If you weren't around at the time, it's probably hard to understand just how suddenly surprising and exciting the San Francisco Giants were in 1986. This was a team that had lost 100 games the previous season, the only time in franchise history that has happened. Over 14 years the Giants had managed only three winning seasons, none of them consecutive. They'd nearly been sold and moved to Toronto, and the owner who'd kept that from happening was famous for complaining about Candlestick Park, not for building a good team. "We're the worst in organized baseball," lamented their best player in 1980, and the increasingly few fans tended to agree. The Giants weren't just bad, they were boring bad.
Roger Craig, who passed away yesterday at the age of 93, changed all that. His team was-- seemingly all of a sudden-- young, quick, eager, daring, and resourceful. He swapped out the worst infield in baseball for the youngest, transformed veteran pitchers and encouraged rookie pitchers, forbid any complaints about the ballpark-- and then he let go and let his players play. Fans were startled: are you sure these are the same guys? Quickly the verdict came in-- no, they're not; there's something about them. Something that began filling the stands. And our hearts. And now our memories.
We called it, and still call it, "The Giants Renaissance." And Roger Craig, bless his generous heart, was its leader, the wise and genial face of the franchise at its pivot point.
Those 1986 Giants surged to the division lead at midseason, and brother, were they fun to watch. Roger became known for his small-ball tactics-- the suicide squeeze, the hit and run, the extra base-- but his real gift was using the entire roster and focusing on what his players could do, rather than what they couldn't. The Giants didn't win that year-- injuries to key players down the stretch saw to that-- but they were a blast. They were fun. And, unlike earlier seasons, they didn't fall back in 1987. Instead, they won the division for the first time in 16 years. And two years later they went to their first World Series in 27 years. And ultimately they posted five straight winning seasons, which we fans hadn't seen since the 1960s.
Yes, it was the renaissance. Those five years permanently changed San Francisco Giants baseball. Had Roger Craig, and GM Al Rosen, not come aboard and transformed the Giants in 1986, we wonder whether the league would have had the moxie to stall the threatened move to Florida in 1993, and whether there'd have been enough local motivation to step up and save the Giants for San Francisco, and to keep them in the City, in the ballpark many said couldn't be built.
Our only up-close encounter with Roger Craig was in his last season, 1992. We were fairly serious about running in those days, competing in the Bay to Breakers race every year and several 10K events. That June the Giants sponsored a pre-game 5K "Run to Home Plate", where we ran around Candlestick Point, into the parking lot, through the tunnel, down the left-field line, and touched home plate to complete the course. As we turned left past the first-base dugout, there was Roger, on the steps, watching all the fitness freaks with an amused look on his face. What to say?
"Who you got starting today, Roger?" we called.
"Left-hander," he replied with a wink, tapping his left arm. "Good stuff today."
Bud Black won that game with seven solid innings. The Giants were flirting with .500 at the time but already seven and a half games out of first. It didn't get any better, and Roger was fired that December after the ownership transfer. It was inevitable, and it was sad. His last game, in October, was a win over Cincinnati that kept the Giants nine games ahead of the last-place Dodgers, which may cheer some of you.
Roger Craig pitched, and pitched well, for three World Series champions. He coached another World Series champion. He was a teammate of Bob Uecker on the 1964 Cardinals. (We imagine they got along well.) His tenure with the 1962 New York Mets is still the stuff of legend-- did he really get caught in a stalled elevator on the way to start the first game in Mets history? Did he really balk home the first run?-- and Casey Stengel himself said Roger had to be a damned good pitcher to go 10-24 for that team in '62.
But Roger Craig has a home in the heart of every Giants fan who remembers what he did, and how he did it, for the only team that matters. Godspeed to a baseball original, a fine manager, and a good man.
