Monday, June 16, 2008

Larry Bowa Interview

Larry Bowa isn't the guy I'd want managing my team, but I'm happy that colorful, unvarnished people like him are around. Here's a really fun interview with him conducted by David Brown of Big League Stew.

I'm not sure if I like the questions better or the answers, because they're all pretty good. Unlike most interviews you read, Brown eschews the current talk-of-the-day business (i.e. "how is Los Angeles going to come back with all of these injuries? What's Joe Torre like?") and instead asks things people actually want to know. For his part, Bowa seems to answer almost all of the questions honestly and in an unrehearsed manner that you rarely see anymore.

Of course there was one exception:

Q: Whatever happened in San Diego when you managed, was it all Kruk's fault?

LB: Was it all Kruk's [laughs]? Yeah, let's just blame John. No, I had a young team and I was a young manager and we didn't win. I had the sense that they were trying to develop young players and win at the same time. I told them, "You can't have both, with as many young players as we had." And so, a couple weeks later, they let me go.
Well, Jack McKeon went 67-48 with those same young players right after Bowa got fired, so I guess they could have both.

Link via themarksmith, who has his own take on the interview here.

1 comment:

Dre said...

Great interview... Bowa is one of the good guys in baseball. Thanks for the link, I may have missed it otherwise.