Dallas Green made Phillies into winners

It was the voice the Phillies heard in their dreams — and maybe their nightmares. No, not Harry Kalas. Harry’s dulcet baritone likely eased the players into lullaby land. But it was the booming bravado of Dallas Green that jarred them from their reverie — and made them into something that had eluded them for years. He made them winners.

The person who coined the saying that some people are larger than life probably had Dallas Green in mind.

Green was a giant — figuratively and literally — on the Philly sports scene.

He took a team of chronic underachievers, stuck his boot firmly in their posteriors, and dragged them kicking and screaming to the team’s first World Series championship in 1980.

For that — meaning his no-nonsense approach to the game and demand that his players bust it every night — he earned the undying respect of Philly fans. That parade in 1980 wasn’t bad either.

Like Kalas, Green was invested in the region, not just at Veterans Stadium. He made his home for years on a farm in West Grove in Chester County.

Green died Wednesday at 82.

The outpouring of emotion and expressions of gratitude from the fans should surprise no one.

No one said ‘Philly’ more than Dallas Green. And no one did it in a more emphatic voice. Just ask the players who often chafed at their manager’s pointed criticism.

Green made it clear when he took over for the fired Danny Ozark late in still one more disappointing season in 1979 that things were going to be different.

“The Phillies didn’t fire Danny Ozark,” Green told his troops. “You guys did.”

Green stood 6 feet, 5 inches tall, and his voice matched his physique.

The guy could peel the paint off the walls. The fans loved him for it; his players not so much.

He coddled no one, from superstars like Mike Schmidt and Pete Rose, to the last guy on his bench.

No one feuded with Green more than scrappy shortstop Larry Bowa, another Philly baseball lifer.

So listen to Bowa now, talking about his antagonist back then: “Dallas was what Philly is all about: toughness, honesty and fairness. Without Dallas, the Phillies would not have won the World Series in 1980. I wish all of our current players would have had the opportunity to meet Dallas. He was a huge impact on my career as a player, manager and coach.”

It worked. Those players whose ears turned crimson with every pronouncement from the manager’s office turned that anger into performance.

Eventually they turned things around, caught fire in September 1980 after another legendary Green torching, and delivered the city its first championship since the Flyers captured back-to-back Stanley Cups in the ’70s.

The 1980 Phillies, stocked with superstars that Green played a vital part in bringing to Philadelphia, was well on its way to playing down to the team’s losing reputation. That’s when Dallas Green challenged them.

Green spent six decades in baseball, all but a few of them as part of the Phillies organization. He came out of Delaware as a pitcher and compiled a 20-22 record.

That led to one his classic quips: “I’m a 20-game winner, it just took me five years to do it.”

But he made his real mark on Philly off the field, where he coached and managed in the minors, then took over the team’s farm system, delivering home-grown talent such as Schmidt and Bowa to his mentor, Phillies GM Paul Owens.

When Owens and Phillies owner Ruly Carpenter decided to make a change late in that 1979 season, they turned to Green.

The Phillies likely heard him coming long before they saw him.

“He was a big man with a big heart and a bigger-than-life personality.” That’s how Phillies Chairman David Montgomery described his friend.

Indeed Green’s voice shook up a Phillies clubhouse that badly needed it. But it did more than that. It made them — and us — winners.

Thanks, Dallas.