
out there, an old man named
Jimmy Reese, who still keeps the books
for the angels fantastic
with a fungo bat.
And Nolan had run back and forth across
the outfield and Jimmy would hit that
ball where we were going to be without
breaking stride. And we'd do that for 30
to 45 minutes every day.
And then two days after he pitched
the ballgame, it was back in the white
room. So what he's done
doesn't really surprise me because of his
work habits and his fundamentals.
Would you say he's worked harder than any
other pitcher, you know?
Are there other pitchers that have worked
hard but just haven't had that?
No, I think he's
probably worked as hard or
harder than anybody I've ever come
across.
And I think that's the reason he's
withstood all this time.
Now, let's look at the League
Championship Series and the upcoming
World Series.
What does it take for a team to have
a championship year?
They got to, first of all, keep everybody
healthy.
And they've got to put some
games together at the right time.
Guys, we've got to get on a hot streak at
the right time.
They've got to just come together and
everything fall in place.
They can have the best talent.
Of all the twenty six teams or
whatever there are, but yet
if a little bit of luck goes against
them or somebody gets hurt, it's not
going to matter how good they are.
You got to be lucky.
And, you know, you've got to have that
luck factor.
If you if you look at
the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland
A's who are now in the series,
which starts this weekend, what
would you point to in those two teams
as the reason why they're there?
Well, Kevin Mitchell hit forty
six or seven home runs for the Giants
and Will Clark, I think is probably,
if not the best, one of the best hitters
in baseball.
And Rick Russell
is is always a constant 18
20 game winner.
They had a nice.
Molding of the team, together with
the with all their guys just came
together. Roger Craig is a good manager.
I played for Norm Cherry, who's the
pitching coach, and they know
baseball and they you know, they demand
you to to put out
Oakland. They just got some real talent.
And since they got Rickey Henderson back
from the Yankees.
That's a tough thing to beat.
There's the old the old
argument of which wins
good hitting over good pitching or good
pitching over good hitting.
Well, being a pitcher, I'd like to think
if you've got good stuff,
you know, you can beat
good hitters.
But by the same token, you can
make a good pitch
in the guy today.
Canseco, if you make a mistake on
him, he can still hit it out of the
ballpark. Same thing with Mark McGuire
and Dave Henderson.
You got to have the you got to have the
guys that can throw strikes and be
effective that way.
And the guys are going to have to get the
runs on the other side of to
how much of a role does the
manager play when you got talent that
good that knows what they need
to do? What's what's what is
the key role of a winning
a championship manager and Roger Craig
and Tony La Russa, for example?
I think I think probably just
keeping them more as a team
unit and motivating them to,
you know, when things get down.
Tommy Lasorda is as good a motivator
as anybody and he's proved
it over the years.
But when somebody is hurt, you got to
pick the other guys up.
They can't say, well, we can't do without
such and such or, you know,
he's got to be able to keep them going
no matter what happens.
As you go into this series, what are the
things you're going to you're going to
watch for that will make a difference?
In other words, is it crucial for, say,
will Clark to have a good
a good series of at bats
in order for the Giants to win?
One of the things that have to happen for
the Giants to win versus one of
the things that have to happen for
Oakland to win.
From what I saw in the in the
prior playoffs, the Giants
pitching is going to have to do better
than than they did.
Oakland's got a good pitching staff, Dave
Stewart Welch,
Mike Moore, and then they got Eckersley
in the bullpen
recounting cuts in the bullpen, several
guys that can come in and put a fire
out. And I didn't really see
that
in the Giants pitching rotation.
They just they just didn't perform like
what I would think they would have to do
against Oklahoma is
the is the excitement
of a World Series
set of games raise
or lower the level of performance.
In other words, is the tension
create the prospect of more errors or
mistakes, or does it raise professionals
to higher levels of performance?
Well, it goes back to what we've
talked about several times.
It depends on how that person can
take the pressure.
He can either rise to the occasion and
come in like Kirk Gibson did last year,
and be hobbled up and can't hardly swing
a bat or run and hit a ball out of the
ballpark. Or it could be that
he gets so tense
that he couldn't hit a sack of balls.
So it really depends a lot on how those
you know, right now Oakland has that edge
because they were in the World Series
last year. However, on the other hand,
they may be trying so hard to avenge the
Dodgers beating them last year that they
get so tight they can't perform,
you know, in their favorites.
So really, there's no pressure on the
Giants to win.
How much difference does the home feel
like they some games?
You know, each team will have home field
advantage, as they say.
How much in this case would you say
is the is the advantage of
playing at your home field?
I would think for San Francisco,
it's going to mean a lot because the wind
factor out there, because
the wind can be blowing out at home plate
and in a crosswind or
an from center field.
And there's been a lot of mistakes made
in Candlestick
in Oakland.
You've got a lot of area back behind
home plate and around the first
and third base area, which might
help them.
So I think it plays a big part.
And depending on how the fans are,
you know, they can always help them.
When you see a performance like
Will Clark's in the
series in the league championship series
of something like batting 600.
Does that.
How does that affect performance going
into a World Series, is it is
is there really something to
the idea of a batting slump or a
hitting streak as we talk about
it? Or in other words, would you would
you say he's on a hitting streak right
now and that something he can carry in or
is every day another day
individual and independent with him?
He doesn't get out of a strike very
often. I think he's just got a
really good swing.
What most people who watch baseball
and you haven't played you know what I'm
talking about, the fundamentals
that you do are very hard to learn
and so easy to get out of,
especially pitching.
You can you can change your motion
or have a sore toe and change your
motion one little bit and it throws
everything off.
Same thing with hitting.
If you drop your hands,
if you've been batting off somebody that
throws a slower pitch and what you're
going to see and you drop your hands and
you're behind with the barrel of the bat,
it changes everything up and you don't
even realize it.
So you can get on hot
streaks. And Hershiser was was hot
last year. They called him right when he
was in a pitching groove
and so will Clark.
I don't I haven't seen him very seldom
ever get out of his group, though.
You mentioned Dennis Eckersley long
ago, and a lot of people
have been saying that if Oakland can be
ahead going into the eighth inning,
there's a high probability they're going
to win if he comes in and just
shut it down for the rest of the game.
Is that is that cause
to affect coaching strategies that
would that would, for example, make Sims,
Cisco have to do things earlier so that
that they don't get themselves in
a late inning situation being behind.
They want to get rid of those starters
and make the long relievers
have to come in and see what they
can do if they can't hold a millionaire
because he's not going to get in there
unless they just try and get him some
work between, you know, the
next game and when
when when you get into the psychology
of playing first game, second game
and then down to the sixth and seventh
game, do you think differently about
the approach to playing in a seven game
series like that of of
what type of strategy,
coaching strategy, using
players and so forth?
I don't think so much anymore because
they've got such accurate scouting
reports on these people.
And, you know, your job
is to go out there and win four games if
you can win.
The only thing that would change was if
you've lost the first three, then you
know, you don't have much choice but to
try and win the next ones.
But they know how these players
hit field run throw
and it's a lot more accurately done than
was ever done back.
You know, when in an earlier time,
from your experience as a pitcher, is
there a particular pitcher that you see
as being the key pitcher that needs to do
well for either team or each team?
I think I think Russell
will probably give these the jets
a pretty good game.
He throws the ball with
a lot of off speed stuff, mixes up
his pitch is good.
That might be something that would
kind of keep Oakland
from, you know, really killing a fastball
because they can hit a fastball.
Grillz, I think, is going to have to come
through for them. Scott Morrell's
I believe that's how you say his last
name and.
Dave Stewart, it's a good picture
for Oakland that
might more I believe he's been
really impressive to me during the
season.
OK, so we're almost out of time.
Who's going to win the series A's or the
Giants? I think Oakland A's.
You predict Oakland. Bill, thanks for
being with us. It's been been fun talking
about baseball. And thank you for being
with us on campus with
Bill Gilbreth.