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CNN Live Today

Interview with Tommy Lasorda

Aired July 05, 2002 - 13:01   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: We've got Tommy Lasorda, who's on the telephone with us, to talk more about our top story, legendary Ted Williams is dead.

Thank you very much for joining us on the phone now.

TOMMY LASORDA, FORMER DODGERS MANAGER: You're welcome.

WHITFIELD: He leaves behind an incredible legacy: the last hitter to hit over .400, most notably known for that. How will you be remembering Ted Williams?

LASORDA: Well, I'll remember him as a dear, dear friend. We have been very close over the years, and he is an inspiration to me at all times.

He taught me a lot about life. He taught me a lot about the game of baseball. When I become the coach of the Olympic team, I made him the honorary coach. I had him speak to the baseball -- the Olympic baseball team on the telephone, and we just felt that if there was anybody we wanted to win it for, it would be a hero like him, a great, great patriot.

And I tell you, he was -- he was just great. We have just lost one of the great, great icons of baseball. This man will always be remembered. He was the living -- at the time, the greatest hitter that ever lived. And he has suffered quite a bit in the last couple of years, and now he's no longer going to suffer.

WHITFIELD: And particularly because he suffered a series of strokes and congestive heart failure in recent years, you and others were, I'm sure, bracing for this very day.

LASORDA: Well, we knew it was going to happen. I had breakfast with him about -- oh, I guess about a month ago, and he was still coherent. He came to the table and we had breakfast together in his home. But then he started to slip real bad, and then this morning I got a call he had passed away. I mean this guy was -- he suffered a great deal over the last few years.

WHITFIELD: And what were your conversations like with him most recently -- do you talk about the evolution, or did you talk about the evolution of baseball? Is that something that all fellow Hall of Famers converse about? LASORDA: Yes. We talked about the hitters of today and the hitters of yesteryear. He was a great admirer of "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. He said that Ty Cobb once told him that "Shoeless" Joe Jackson was the greatest hitter that ever put a bat in his hand. Ted talked about the hitters of today compared to the hitters of yesteryear. He kept arguing that they're bigger and stronger, and I disagreed with him.

WHITFIELD: Did he express some of his favorites?

LASORDA: Oh, yes. He liked Tony Gwynn. He liked McGwire. He had -- he liked Michael Piazza. I took him to Pennsylvania to look at Mike Piazza when he was 16 years old. He was in the batting cage and Ted looked at him and he looked at him and he said, "This young man will be an outstanding hitter." He said, "He is a better right now than I was when I was 16 years old."

WHITFIELD: Wow, that's a compliment, huh?

LASORDA: Yes. And also he called -- he called us his family, and my little granddaughter Emily, when she came to Cooperstown and sat on his lap and sang "Take Me Out to the Ballgame," he kept calling her Shirley Temple.

A lot of people don't know how wonderful a guy he was. He was so engraved in the game of baseball. He loved baseball, and he didn't ever want to see anything happen to this great game. But more important, he was proud of what he did when he served his country. He was a great patriot. He loved what he was doing when he put that uniform on with the Red Sox, and above all he loved that uniform when he -- when he served in the service.

When I had him talk to the team, the thing that he told them most important, don't ever do anything in Australia to embarrass your country. Be proud that you are representing the United States of America. Those were the last words that he uttered to those players.

WHITFIELD: Wow, that really does underscore how much of a symbol he was for American traditions, of so many ways.

LASORDA: Yes. He was a great man. He was an icon, and you know, just, I guess, maybe a few hours late, he could have died on July the 4th, which would have been appropriate for him.

WHITFIELD: Do you think many of the modern day baseball players -- you mentioned Mike Piazza, who was being compared by the viewpoint of Dead Williams -- do you think they appreciate and understand what a legacy Ted Williams is?

LASORDA: I think they do. I think they all understand, because they've seen him. He's had the Ted Williams baseball Hall of Hitters -- Hall of Fame. Every year I've been there, the master of ceremonies for that affair, for the last seven years, and he inducts all of those young home run hitters every year into the Hall of Fame.

And they -- they really -- they really are all well aware of him. Everyone...

WHITFIELD: OK. Tommy Lasorda. Don't go far away. We want to keep you on the line if we could. Well, let's continue talking, because we want to bring somebody else in, in a moment, to join you in this conversation. You know, I'm looking at just some information handed to me about his bio, and how he twice won the Triple Crown. Best batting average, most home runs, most runs batted during a single season.

No one has ever been able to top that, in your view, the way in which Ted Williams carried those out?

All right. Well, it looks like we may have Tommy Lasorda as well, former L.A. Dodgers manager...

Hi. Hi, there! Is this Mel Antonen, are you there?

MEL ANTONEN, COLUMNIST, "USA TODAY": Yes, I am.

WHITFIELD: With "USA Today." OK, well, I'm glad you're on the phone with us. We lost Tommy Lasorda for a moment, but perhaps we can restore our communication with him.

The legacy of Ted Williams. Tommy Lasorda spoke so eloquently about him and his influence on baseball, and even during the recent evolution of baseball that we've been seeing and witnessing, a much more athletic game being played, but in so many ways influenced by the phenomenal efforts carried out by Ted Williams. How will you be remembering this legacy?

ANTONEN: I'll remember -- every time, no matter -- I've covered baseball now for 15 years -- 15 or 16 years, and no matter who you talk to on the baseball field, every prayer in today's game knows Ted Williams. They've read his books. They've tried his hitting techniques. His legacy will never be forgotten in the game. He was quite simply the best hitter in the history of baseball, probably.

Nobody studied hitting harder than Ted Williams did, and nobody taught it as well. I mean, a lot of players are superstars and can't relate. But my memories of Ted Williams are that he always related well to young players when he was a coach, and he is really going to be missed.

WHITFIELD: You said he taught it as well. Which way did he try to pass down or help nurture other players?

ANTONEN: Well, he loved to stand around and talk hitting. I know that in the '60s and the '70s, after he retired, he used to hang around the Boston Red Sox spring training site in Winter Haven, Florida, and he'd get out there at 7:30 a.m., 7:00 a.m., 7:30 a.m. in the morning, and he would go out to batting cages with young kids, whether they were 18, 19, 26, 27, anybody who wanted to talk hitting, Ted Williams was always available.

One of my lasting memory of Ted William will be of him leaning over a batting cage and telling some 19-year-old kid who was in total awe that this kid should raise his hands on the bat or he should try to hit the ball up the middle more or move his foot over. It was an incredible surreal picture, because you had this Hall of Fame legend, at 7:00 a.m. in the morning, teaching this no-name kid how to hit, and Ted Williams always loved that. And that's what endeared me to Ted Williams.

WHITFIELD: Wow, and he was quite the disciplinarian, as we were hearing from Tommy Lasorda, in so many ways. Military man, an athlete, and an athlete who broke so many records in a clean-living kind of way.

ANTONEN: Yes, Ted Williams is what -- is what a lot of -- a lot of baseball players, if every player were like Ted Williams and had his discipline and had his approach and his appreciation for the game, baseball would have a lot fewer problems than it has today.

You know, Ted Williams -- you know, even though he retired, he loved to go to baseball games, he loved to go sit in the front row and watch guys like Nomar Garciaparra of the Red Sox, and Derek Jeter, and Jason Giambi. He had played the game for years, and then he -- when he retired, up until the very end, he was a huge fan of the game. And that was exciting, too, for Ted.

WHITFIELD: So Mel, paint a picture for me. What was it like when he would walk down the bleachers and take his seat? What kind of reaction would he get from people in the stands, not just the players on the field, but the people in the stands whose recognized him?

ANTONEN: People would get chills. When you see Ted Williams walking into a baseball park at spring training -- you know, in spring training or in regular season or in Fenway Park. People would get chills. The whole corridor would stop and people would look and go up and talk to him, and they would treat him with such respect. "Mr. Williams, do you remember this?" "Mr. Williams, do you remember that?"

And some people couldn't even talk around him they were so awestruck. And the thing that was always so great is Ted was, as I remember, very, very gracious to fans. He appreciated the support, he appreciated the love. He'd say, "You know, I'm just an ordinary guy," and he wasn't. He was the last man to hit .400. And there's just so many great memories of Ted Williams.

WHITFIELD: Wow. Well, stick around, Mel, for a moment, because we want to bring in on this conversation Tommy Lasorda, former L.A. Dodger's Manager. You were with us a minute ago. Dropped off the phone there, but I'm glad to see that you're back.

LASORDA: Thank you. And Mel's right. I still get chills just watching him and thinking about him. What comes to my mind, a couple of incidents, when two years ago when -- I kept asking him if he would come to Vero Beach and talk to our players down there. And he said that he would, so chairman of the board Bob Bailey (ph) -- we went up and picked him up in Florida, where he lives, and brought him down to Vero Beach. He talked to the players in the clubhouse for about two hours, then we had lunch together, and then he watched a game, and they -- when they introduced him at the ballpark, there was a standing ovation for -- I don't know how long.

And it just brought tears to his eyes. And when I was the master of ceremonies at the dinner, at the Hall Of Fame, his Hitters Hall Of Fame, and they brought him to the big tent where the affair was held. And I -- and I reached over and I said to him, Ted, look at the way these people love you. I mean, they gave him a standing ovation that just brought tears to everybody's eyes.

And I said, Ted, just how much these people love you. I said you've got to last a long time, Ted. These people need you. You're an inspiration to everybody in this country. All of a sudden tears are coming out of his eyes, and a writer asked me, he said, "What did you say to him that brought tears out of him?" And I told them just what I told you.

And another thing I remembered about him was that I asked him, "Ted, why did you play in that double-header the last day of the season? You were hitting .400. You would have been the first player in so many years to hit .400 in the American League, and the manager told you you could sit out the double-header, and he said, I wanted to play. I wasn't going to take that .400 sitting out two games.

He played the double-header. He got six hits in the double- header and wind up hitting .406. Now, you think the player of today would go to bat on .400, laying on .400 the last day of the season?

No way. No way. This is the kind of guy that he was. And I'll tell you, I loved this man so dearly. My family loved him dearly. Every time he would call he'd always ask, "Where is little Shirley?" My little granddaughter, he kept calling her Shirley Temple.

WHITFIELD: Well, Mr. Lasorda, let me ask you this. When Ted Williams would talk to the current players and, you know, they would be inspired by and hanging on every word of his, did he ever talk to them about the rewards of good clean playing, the rewards of playing steroid-use free, since that seems to be grabbing the headlines with baseball, particularly the power hitter baseball players now. Did he ever broach that subject with them?

LASORDA: When Ted Williams spoke, those hitters down there, all those young home run hitters that were inducted, stopped and listened. They absorbed every word that he said.

When he was in that clubhouse talking to the players, you could hear a pin drop. Everybody was listening to him. It was amazing. One of the great stories that I tell about him is a number of years ago I was speaking at banquet in Toronto, Canada, and I looked out in the audience and I saw Ted Williams and Ferguson Jenkins in the audience. Nobody even referred to him.

So when I got up I introduced him, and he made a sign for me to call him after the dinner at the hotel we were in. And I called him, he said come on up to the room. I went to the room and we start talking -- I couldn't -- oh, couldn't wait until he starts talking about hitting with me. And finally it was 3:00 a.m. in the morning and he said, "I understand you're a good friend of Frank Sinatra's." I said, "That's right." He said, "Well, you know, I admire him. I thought he's a great singer." I said, "Why don't you tell him that yourself, Ted?"

He said, "What do you mean?"

And I picked up the phone and I called Palm Springs, which was midnight, and I called Frank, and I said, "Francis, somebody here wants to talk to you."

He said, "Frank, this Ted Williams. I can't tell you -- I was telling Tommy how much I love you. You're the greatest singer I ever heard," and everything. And when he got finished he handed me the phone, and Sinatra said to me, "I can't believe I was talking to Ted Williams." So there it is. That's how great he was.

WHITFIELD: Mel, let me bring you back into this conversation, with "USA Today" and on the telephone with us now. How do you expect baseball fans to be paying their respects to the passing of Ted Williams at baseball fields across the country?

ANTONEN: I think -- I think what they're doing to do is, I'm sure there's going to be moments of silence. There's going to be a lot of tears. I think you are going to see a lot of baseball memorabilia, particularly Red Sox shirts with Ted Williams' number nine on the back.

Things like that. They are just going to take a look at his wonderful career. They're going to watch videos. They're going to read more about him. He was one of a kind, and he's gone now. And so they are going to appreciate him even more.

But I suspect you are going to see just a lot of baseball emotions, a lot of Red Sox memorabilia coming out. They are going to remember him for a long time. You know, '99 All Star game in Boston. Ted Williams was honored, and it was probably one of the most -- it was probably the most emotional moment in All Star history.

You had all those All Stars out on the field at Fenway Park, and Ted Williams was on the pitcher's mound, and all the players gathered around him. And that was an incredible moment, and I think it's moments like that people are going to remember, and I think you are going to see a lot of number nines coming up on baseball shirts across the country at baseball parks everywhere.

WHITFIELD: And Tommy Lasorda, I'll let you have the last word on how you expect baseball fans to pay their respects.

LASORDA: I think that in some way about that number nine, we should have it on every ballpark in the country to remember this great, great, great player. I think they should make a movie about him. They made a movie about other baseball players and never one was made of Ted Williams. I think a movie should be made of him, and I think that his spirit and his love for the game and his love for the country will live forever.

WHITFIELD: Very eloquently said. Thank you very much. Former L.A. Dodger's manager Tommy Lasorda and Mel Antonen of "USA Today" Sports. Thank you very much for joining us on the telephone, talking about the life and legacy of Ted Williams, dead at 83. We'll be right back.

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