Being in San Francisco good for Dusty's soul
SAN FRANCISCO -- The golf cart wheeled him, slowly, through the lower bowl of AT&T Park, out toward the Northern California night, where a Filipino dinner, followed by the typically short sleep that accompanies postseason play, awaited him.Each San Francisco Giants employee that Dusty Baker passed extended a hand, a hello, a Halleluiah."Thank the Lord!" one woman said, clutching Baker's hand. "I was so worried about you!"Baker is lighter in body -- more than 20 pounds shed over the course of his medical ordeal, followed by the determined diet prescribed by his daughter. But he's not frail -- in body, in mind or in soul. He's simply recognizing the value, at this stage, of energy preservation.
Anthony Castrovince is a reporter for MLB.com. Read his columns and follow him on Twitter at @Castrovince.Lofton tells the story of third baseman David Bell from that '02 team. Baker found out Bell loved catfish.
"We go on the road," Lofton recalled, "and there's arrangements for a catfish dinner in his locker that Dusty got for him. That's the kind of man Dusty is."And so the man has an effect on people -- on those who play for him, and on those who know him from another time and place.So in the Reds' clubhouse and in the interior of AT&T Park, the sight of Baker back at work, at this pivotal point in the baseball calendar and in the place he calls home, elicited one response:Halleluiah.