- April 11th, 2006, 9:20 am
#10930
I don't remember Tony pitching for us, but I remember him at the plate and on the basepaths.
Scooter turns tutor Caroline native Tony Beasley makes it to the Majorshttp://fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2006 ... 006/182260
Date published: 4/11/2006
By TODD JACOBSON
Tony Beasley (right) snares a ball tossed from teammate Nilson Robledo during a Nationals' workout in Houston Friday.
Tony Beasley never imagined coaching as a career.
Not when he was a teenager whipping a ball around Caroline County diamonds with his baseball-bred family.
Not as he starred at Louisburg (N.C.) College, and later at Liberty University, excelling as a middle infielder and pitcher.
And certainly not as he was grinding his way through the Pittsburgh Pirates' minor league system in the mid-1990s.
So when then-Pirates general manager Cam Bonifay approached Beasley in the summer of 1996 with a question--have you ever thought about coaching?--the words represented both a beginning and an end for the 5-foot-8 infielder.
Coaching meant a career after baseball for the young father and husband, but it also signaled something more ominous.
"My initial reaction was he doesn't think much of me as a player," Beasley said. "I really don't have a chance to play in the big leagues here if he is talking about coaching to me."
That was the problem. Beasley was still playing--still in the seventh season of a nine-year career that took him through two organizations and six cities.
He wasn't quite ready to give up the dream that started on the fields surrounding his childhood home in Bowling Green, where he played with his father, James, his brother, Rodney, and his many uncles.
Tony Beasley's love for the game dates back to his younger days playing in the 1980s in Caroline.
He still clung to hopes of playing in the major leagues like his uncle, Lewis, who played 25 games with the Texas Rangers in 1977.
After all, he could field like a big leaguer, and he could throw and run like one.
"Just the bat limited him to the level where he was going to go," Bonifay said.
Beasley hit .260 with 138 stolen bases in eight minor league seasons--pedestrian numbers.
But his baseball knowledge, leadership and clubhouse presence convinced Bonifay he could be a good coach.
"He just showed a lot of leadership abilities as an older player," Bonifay said. "He truly understood the game, was very knowledgeable and he had learned the game from the ground up."
Before he could accept Bonifay's offer, however, Beasley first had to reconcile his own hopes. He played two more years after Bonifay approached him--two of the best seasons of his career--before becoming a player/coach at Double-A Carolina in 1998.
"I wanted to make sure that playing was out of my blood and I didn't want to have a chip on my shoulder as far as still wanting to play and comparing myself with players," Beasley said. "When I decided to coach I wanted to make sure that all of my thoughts about playing were done."
Beasley eventually made it to the majors--just not the way he always imagined.
After a successful minor league managing career in the Pirates' organization, he was hired this offseason by the Washington Nationals to be their third-base coach.
Last week, the 39-year-old Ruther Glen resident made his big league debut when the Nationals opened the season against the New York Mets, and today at 1:05 p.m., he'll be on the field at RFK Stadium when Washington hosts the Mets in their home-opener.
And though Beasley never played a game above Triple-A, Beasley has no complaints.
He has embraced the role he once spurned.
"There are two ways of making it to the big leagues," Beasley said. "I had to take the alternative route but I am thankful that I got this opportunity."
The path
Beasley's resume reads as one long "alternative route," but his unique track through the minors proved to be the perfect training ground for a career in coaching.
He wasn't drafted out of Caroline High, so he played two years at Louisburg College, and then two more at Liberty University.
The Baltimore Orioles took a shot on the slick-fielding infielder in the 19th round of the 1989 First-Year Player Draft, but he was traded after 2 seasons to the Pirates and released in 1993.
He thought his career was done.
With his wife pregnant with son Tony Jr., he returned home to Bowling Green, worked with his father's logging company and played in the Virginia Baseball League. He planned to give baseball one more year.
"If it wasn't going to happen and I would've moved on the year after that and I probably wouldn't have looked back," Beasley said.
After a year off, baseball called, but not in the way he expected.
With major leaguers on strike in 1994 and into 1995, Beasley was re-signed by the Pirates as a replacement player.
He attended spring training, wore a big league uniform and was prepared to start the season with the Pirates when a late agreement between the Players Association and Major League Baseball ended the strike.
His big league dreams were dashed again, but his solid spring with the Pirates convinced the team to give him another chance.
"Had I not done that I probably wouldn't have been in the game now," Beasley said.
The second chance turned into a rebirth for his career, and his unique playing experience helped him relate to players as he worked his way through the minor leagues as a manager.
He'd been cut. He'd been demoted. He'd played several positions to make himself more valuable.
He'd seen prospects pass him on the major league ladder.
"I never had the luxury of coming to spring training and knowing I would leave with the team," Beasley said. "I had to make a team every year and I had to work hard at what I did."
That perspective helped him relate to his players and played a large part in his winning ways as a minor league manager.
In five seasons, from Rookie League Williamsport (Pa.) to Double-A Altoona, Beasley's teams were 372-258, never had a losing record and made the playoffs every year.
"I thought he would communicate well with the players," Bonifay said. "I thought he would be upfront and honest. A manager has to communicate and he has to be honest."
No regrets
Beasley interviewed for a job as the Cleveland Indians' first-base coach this winter and was slated to be the New York Yankees' roving infield instructor when the Nationals showed interest.
Of course, Beasley wasn't at home when the Nationals called.
No surprise. Never one to shy away from hard work, Beasley was logging with his father.
Beasley's offseason routine has involved equal parts baseball and logging with Beasley Tree Harvesters since he was in high school, and that approach always worked well.
If he thought life in the minor leagues was tough, he had only to think about icy winters cutting down trees in Caroline County.
"Hard work set him apart, kept him going," said Beasley's father, James. "He was determined he was going to play baseball."
Hard work is what got Beasley to Louisburg College and Liberty University when no member of his immediate family had attended college.
Hard work is what got Beasley drafted by the Orioles when others thought it was impossible.
"I always told people I wanted to play in the major leagues, I wanted to play professional baseball," Beasley said. "I wasn't the biggest guy so people didn't necessarily believe that and I believed it and I kept working toward that goal and it happened."
Russ Frazier, Beasley's coach at Louisburg College, said Beasley always impressed with his approach.
"You could tell he wanted to learn things," Frazier said. "It was obvious. He would pick your brain and that type of thing and he was different from some of the other kids. He was just more mature."
So it was appropriate that Beasley was operating heavy machinery in a Caroline County forest when Nationals assistant general manager Tony Siegle reached him on his cell phone.
Having heard of Beasley's work ethic and success, Washington wanted to interview Beasley the following day.
Though Beasley had never met general manager Jim Bowden or worked with anyone on the Nationals' staff, Beasley made an immediate impression.
"He came in and he blew us away in his interview," Bowden said. "He thinks alone. He has great people skills. He has great motivational skills. He knows the game inside and out. I think he is going be a special manager down the road in the big leagues."
Before that can happen, Beasley will savor this, his first season in the big leagues, one so unexpectedly close to home.
His father, brothers and sisters will be able to come to games, and Beasley, who owns a home in Ruther Glen, will be able to commute to home games.
When he steps on the field today at RFK Stadium, it won't matter that it took 17 years for Beasley to get to this point, or that he'll be standing outside the lines instead of within them.
The big leagues are what he waited for all these years, and he has no regrets.
"I don't feel I didn't have the ability to play in the big leagues," Beasley said. "It's just that I wasn't in the right situation at the right time.
"But I don't look at that and wonder or worry. I was never going to look in the mirror and say I wish I had done this or wish I had worked a little bit harder. I am happy with where I am. I am happy with the path I took."
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