Lasorda's still having a ball

For the first time, the Los Angeles Dodgers are coming to Boston to play the Sox this weekend. While it's a homecoming for the new Dodgers owner, Frank McCourt, it's also a return to roots for the irrepressible Tommy Lasorda, 76, a Dodgers vice president who pitched for the club a half-century ago when it was the Brooklyn Dodgers and they came to town to play the late, lamented Boston Braves.

If you collect baseball cards, you know that Lasorda is in the Hall of Fame, but not for anything accomplished as a pitcher in a career that spanned two years, 1954 and 1955. If Pedro Martinez's stats raise an eyebrow, Lasorda's lower it, for he appeared in eight games, winning none, losing none.

A bum on the mound, all right, but what a Dodger he became.

His plaque at Cooperstown praises him as one of the most enthusiastic and successful managers in baseball history.

"Known for his fondness of pasta and pitching," says the plaque, "the jovial Lasorda led the Dodgers to eight division titles and two World Championships in 20 years as manager." The citation cites his achievement at the 2000 Olympics, where he managed the United States to its first gold medal in baseball.

At breakfast at spring training this year, Lasorda sat in his Dodgers uniform, eating ham and eggs and pitching stories that soon attracted players spellbound by his 55 years with the Dodgers.

"I have two great loves," he said, "my wife and the Dodgers. One day my wife said, `We've been married 53 years, but you love baseball more than me.' `Yes,' I said, `but I love you more than I love football, basketball, and soccer.' "

Under the previous owner, Lasorda said he was kept on the shelf, like an old baseball card. Under McCourt, he's a factor on the field.

"I can't tell you how many fans tell me they're glad to see Tommy back on the bench," says McCourt.

Before meeting minor leaguers, McCourt sought Lasorda's advice.

"Tell 'em the way to succeed is endless hours of hard work, and to play with pride that they belong to the Dodgers."

Lasorda's appeal is rooted in his early history with tough players like Jackie Robinson and Pee Wee Reese. Don Drysdale once captured the spirit: "If a manager came to the mound and instructed me to walk a batter, I wound up hitting him instead. Why waste four pitches when one will do."

No one ever asks Lasorda to speak up. As columnist Jim Murray observed, "He always managed to sound as if the building were on fire." But what tales!

"I'll tell you a story about Lefty Gomez," he says, referring to a Hall of Fame pitcher for the New York Yankees in the 1930s.

"At a convention, Lefty takes out a cigarette and puts it in his mouth. I lit a match and thought, I can't believe I'm lightin' Lefty's cigarette. I said, `Geez, Lefty, when I was young, you were my hero. And the first words I heard my hero utter were: `Wasamatta, kid. You didn't like girls?' "

Lasorda's ebullience is captured in his 1985 autobiography, "Artful Dodger," including stories about an invitation to the home of Gregory Peck for dinner with Kirk Douglas, Cary Grant, Johnny Carson, and Lee Remick.

Peck said, "There's one person to whom I want to pay tribute, a man we all respect. . ."

Lasorda looked across the table, assuming Peck was talking about Frank Sinatra.

But Peck said, ". . .Tommy Lasorda." In telling stories, Lasorda has better timing than he had as a pitcher.

"My father worked at a stone quarry. One hot day, he gave me a quart bottle and told me to fill it with water and not to break the bottle. Then he hit me, and I said, `Why'd ya hit me, pop?' He said, `Well, if you break the bottle, it's too late to hit you.' So, I said, `Damn, if he hit me before, what the hell would he do if I broke the bottle?' "

When the Dodgers lose a game, Lasorda loses his laugh. This is the manager, after all, who was once so distraught in defeat he slammed his office door so hard it jammed and required a carpenter to remove the hinges.

"One night, playing the Braves, we were four runs down in the ninth, but scored five to go one ahead. I brought in one pitcher makin' $2.8 million, but he couldn't stop 'em. A second earnin' $2.6 million couldn't stop 'em, and a third makin' $2.9 million couldn't. Three guys, $8 million and they can't get two damn outs?

"I decided if I got on the bus I'd kill [somebody], so I started walking to the hotel. An ambulance pulls up and the driver says, `Tommy, are you crazy walking around here? Get in.' At the hotel, a pitcher saw me and the ambulance and assumed I had a heart attack because he was such a lousy pitcher."

But stress did lead to heart problems and a decision in 1997 to quit managing.

"I thought of Don Drysdale in Montreal and how we planned to have breakfast, but when I called he never answered because he was dead of a heart attack. I said, `Damn, I don't want to die this way.' "

Asked how he wanted to be remembered, Lasorda spoke about the 2000 Olympics and the surprise win over Cuba.

"I told people that was bigger than my 50 years with the Dodgers. People thought I was wacky, but you know, when we win championships, Dodger fans are happy, other fans aren't. But you win that gold medal, and everybody in America is happy.

"Someone said, `Hey, Tommy, they didn't give you a medal,' and I said, `Well, I got my gold medal when I saw them put the gold medal around those players, and I got my gold medal when they raised the American flag, and I got my gold medal when they played our national anthem, because I did something for my country that's bigger and better than anything I've ever done in baseball.' "