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Monday, May 26, 2003

By Shelly Anderson, Post-Gazette Sports Writer

Walking onto the field before a practice, Jim Leyland noticed a huge mud puddle just outside the foul line on the third-base side near home plate.

	A player in the Beaver Valley Baseball Club gets some big-league advice on how to throw the ball from Jim Leyland. (Lake Fong, Post-Gazette)

He gestured toward the slop and said something that obviously conveyed a warning for players to avoid the area, but the message came out as guttural garble.

It was vintage Leyland.

But players were not Pirates, Marlins or Rockies.

This was Thursday night on a hilltop behind Freedom High School. These were boys, mostly 12 and 13. And Leyland was one of a handful of coaches preparing the young ballplayers for a big holiday weekend tournament in Michigan.

It's not unusual for a dad to help coach his son's team. Leyland's son, Patrick, is a catcher. The boys who play in Coach Brian Smith's Beaver Valley Baseball Club program, though, are luckier than most. One of the dads who helps coach them has a World Series ring.

"He knows his stuff," C.J. Brown, a shortstop and center fielder with the program's Red 12-year-old team, said of Leyland. "He helps us with everything."

Brown isn't old enough to remember Leyland when he managed the Pirates from 1986-96 and made three trips to the National League Championship Series, or when he won a World Series managing the Florida Marlins in 1997. But Brown understands the advantages of having someone like Leyland around.

It's the same for Nate DeFilippi, an outfielder for the Red 13-year-old squad in the Beaver Valley program.

"I was smiling all day," DeFilippi said of the time he learned Leyland would be helping the players. "He's a tremendous help."

	Patrick Leyland, second from left, prepares to receive a throw as his father, former major league manager Jim Leyland, watches players in the Beaver Valley Baseball Club program go through drills at Freedom High School last week. (Lake Fong, Post-Gazette)

Last year, Patrick Leyland became the first 10-year-old to make Smith's Red 12-year-old squad in a tryout the previous fall. Smith emphasized that Patrick got no special consideration.

"Absolutely not," Smith said. "I told Jim that from the beginning, and I think he appreciated that."

"All my kids play. These are the elite kids in Western Pennsylvania. Patrick takes his turn on the bench just like everybody else. He's a great player, but they're all great players here."

Smith, a teacher by day, began the Beaver Valley traveling program eight years ago with one team for 12-year-olds. He now coaches seven squads of what might be considered all-stars, draws players from the tri-state area and aspires to make the program a link to college scholarships for the boys. The Red 12-year-old team, including Patrick Leyland, was 24-1 entering the weekend.

The boys practice during the week and play on weekends. They have fall tryouts, a winter program, even an indoor facility.

Leyland primarily works with the youngsters during practice. He retired from managing in 1999 after one season with the Colorado Rockies. Now, as a scout for the St. Louis Cardinals at most Pirates home games, he cannot be at all of his son's weekend games.

Last season, Jim Leyland didn't work with the players.

"He was a spectator only, a parent," Smith said.

During the winter, Leyland became the program's hitting instructor. When the season began this spring, he took a more active role.

He is both hands on, in the way that he works one-on-one with the boys, and hands off, in the way that he defers to Smith and other parents and shuns extra attention.

"I set that straight right from the get-go," Leyland said. "I told them, 'Look, I'll help any of your sons that want help. If you've been working with them and you don't want anybody messing with them, that's fine.' I only assist the ones that want it."

Which is just about everyone.

"We already have good coaches, but having him here just makes it even better," DeFilippi said. "When you first meet him, you think, 'Oh, boy,' and you want to try to impress him. But as time goes on, he just wants you to play your ball. He's down to earth. He likes to work with us on technique."

Leyland focuses mostly on fundamentals. When the boys are warming up for a practice, he moves around the field, helping one player at a time.

During a scrimmage Thursday between 12- and 13-year-olds, he called for fielders to occasionally alter their positions and was quick to clap and offer praise and encouragement.

"He's a real good instructional guy, skill-specific with individual players," Smith said. "He really stresses the basics of the game. So I've seen our teams improve in just the absolute basics of baseball, and a lot of that comes from him.

"He started with some of them on something as basic as the grip of the baseball, or things like how to hit a curveball to right field. Even for the best players in the area, some of them gripped the baseball wrong. It's that kind of little fundamental thing that these kids now do right every time."

	Jim Leyland only takes the field during practice for the players in the Beaver Valley Baseball Club. (Lake Fong, Post-Gazette)

When he does go to games, Leyland makes himself inconspicuous in the dugout.

"He won't coach on the field," Smith said. "He wants to be more in the background. But he's involved in the strategy in the game if I go to him, and I call on him quite a bit to see what he has to say, any suggestions. Usually, it's the right one."

Leyland said he simply took his baseball knowledge and "condensed it down to an 11-year-old's level."

Still, the approach, the mannerisms, the gravelly voice all mark Leyland as the same man he was as a big-league manager. He might even sneak a cigarette during practice.

The situation is comfortable for Patrick Leyland, who is still playing up as an 11-year-old on the Red 12s squad.

"He knows a lot about the game and really helps all the players," Patrick said. "What is it, Dad, 57 managers who have a World Series ring?"

"Oh, I don't know, something like that," Jim said modestly, turning away and letting his voice trail off into that trademark garble.

"It's pretty neat to have him here," Patrick said. "Plus, I get to spend a lot more time with him than I have in the past years."

Although Jim Leyland likes working with all the players, Patrick is the real reason he is lending his expertise.

"It's fun to watch my son, and I'm sure once he graduates from the program I won't be here, but during this time I'm going to enjoy it," Leyland said. "I told Brian that what I'd try to add to the program is to make sure that at the end of the year, the kids are better players than when they started."

Shelly Anderson can be reached at shanderson@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1721.