Editor’s note: Al Lesar wrote about Michiana sports for 32 years at the “South Bend Tribune.” In 2017, he retired, gave away his snowblower, and moved to Tennessee. He keeps a pulse on what's happening in Michiana and tries to give some historical perspective.
Thanks to an elite medical team, the support of family and friends, and a stubborn will to be healthy, Mark Haley is recovering from the nightmare of last year.
What started with surgery to repair a cerebral spinal fluid leak near his right ear got complicated by a brain hemorrhage. Several surgeries and six months in rehab facilities got him to the point in which he has finally returned to his Granger home.
Haley is a baseball lifer who had to take a break from the game.
“Hales,” as he’s known to his baseball friends, is a rare bird. The barrel-chested former catcher from the University of Nebraska (1983 graduate) took over as the South Bend Silver Hawks manager in 2005. What made him unique was that he lived in Michiana full-time. While most players and coaches with South Bend’s low Class A franchise were in town from April to September, Hales was invested in the community.
He had chances to move up the chain in the Arizona Diamondbacks organization, but chose to stay to give stability to his family.
“It takes a special person to manage at the Class A level. You have to be a manager, coach, father, mother, and local priest,” Bob Gebhard, who was Arizona’s assistant to the general manager in 2011, said.
That’s not to say he didn’t enjoy the occasional perk from the big club.
One season, when the Diamondbacks were in the pennant race, Hales was part of the group that got called up in September when rosters were expanded. The extra players needed someone to shepherd them. He got to spend a couple weeks in “The Show.”
“These are games that count on the back of baseball cards,” Hales said back then, in awe of the scope of his opportunity.
Hales managed the Silver Hawks through the 2014 season, when the Cubs took over the affiliation. He left the dugout and moved to the Performance Center, where he’s been general manager ever since.
He took with him a ton of stories that came from almost 40 years in professional baseball. Every time I’d run into him at the ballpark, I’d pester him about writing his memoirs. Then, he’d tell another story and I’d worry that I didn’t know enough about defamation and libel law to get through it without a lawsuit.
In July, 2011, I spent a full day with him — from the time he left his house in the morning until the time he returned home well after midnight — to find out what really made him tick.
I came away with more stories than I knew what to do with.
He talked about the time, as a younger fella who was newly married, he spent a night on the town with Mickey Mantle at a convention, thanks to a mutual friend.
“It was four in the morning, my ride back to the hotel left,” Hales said. “Mickey said, ‘Hell, let’s just stay over at the mutual friend’s house.’ My wife called the next day and said I hadn’t been back to the hotel all night. I said, ‘I was out with Mickey Mantle,’ she said, ‘Yeah right. Who was she? Were you with some woman?’”
Then there was the night at another convention when he was out with Yankees Manager Billy Martin.
“I was young, about 240 pounds, and lifting weights all the time,” he said. “There’s me, Don Mattingly, Billy Martin, and Lou Piniella. We’re hitting the cocktails pretty hard. Billy Martin says to me, ‘You got my back?’ I said, “I got your back.’ He said, ‘You got my back?’ I said, ‘Yeah Billy, I’ve got your back.’ He said, ‘OK.’ He turns to this big guy and says, ‘What are you lookin’ at?’ We all started laughing.”
Hales has coached baseball all over the country, as well as Venezuela. One of his more interesting stops was Alaska, paradise for a guy who loves fishing.
“None of the fields has lights,” he said. “You play a game that starts at seven o’clock, then afterward you get your gear and go fishing. It hardly ever was dark in the summer.”
When Hales left the field, he didn’t stop having fun with his buddies. During spring training, there are meetings for all managers and coaches in the organization first thing in the morning. One steadfast rule is that all cellphones must be off, or fines will be levied.
“I’d call my buddies, because I’m sure they forgot to turn off their phones,” Hales said. “I love getting them in trouble.”
His sense of humor is legendary, but so is his work ethic. A shirt, with a typical Haley quote on the back, was sold to help with medical expenses: “Play hard; practice harder.”
Hales even took pregame warmups seriously and got the message across to his players. Scouts and team officials love to see the hustle young ballplayers have when it comes those times nobody is supposed to be watching.
As he’s hitting fly balls, making sure the cut-off man is hit, and pelting grounders around the infield, Hales would give his players hand signals if: A scout’s watching; an organizational assistant; an organization big shot; or the Major League club’s general manager himself is there to observe.
It all comes down to giving his ballplayers their best chance to succeed.
Keep getting better, Hales.