Baseball Managers

Dodgers Manager Joe Torre didn't directly address whether his controversial new book about the New York Yankees would affect his relationship with his current team during an appearance Friday night on CNN's "Larry King Live." "I think that's a great question," said Torre, who revealed his contract with the Dodgers does not include a confidentiality clause. "I say I hope so because they don't want you to write a book unless you win a championship. So hopefully we'll have that issue later on."

Perhaps never before has a sport so badly needed an elder statesman the likes of Joe Torre. Friday, he keynoted the first day of the rest of baseball's life the way few others could. "The healing has to start now," he said. At the beginning of the week, the Dodgers' manager could have reasonably assumed he would be addressing the media here, on this day before spring training, about Manny Ramirez . . . or his recently released book on his years with the Yankees . . . or his pitching rotation.

A series like this one, a sloggy stretch of season like this one, is precisely when you need Joe Torre. Why paying him all those millions to come west made sense. Why, even after a heartbreaking, sweep-denying loss against the Giants on Wednesday afternoon, there's no reason for fear and loathing in Dodgersland. Torre has been there, done that. He has always kept his head. Always, since the mid-1990s and New York at least, had a knack for keeping matters clear and simple during times like these.

Mike Scioscia joked that his hamburger did not taste very good the other night, on the long flight home from New York. Arte Moreno ought to have ordered Scioscia a juicy filet mignon Monday night, in tribute to the way his manager carved up the New York Yankees. Seldom does a manager have this much impact on a playoff game. While the Yankees' Joe Girardi was pushing every button he could find, including the lose-the-designated-hitter button and the overmanage-the-bullpen button, Scioscia hit just the right amount of buttons, all just right.

from tempe, ariz. The spring-training office of the most secure leader in professional sports looks like the bedroom of a 12-year-old boy. Flung across the desk is a bat. Looped on the end of that bat is a catcher's mitt. Sitting next to that bat is a crumpled baseball cap. Hanging in a locker are baggy baseball sweats surrounding a pair of blue jeans. Above that locker hangs the perfect explanation. Scioscia, 14.

That the Colorado Rockies are on a big roll, at this juncture, cannot be questioned. But the question is, how? Did firing manager Clint Hurdle and replacing him with bench coach Jim Tracy really spark that much of a turnaround? Or was the clubhouse in such a funk that a change, any change, would have been positive? Some suggest the answer is this: Guilt. "We know we messed up, we basically got Hurdle fired, and we have to turn this thing around," shortstop Troy Tulowitzki said.