Terry Collins admits that when he got the call late last year that he was named to the latest class of the Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame, he was unfamiliar with the organization.
But once they shared the Hall’s mission and who was eligible to be inducted, the longtime minor league player who then enjoyed an even longer career as a coach, manager and front office employee had one question to make sure this whole thing was legitimate.
“I wanted to know if Dave Parker was already in,” said Collins, who hit .255 as a member of the 1972 Pirates, but went on to a decorated managing career that included stints with the Houston Astros, Anaheim Angels and New York Mets. It was that body of work, Collins was told, that put him over the top in the eyes of Southwest Virginia baseball enthusiasts.
Parker, who was the undisputed star of the ’72 Pirates who won the Carolina League championship, was part of the Hall’s inaugural class of five inducted in 1992. Parker went on to be one of the greatest players in Pirates history, leading the team to a world championship in 1979 and hitting 339 home runs during his 19-year career.
Collins participated in the induction ceremonies on Sunday with four others, longtime Northside High School coach Ed Culicerto and Southwest Virginia natives Casey Hodges, JD Mundy and F.L. Slough.
“I don’t remember a whole lot about Salem, but I do know I was just out of college and playing in one of the best leagues at that time,” he said. “I mean everybody talked about the Carolina League. If you were going to be a big leaguer, you had to be able to compete here.”
Several did very well. That 1972 roster included Parker, Ed Ott (a 1997 Salem-Roanoke Hall inductee), Ken Macha (2007), as well as longtime major league pitcher Doug Bair and infielder Mario Mendoza.
Yes, that’s the same Mario Mendoza who hit .215 during his nine-year career in the majors, establishing what is now known to hitters as the “Mendoza Line.” But Collins said there was a reason he managed to stick around.
“I had been a shortstop in my first season, but in spring training, they told me I was going to be playing second base [in Salem],” Collins said. “They said they had [Mendoza] who was going to play shortstop. And then when I saw him play shortstop, I said ‘yeah, I belong on the other side.'”
This past weekend marked the sixth time he had been inducted into a hall of fame. It’s something that happens when you spend more than 50 years involved in a sport like baseball. And while he is always glad to receive such an honor, he can also be thrilled to see former teammates or players he managed garner even higher accolades.
Collins cannot stop smiling when he is asked about this summer’s induction ceremony at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. First, his good friend Parker was added to the membership when the hall’s veterans committee voted him in late last year. Collins and Parker never played together after that season in Salem, but while Collins managed the Angels, he hired Parker to be his first-base coach.
“A few years ago, I started getting letters from [Parker’s Hall of Fame advocates], asking me to write letters on behalf of Dave to hopefully get him in the Hall of Fame,” Collins said. “I wrote several to whoever it might have concerned. … He deserved to be in there, and fortunately the veteran guys got it right.”
Joining Parker on Hall of Fame weekend will be another member of the Salem-Roanoke Hall, Tazewell High School graduate and former Ferrum College star Billy Wagner. Collins was Wagner’s manager when he was called up briefly in late 1995 and again in 1996, when he became a permanent member of the Houston Astros’ pitching staff.
“When I first saw him in the minors, he was a starting pitcher,” Collins said of Wagner. “I remember talking to my pitching coach and he said, ‘You know, he’s going to be a starting pitcher when he’s just 5-foot-10. But with that fastball, don’t be afraid to put that guy in.’”
He was right, as Wagner recorded 1,196 strikeouts and 422 saves in his career.
After nine seasons of falling short of winning the minimum of 75 percent of votes cast by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, Wagner reached the threshold last month
While Collins’ connection with the Roanoke Valley was as a player — Salem was the second stop of a 10-year minor league career — his inclusion in the Hall has more to do with the body of work he produced following his playing days.
Collins transitioned to coaching in his final minor league years. He started as a player-coach and eventually became a manager in the Dodgers’ organization, which he said was one of the best places to learn how to run a baseball team.
“There was a time in the Dodgers organization when I was a minor league manager, when you were at [the Dodgers Florida spring training complex], there was [staff lounge in the back],” Collins said. “You would go back, and Sandy Koufax would be back there, Don Drysdale, Johnny Padres, Maury Wills, Wes Parker, and you’d sit there, shut up and listen.
“Then you’d walk outside, and sitting in his wheelchair was Roy Campenella holding court with the catchers. Where else can you learn that?”
The years of listening paid off, he said. Collins eventually managed the Dodgers’ Triple-A affiliate and later served in the same capacity for the Pirates at their top farm team in Buffalo. Following those two successful stints, Collins was named the manager of the Houston Astros, where he spent three seasons. That was followed by another three-year run for the Anaheim Angels.
Collins credits the two Dodgers managers who reigned during his time with that club — Walter Alston and Tommy Lasorda — as major influences on how he did his job. And once he did get the Astros job, two contemporaries — Sparky Anderson and Jim Leyland — spent time with him as well, helping him prepare for the tasks that faced him.
“So, you have Alston, Lasorda, Sparky and Leyland — four Hall of Famers that I learned by craft from,” he said. “That’s pretty good.”
Both stops did not go as well as he had hoped, Collins said.
His 1994 Astros team featured some of the best players in the game at the time, including Hall of Fame members Jeff Bagwell and Craig Biggio, and Houston trailed NL Central leader Cincinnati by just a half game when activity came to an abrupt halt in mid-August due to a players’ strike. The dispute was never resolved, and the rest of the season, including the World Series, was canceled.
“It was really a shame because we had a really great team that year,” he said.
After he parted ways with Houston in 1996, Collins was named the manager of the Anaheim Angels. In his first two years, the Angels fell just short of the AL West title, first to the Seattle Mariners and then to the Texas Rangers. In his third year with the club, Collins said injuries plagued the team, which won just 70 games. Collins resigned late in the season.
That was his last major league managing job for more than a decade, although he stayed busy, serving in various minor league capacities for the Dodgers. In 2006, he began a two-stint with the Orix Buffaloes of Japan’s Pacific League. When he returned, a longtime Dodger colleague of his, Paul DePodesta, had moved on to the New York Mets and hired Collins to be the director of minor league operations. That eventually led to Collins being promoted to manager of the big-league team prior to the 2011 season.
By then Collins, who had the reputation of having a fiery style to his management approach, had ebbed a bit. His less-intense attitude turned out to be a great match for New York City.
“I learned more patience, especially when I was the farm director,” Collins said. “I learned to be patient with players, and I also realized that [managing] jobs were hard to get and you should have fun doing the job.”
Collins spent seven seasons in that job, the longest tenure of any Mets manager and is second to Davey Johnson in all-time wins with 551. The 2015 team also won the National League pennant, giving Collins his first trip to the World Series. The Mets fell in the series to the Kansas City Royals in five games, but it was still an experience Collins will never forget.
“I can’t possibly explain what it’s like standing on the third-base line in Kansas City — or even when we swept the Cubs [to win the pennant],” Collins said. “When you’re born and raised a baseball guy like me, and you reach the ultimate of the ultimate.
“When I was in sixth grade, my mother would write a note and say I had a doctor’s appointment, so I could watch the World Series. Then to all of a sudden be there for the first time, there’s nothing like it.”
Collins retired after the 2017 season, although he did remain as a team adviser for a short time. Since then, most of his involvement in baseball has been on the broadcast side. He still does some work as a pregame and postgame commentator on the Mets’ television broadcasts and was part of a Mets podcast this past season, although he does not plan on returning to that job.
And at age 75, he said managing is now in his past.
“I’ve been away now for eight years, and the game has changed,” Collins said. “I disagree with the way it’s played today, the intentional walk rule, the ghost runner at second base in the 10th inning, pitch counts. It’s a whole different game.”