Baseball Icon Dusty Baker: The Life Lessons Baseball Taught Me

SPEAKER_1 (0:00)

Finding a doctor is hard enough. Finding the right doctor, even harder. Someone who takes your insurance, has an available appointment when you need one, and feels like someone you can actually open up to.

That's where ZocDoc comes in. Download the ZocDoc app to search and compare doctors by specialty, insurance, and availability. Read real patient reviews, find the right fit for you, and book instantly because getting seen by the right doctor matters. ZocDoc, ready to be seen? Download the ZocDoc app today.

SPEAKER_2 (0:31)

Hey, Spotify listeners. When you travel with American Airlines, you'll enjoy comfort and convenience at every altitude. Before takeoff, unwind in the Admiral's Club Lounge with curated self-serve offerings of hearty bites and refreshments. In flight, stay connected with high-speed Wi-Fi, sponsored by AT&T. Your journey is designed to feel easy from the moment you check in to the moment you arrive. No matter where you're going, American gets you there. Book now at aaa.com.

SPEAKER_3 (0:57)

If you're building AI agents, you should check out Strands Agents. It's an open-source SDK for Python and TypeScript. The idea is simple. Give a model some tools that it decide what to call and when, and loop until it's done.

No chain configs, no graph orchestration, and works with any model provider. It's also open-source and built and tested for production agents. Get started at strandsagents.com.

Anthony Scaramucci (1:23)

Trust your feelings in the box, which is sort of your hitting philosophy about being in the batter's box. But I feel like it translated into every facet of your life.

Dusty Baker (1:34)

Well, it has.

There was a time when I used to doubt those feelings, because we're always told that, hey, nobody's right all the time or everything has an equation, everything has an absolute about it. But some things that we're getting away from are feelings that God gave us. I see it in kids. I saw it in my son and daughter when they were young. They trust their feelings. They're like, I don't really like that guy that much. Or dad, that guy is a good guy. You've seen your kids sometime won't go to Aunt Hazel, but they hang around Uncle Charlie. And I learned from my kids really, and I learned from Hank Aaron about in the box, he says, you'll never be a good hitter until you learn to trust your feelings. And he said, if something told him that they were going to throw him an O2 fastball, they were going to throw him an O2 fastball. When he told me that, I'm looking at guys play in the game. And have you ever seen a guy take a pitch and then swing after the pitch is already there? That shows me that he didn't trust his feelings, that he second guessed himself because he knew it was coming, but it really didn't make sense that it was going to, so he didn't trust it.

Anthony Scaramucci (2:36)

Welcome to Open Book. I am your host, Anthony Scaramucci. Joining me today is legendary baseball player and manager and bestselling author Dusty Baker. The title of the book is Crossroads, A Memoir in Baseball and Life. Dusty, welcome to the show.

It's an honor to have you. What a book, though. I mean, you wrote such- Oh, thank you, Moose. You know, let me tell you something. You wrote such a real book. Really? We're going to get into it. Yeah, no, I felt you in the book. I felt the trials and the tribulations of what you're going through. We don't know each other. We have a lot of friends in common, and I think if you ever come to my office in New York, up on the wall is a picture of Jackie Robinson, because he's one of my heroes. You know, I think about him all the time, and I think about, you know, what you did and the sacrifices that all of you guys did has just made the society better. So before we get into all that, I want to talk about you and your extraordinary life. Okay. Tell me why, why did you write this book?

And by the way, you took a, you made a decision, Dusty. You were like, I'm leaving everything on the field here in this book. I'm going to pour it all into this book.

Dusty Baker (3:52)

Most of it. You know, nobody leaves everything. You know, there's nobody that... Most of it.

Anthony Scaramucci (3:58)

You got a lot in there. If there's more to know, I'm looking forward to the next book.

Dusty Baker (4:02)

I know. No, there is no next book. If I do the next book, it'll be a children's book. I'm serious. That's what they've been asking me to do. Yeah. But, you know, I'm just thinking...