Dallas Green, The Mouth that Roared

By Richard Summers, Site Administrator 3/22/2017

It’s one of those little sports irony for Philadelphia sports fans that it took a man named Dallas to bring Philadelphia a title.  97 years of Phillies futility were swallowed up by the Mouth that roared.

Green yelled.  Green cussed.  Green fought with his players.  Green insulted them in the press… and somehow got the Philadelphia Phillies somewhere they had never been in their entire lackluster history.  On top of the world.

Dallas Green passed away today at the age of 82.  Father time finally accomplished what millionaires, all-stars and hall-of-famers on the Phillies roster were unable to do.  Shut him up.

Though it’s Green’s combative nature that gained the headlines, it was his baseball acumen that brought him to that mountaintop.  Years spent playing for the Phillies, managing their minor leaguers, working as the farm director under general manager Paul Owens gave Green a unique perspective on the team.  He had been at the bottom of the organization, both as a player and as a manager.  He knew the Philadelphia Phillies organization better than perhaps anyone.

He also knew how to light a fire under a team known for playoff collapses and lackluster attitudes.  Word given through the press.  Profanity-laced tirades.  Benchings of established stars in favor of hungry rookies.  Strict rules in the clubhouse and on road trips.  Signs proclaiming “We, not I” in spring training.

And, when it was over, when the mountain had been climbed and the demons fully exorcised, there were tears, hugs and kisses for all those players.  It was certainly tough love at times.  But it was a deep, focused love Dallas Green has for those Phillies.

Green would move on when the Carpenter family sold the Phillies.  He helped build a division-winning Cubs team, partially by fleecing the Phils for future hall-of-famer Ryne Sandberg.  But his combativeness soured the Cubs executives, and he left the Cubs in 1987.  Two managing stints in New York – one for the Yankees, one for the Mets – proved unfulfilling.  Green would return to his baseball home as a special advisor of the Phils, a position he would fill the rest of his life.

I had the pleasure of meeting Mr. Green at the Carpenter Complex during spring training a few years back.  A few years older, but still tall and imposing, Green nevertheless gave me a thrill with a brief conversation about a topic we shared a passion for – the Philadelphia Phillies.  The nucleus was there for the second golden era of Phillies baseball, and Green spoke with this fan for nearly 10 minutes talking about how excited he was to see the kids coming up.  He was right then.

He was also right in 1980.  The ring he wore proved that.

Thank you for the thrill, Mr. Green.  Not only for the championship you brought to Philadelphia in my childhood.  But also for being a class act and giving  a huge Phillies fan a bit of your time that day in Clearwater.  Both are cherished memories, and I am grateful.

Rest in peace, Dallas Green.

• Phillies
• Philly.com (Frank Fitzpatrick)
• Philly.com (Bill Lyon)
• CSN Philly
• Chicago Tribune