Dave Schuler was about to pitch in a game after being told, for the first time in his life, that he wasn’t good enough.
A tall left-hander in his seventh year as a pro, including a couple of sips of coffee in the major leagues, Schuler had just signed as a free agent with the Kansas City Royals after being released by the then-California Angels.
His confidence shaken, Schuler was trotting out to the mound to make his debut with Triple-A Omaha when his burly first baseman, jogging past on the way to his position, said, “Come on, Schu, let’s go have some fun!” and punctuated it with a giggle.
Schuler, who barely knew the guy, was jarred.
But he’d soon get to know and respect that first baseman, and so would countless others throughout baseball.
On that day in 1982, it was future major leaguer and Norfolk Tides manager Ron Johnson who said exactly the right thing at exactly the right time.
Johnson, it turns out, was managing long before he became a manager.
Johnson died last week at 64 in a Tennessee hospital from COVID-19 complications, leaving the tight-knit baseball world floored.
He played in only 22 games in the big leagues. He coached first base for the Boston Red Sox for just two seasons. Otherwise, Johnson was a coach or manager in the minors for 30 years, sharing dugouts and clubhouses and never-ending bus rides with thousands of players, most of whom you’ve never heard of.
So why was Johnson so celebrated in death? Why the outpouring from major leaguers spanning generations for a minor league lifer?
The short answer: This man with the most ordinary of names was nothing short of extraordinary at his job and all that came with it.
As Schuler first saw during the early part of the Reagan administration, Johnson was perhaps born to manage baseball players.
On the field, his bona fides spoke for themselves. It was between the last pitch and the first when Johnson worked his real magic.
Perpetually upbeat, he was the same guy every day, win or lose. Among Johnson’s favorite sayings after a rough night was, “Turn the page,” baseball’s time-honored reminder that there’s another game and another chance for success tomorrow.
Johnson didn’t care if one of his players was a first-rounder or an undrafted free agent; he treated them all the same, considering each a prime candidate to somehow help the parent club. That’s why they were there.
Johnson managed egos as well as he managed bunt situations and pitching changes. The truth is that most players don’t want to be in Triple-A, where creature comforts pale in comparison to those in the bigs.
It was Johnson’s job to make it palatable, and he did it by being fearlessly fair, fully transparent and endlessly fun.
Former Baltimore Orioles skipper Buck Showalter frequently called Johnson “the best Triple-A manager in baseball.”
Johnson, who loved to brag about his wife, Daphane, and their five kids, had an uncanny way of making anyone feel welcome in his Harbor Park office, from the Orioles’ GM to the nervous batboy on his first day of work to, yes, the beat writer he had to see every day.
Few had more frequent interaction with Johnson than Ian Locke, the Tides’ director of media relations. Locke often had to contact the skipper when the team was on the road.
“Any time we talked — either by text or by phone — it wasn’t just about ‘business,’ ” Locke said. “He’d ask how my wife was doing or tell me about some crazy movie he was watching or predict what would happen next on ‘Game of Thrones.’ He was a chatterbox, but in the best way because it always left you laughing whenever you got off the phone with him.”
But laughs never got in the way of the job.
For major league veterans down on their luck, Johnson convinced them they could get back to where they were. For younger guys on their way up, he made them believe their ascent was inevitable if they just kept working.
“He just gave you so much confidence every time you went out there,” said former Tides right-hander Jimmy Yacabonis, now with the Seattle Mariners.
“He just brought the best out of you, the player that you are. He would never try to change you. He never tried to make you into something that you weren’t. He knew how to get the best out of you at all times, and that’s what he did, man. It’s just such a shame that he’s gone. I’ll miss him, for sure.”
Johnson’s personal skill set, honed over a lifetime in the game, is why messages of mourning came from all corners of baseball. Current and former major league stars like Zack Britton, Adam Jones, Kevin Youkilis, Mark Gubicza, Kevin Gausman and Cookie Rojas, all of them affected in some way by the man known universally as “R.J.,” were among those who expressed their grief on social media.
Schuler, who appeared in a total of 18 major league games over 12 professional seasons, soon became Johnson’s road roommate with Omaha. He remembers late-night games of backgammon in the hotel room, Johnson’s boundless energy and the license plate on Johnson’s old Datsun.
For a self-deprecating but capable player drafted by the Royals in the 24th round in 1978, the non-vanity plate was perfect: “NOBONUS.”
When Johnson jogged past him that day with Omaha, Schuler, now 67, found himself baffled. Did this stranger on his way to first base know something he didn’t?
“Why would somebody say that to me running out to the mound?” Schuler said. “I mean, I just got there. He had a feel. He had a feel for people.
“I had a lot of anxiety. But he must’ve put himself in my position to say, ‘Come on, Shu, let’s go have some fun!’ And he gave me that little giggle. The great giggle. He was the master of that giggle, that snicker.”
And guess what: Newly relaxed, Schuler pitched great that night. He even made it back to the big leagues three years later.
It was but one example of the effect of Johnson’s “feel” for his fellow humans, arguably the most valuable asset a Triple-A manager can possess.
Let not the measure of Ron Johnson, baseball man, be that most of his work was done in the obscurity of the minors. Let it instead be that, from beginning to end, it was done right and well.
David Hall, david.hall@pilotonline.com
