An Appreciation: Cal Ripken Sr.

Maybe you've noticed, as I have, that his name keeps coming up in my Bird Tapes interview collection. The lesson: He did a ton for the Orioles that basically went unseen.

These days, more than a few fans probably would suggest that Cal Ripken Sr.’s biggest contribution to the Orioles was being the father and de facto personal coach of the Ironman, Cal Ripken Jr., who grew from a gangly kid hanging around the clubhouse into a Hall of Fame shortstop and one of the franchise’s greatest players.

That was, indeed, a big deal. As was the fact that Senior, as he was widely known after his son came along, managed the Orioles for a little over a year in the 1980s, just a few years after they’d won a World Series. At the time, he was just the seventh person to manage the club.

But it does Senior a disservice to remember him strictly for the most high-profile items on his career checklist.

They don’t come anywhere close to accurately summing up Senior and his many and varied contributions to the Orioles over nearly four decades.

The lack of a deep understanding of his role in Orioles history is, well, understandable. He signed with them as a 20-year-old catching prospect in 1956, nearly seven decades ago. And sadly, after a lifetime in and around the game, he died at age 63 in 1999. His time is long gone, in other words.

As well, many of his most significant contributions took place out of the sight of fans, in the instructional leagues, minor league parks and spring training back fields that he inhabited for so long. He was a natural foot soldier, most comfortable when helping others, his exploits destined not to be recalled like those of Orioles such as, well, his son, who put up gaudy numbers, made history, etc.

Senior’s winning percentage as the Orioles’ manager was a dismal .402, his tenure mostly remembered for the fact that a) he became the only manager in major league history to manage two of his sons (Junior and Bill) at the same time, and b) he was fired six games into the 1988 season, a dismissal that still ranks as the earliest in-season firing in major league history. (The Tigers also fired Phil Garner six games into the 2002 season.)

So … yes … he is easily lost in the mists of history.

Unless you go looking.

As I re-listen to my set of vintage interviews from a quarter-century ago, build the Bird Tapes archive and hopefully tell the story of the Orioles in the process, I’ve noticed something. Maybe you have, too.

Senior’s name keeps coming up. Like, all the time.

Did you hear Steve Barber? The Orioles’ first 20-game winner was stuck in Class D until Senior, his catcher, was promoted in 1959 and recommended him to the organization’s higher-ups as a pitcher with promise. The higher-ups respected Senior’s opinion, yes, even then. Within a year, Barber was in the Orioles’ rotation.

Did you hear Ken Singleton? Senior was a coach under Earl Weaver for most of the All-Star outfielder’s time with the Orioles in the 1970s and 1980s:

“One of our real leaders was Cal Ripken Sr. He was a very dedicated coach. He wouldn’t ask you to do anything he wouldn’t do himself. When we did our morning drills in spring training, he’d be the first one around the bases. It’s 9 o’clock in the morning, you’re feeling kind of tired, but you see him do it and it’s like, ‘I can do it.’ He’d run, slide, get all dirty; he’d do all the relay plays. I’m thinking, this guy, number one, he really likes his job, and number two, he wants us to win. That’s the only thing I ever got from him. He could be stubborn, but he wanted to win.

“He and Earl were a perfect match. Whatever Earl said we needed to do, Rip was eager, he’d say, ‘Let’s go do this.’ He’d have us running down relays all spring, the drills all outfielders hate, but you’d do them. And our defense was impeccable as a result. When I turned to throw, I knew Bobby Grich or Richie Dauer were going to be right where they’re supposed to be.”

Did you hear Eddie Murray? He recalled that, as a just-drafted teenager, his introduction to the Oriole Way was watching Senior’s tireless work ethic at the team’s minor league camp in Fernandina Beach. Florida.

“People were laughing at him, seeing him in uniform at 10:30 at night,” Murray said. “He was grooming the fields for us to play the next day. That kind of dedication, you’re just not going to find it (elsewhere). He was special.”

Murray went so far as to theorize that a key factor in the Orioles’ decline in the mid-to-late 1980s was Senior’s departure from the instructional/developmental structure years earlier. After nearly 15 years as a minor league coach, manager and instructor, he was a major league coach from 1976-86 and briefly out of the organization entirely after being fired as the manager in 1988.

“The old way was over when Senior was promoted to the major leagues. I don’t think you’ll ever see another person come down and do the things he did for us,” Murray said. “Things changed. Who was left to teach the way he did?”

Murray’s admiration isn’t surprising when you listen to former Orioles executive Frank Cashen’s vintage interview, which, spoiler alert, I’ll post next week. The interview begins with Cashen explaining that Murray’s success traces to a phone call he received from Senior, who was his manager the minors in 1974. Senior thought Murray, drafted as a right-handed hitter, would make an excellent switch-hitter and wanted permission from Cashen to try.

Cashen gave him permission and, well, that experiment ended with Murray making the Hall of Fame.

Senior played in the Orioles’ minor league system into the early 1960s, reaching as high as Triple A, before transitioning into coaching and teaching, a role in which his immense value quickly became apparent. He ran the team’s minor league spring training camp in Thomasville, Georgia. He helped write the organizational playing manual, known as the Oriole Way handbook. He managed minor league affiliates all over the country through 1974. After a year as a scout, he joined Weaver’s staff in 1976 and held that job for a decade. After his brief tenure as the major league manager ended with his firing, he returned as the third base coach, a job he held until 1992.

According to my math, that’s 36 years in the organization in multiple roles, almost more than one can easily count. Unfortunately, he succumbed to cancer just as I set out to write a book on Orioles history in 1999. The absence of his voice is among my greatest regrets about the book and the Bird Tapes project. But others are helping tell his story, none more poignantly than his son.

In the first part of his Bird Tapes interview, Cal Junior goes into great detail when discussing his father’s unique career with the Orioles. It was Senior who put the team’s equipment in the back of a station wagon and drove it to Florida for spring training. It was Senior who built several of the fields and backstops at the team’s minor league camp. It was Senior who, as a minor league manager, not only ran the team but groomed fields and even drove the bus.

“Every successful organization has a guy like Cal. He did so many things over the years. Whatever needed to be done, whether it be hammer a backstop or scout a prospect or drive a bus, he was ready to do it,” said Harry Dalton, who as farm director in the early 1960s suggested Ripken go into coaching.

But even though he was a loyal and dutiful foot soldier, he was not without ambition. He was disappointed when the Orioles passed over him as manager after Weaver retired, giving the job to Joe Altobelli, who promptly won a World Series. When he finally did get the chance to manage the Orioles, the minor league system was drying up and the major league roster was full of players who either didn’t belong or had already seen their best days. The Orioles were bad. Senior never had a chance.

Even if the team had been good, though, his sons and admirers understand that all along Senior probably was more suited to being a teacher, coach and instructor than a major league manager.

“He was a great teacher. He was best at that, taking young players and teaching them the right way to play. Probably better at that at managing, truth be told. But what an instructor,” Cashen said. “I finally brought him up to the major leagues because he deserved it after all those years, and he had a good, long run as a coach.”

Quietly, he provided a kind of firm backbone for the organization and isn’t necessarily remembered today for the right things, in my opinion. Yes, he was a manager in bad times, and yes, he was Junior’s dad. But he was much, much more than that to the Orioles.