Jim Leland

I mean, he was one of the nicest guys that I've ever managed.

But, you know, all of them have made their mark on my life in some way or another.

And fortunately, most of them are positive.

I think probably the most difficult part is dealing with the media twice a day.

And I don't mean that disrespectfully.

I mean, there's...

you know, a lot of times they have to fill the newspaper and there's some silly questions and that's aggravating.

And I also think that, you know, I know I'll get blasted for this, but I think that one time somebody told me they thought it'd be a good idea if somebody would have to cover a certain amount of games before they were allowed in the clubhouse, you know, to ask questions.

And I thought that was kind of a good idea.

That'll never work.

But, you know, when you get to postseason play, you get,

So many people that you haven't seen all year, you know, it's not just the beat writers anymore.

It's everybody that's in there in media, you know, asking silly questions like, you know, where do you eat breakfast?

If you win, will you eat breakfast?

I mean, a lot of silly stuff.

So, you know, I think that I try to use the media to my advantage.

I try to use them in the sense that I think my responsibility is to tell the media everything I can.

and everything that's true about our club because I try to use them to get the word of our team out to our fans.

I think that's very important, so I have a great deal of respect for the media.

And on the other side of that coin, a lot of times you get, quite truthfully, some media that don't really know much about baseball.