Cleveland Indians' Manny Acta eager to get advice from new bench coach Sandy Alomar Jr.

Published: Saturday, March 17, 2012, 10:45 PM Updated: Saturday, March 17, 2012, 10:46 PM

GOODYEAR, Ariz. -- A bench coach in baseball can be ignored one day and be the power behind the throne the next. 

His job is to give the manager two sets of eyes instead of one. Not only must he manage with him, but against him. A bench coach might be the manager's best friend on the coaching staff, but in the ninth inning of a tight game, he can turn into the devil's advocate.

This year Sandy Alomar Jr., will step into the role after two years of being manager Manny Acta's first-base coach. He is replacing Tim Tolman, who stepped down at the end of last season because of illness. Tolman, battling with Parkinson's disease, is in camp this spring to advise Alomar. He has a long history with Acta, managing him in the minor leagues with Houston and coaching with him in Washington and Cleveland.

The key to getting along with Acta?

"Never mention his playing career," said Tolman with a laugh.

The bench coach position is one step removed from being a big-league manager. Over the last two years, Alomar has interviewed with the Chicago Cubs, Boston and Toronto for vacant managerial positions. That is still his goal, but right now he's busy learning his new job.

Here's the advice Acta gave him -- never stop making suggestions.

"You might tell me 10 things, but just because I only do one thing out of the 10 doesn't mean I'm not listening," said Acta. "You have to continue to provide ideas and opinions and never feel like you're being shut down.

"That's why I had such a good relationship with Tolman. I've known him since my playing days. He wasn't afraid of telling me anything whether I was going to tell him 'No, I'm not doing that or that might be a good idea.'"

Alomar has a pretty good idea of what makes Acta tick, but this is the first time he'll be in the dugout when the Indians are at bat. When he retired in 2007, he spent two years working as a coach in the Mets' bullpen. He watched his father, Sandy, work with managers Willie Randolph and Jerry Manuel as their bench coach before join Acta's staff in Cleveland.

"It's a new experience," said Alomar. "I'm a rookie again. My dad told me, 'You know the game. Just let your instincts take over.'"

Alomar said he won't get upset when Acta doesn't take his advice.

"I really don't get offended," said Alomar, a six-time All-Star catcher for the Indians. "I've called pitches and sometimes the pitcher shook me off. These are similar circumstances.

"When I was on the field, I always tried to manage the game from behind home plate. It will be Manny's decision. I'll just do my homework and I hope that works out the best for the team."
If variety is the spice of life, it also plays well in the exchanges between manager and bench coach.
"Hopefully, when I do give advice it's contrary to what he's thinking," said Tolman. "That's an important fact. Hey, you're thinking this. I'm thinking this could happen. From there, it's up to Manny. You try to give him as much information as possible to make that decision."

Another key is anticipation. Knowing what is going to happen before it does and making that information available so the manager has time enough to turn it into an advantage.
"You have to be on top of everything," said Alomar.
 
This spring, Alomar continues to work with the catchers, while adjusting to his new duties. He fills out the lineup cards, checks with head trainer Lonnie Soloff about the health of every starter in case a change has to be made. Then come the games, keeping up with the mass substitutions that take place in spring.

During games Alomar is usually sitting or standing right next to Acta.
"Sandy is a very bright guy," said Acta. "All he needs to do is get that confidence with me and not be afraid to tell me what he feels and what he thinks is right or wrong and not expect me to take it personal.

"People say a bench coach needs thick skin. The one who needs the thick skin is the manager because he needs to hear what his bench coach is saying. That's why it's important he's not intimidated by me or feels like he's second guessing me."

Alomar knows in the end that the final call will always rest with Acta. He's getting paid to manage. One day Alomar wants to be in that same position.

 

Remembering Albert

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The recording of a ringing bell would stop when Albert Belle, who clanged through the big leagues like a danger signal, stepped to the plate.

He would hold one hand up, asking for time, while his back foot rubbed out the chalked rear line of the batter's box. That allowed him to stand a few inches farther back and buy a few more milliseconds to decipher the pitch. When he saw it and hit it, no one who ever played for the Indians did so with more power and consistency than Belle at his finest.

That was the Belle the Indians brought to spring training after years of mutual estrangement. Not the raging Belle, but the Belle of the ball. The idea was to restore relationships, to remind the kids of the proud times the franchise has experienced, to pass on tips, to represent. It is a generous move, and Belle seemed to appreciate it.

No one I have ever been around in sports on a daily basis was more committed to excellence at his craft than Albert Belle. No one subdued so many demons -- including alcoholism, a temper that could burn like a welder's torch and an unapproachable sullenness that discouraged friendship and denied him his just due. In the end, despite the damage he committed, Belle hurt himself with his tantrums most of all.

Those unproductive habits and emotions stopped in the batter's box. There, Belle was a predator, and the baseball had few avenues of escape. He kept detailed file cards of each at-bat; knew from them the situations and the tendencies of pitchers; and, in the year of the franchise's rebirth, in 1995, he almost never missed a mistake pitch.

Belle sought perfection, an impossible goal in a game in which error is officially assessed and tabulated. But Belle was not afraid of failing, either. He wanted the bat in his hands with the game on the line.

He played rough and angry, so he seemed like a throwback in a sport in which the commissioner wanted everyone to make nice after the 1994 players' strike canceled the World Series. Belle asked for no quarter and gave none. For serial indiscretions, he was suspended more often than a man on a flying trapeze.

The most serious incident came when he was found to be using a bat with more cork in it than a cellar full of vintage wine. Again, this was throwback stuff. Norm Cash of the Detroit Tigers won an American League batting title in 1961 with a bat adulterated with a mischievous mixture of sawdust, glue and cork.

Belle's impounded bat was stolen from a storage area at Chicago's Comiskey Park by Jason Grimsley, whose ninja skills in a ceiling air duct far outstripped those he possessed on the pitcher's mound. In the place of Belle's bat, Grimsley left a model belonging to first baseman Paul Sorrento. Omar Vizquel, in his tattle-tale book, said no clean Belle bat could be substituted because all of them would have bobbed in the turbulent seas of controversy, like corks.

The whole affair today has a quaint, roguish air. It was like a pitcher throwing an emery ball or spies stealing signs with the use of binoculars from peep holes in the scoreboard. Steroids and other designer performance-enhancing drugs were on the way. The greatest records in a game built on numbers would be trashed by a parade of artificially inflated musclemen.

When complaints by the Red Sox led umpires to confiscate another of Belle's bats in the 1995 divisional playoffs, umpires sawed the bat in half and found it was clean. Belle pointed angrily to his bulging biceps as the cause of the homer he had just hit. The muscles were legit. No hint of steroid abuse ever arose about him.

Belle (deep breath here) got thrown out of the Rookie League and the Mexican League; cussed out television reporter Hannah Storm before a World Series game; tried to make road pizza of two trick-or-treaters outside his home; winged a photographer with one baseball and a taunting fan with another; backhanded another man (Note to hecklers: Leave Albert alone!) with a ping pong paddle; busted up clubhouses; and was just an unholy distraction ... until it came time to produce with the bat. He should have won a couple of Most Valuable Player awards, but his personality prevented that.
The Indians remember his tunnel vision in the box. The fans remember his shots over the wall. I remember how little he cared about being loved, only respected and, undeniably, feared.

It wasn't fun covering Belle. But it was never, ever dull, and you can't say that about the team these days.