The Lowe Down

Do they call pitches from the bench (not unusual for managers with young catchers):
"No. We go over before every game we sit down with the starting pitcher that day, Rick Honeycutt and the catcher and go over the game plan. He's very smart as far as remembering what we said in that meeting. He reads hitters extremely well as far as if they move up in the box, back in the box, he remembers what they did in their last at bat. He has his priorities the right way. Catching first, hitting second."

You can tell that?
"Absolutely, because again, I was around the best in Varitek. If you have a rough at-bat, you don't come back. You may be upset at that time, but he instantly remembers, 'OK, I have to go back out there and do my job as a catcher.' You would think it would be easy, but not a lot of guys do that. He's a special catcher. I said this (earlier) for all these young kids. You hear all the praise about all these kids, they're the No. 1-rated minor league system, all that. I said this in spring training, that I give a lot of credit to the minor league coaches because not one of these kids came up here with an attitude as far as, 'Hey, did you read Baseball America? I'm the second-best whatever.' It sounds simple, but a lot of guys go by what they read. And not one of these guys has come up here thinking (they're big time). They know they're rookies, they know they have to prove themselves at this level, and to a man they've been fantastic. It goes to the minor league coaches, and goes to from the top down, from the owners all the way down that they don't allow these guys to showboat. They make sure they play the game the right way, they make sure they have the right attitude.

"I can only speak for this organization and the ones I played in before, but this organization does it as good as any."

Have you ever played in a situation where a veteran team has turned into a young one as fast as this one has?
"No. We're very fortunate to have the minor league teams that we do. Not just AAA and AA, but all the way down. And again, there's no guarantee that the veteran guys aren't going to get hurt. You've seen some guys get hurt. When you have the guys that we do that can continually step in different holes — Guzman comes up, and all you've heard great things about him, and he's going to step in just in line with the other guys and produce. It's amazing. So it's a good time to be a Dodger, because you have good veteran leadership but you have tremendous young talent that steps in, and they've carried us the majority of the games we've played."

Are they playing beyond expectations?
"If you asked these kids what they expect to do, this is all they've done in their minor league career is to succeed. So none of these kids are saying, 'Wow, I'm in awe of hitting a home run.' That's just one of the great things about this team. Young guys, old guys, we go out and play. Win or lose, no one gets excited and we show up the next day and play. Easier said than done. A lot of teams you have your highs and lows."

—BK