Mackanin wins over young Phillies with easy, confident manner

IT MIGHT BE hard to believe, but Pete Mackanin wasn't always the mild-mannered, player-friendly manager he is today.

Eight years after finishing his big-league playing career in 1981 with the Minnesota Twins, Mackanin, then 38, found himself storming back to his hotel room in a fit of rage one night after a tough loss as the manager of Aguilas del Zulia, a team in the Venezuelan Winter League.

"I was just really going off and I was losing it, and my wife said to me, 'Are you going to have a heart attack over this? What are you doing?' and it stuck with me," Mackanin recalled. "I said, 'You know what? I'm not going to have a heart attack over this. We're either going to win or lose.' "

Mackanin, who became the Phillies' interim manager after Ryne Sandberg stepped down in late June, is in his third stint as a fill-in skipper in the major leagues. He posted a 12-14 record with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 2005 and a 41-39 mark with the Cincinnati Reds in 2007.

Mackanin has led the Phils to a slightly under .500 record since taking over, but the team is 13-4 since the All-Star break.

"Pete brings everybody a lot of motivation and a lot of confidence, because that's the person that I play around with a lot, and sometimes I feel like he's not the manager, because he likes to play around with everybody, and he's confident," rookie third baseman Maikel Franco said. "He's been giving everybody an opportunity to play, and that's what's happening right now."

As the Phillies continue to pick up steam in the second half, despite still having the major leagues' worst record, talk of Mackanin becoming the full-time manager after this season has begun to swirl around the clubhouse.

Mackanin says he doesn't give any thought to it.

"I'm content with what I'm doing right now, not to say I wouldn't want to manage, to have that interim label taken off, but at the same time . . . we'll wait and see what happens," Mackanin said.

On a team with so many Hispanic players, Mackanin's ability to speak Spanish has helped him build a rapport with them that Ryne Sandberg couldn't during his tenure.

"I don't know if it's helping me, but I know I like to joke around with the Latino guys, and I make my mistakes along the way," Mackanin said. "But it's funny, I found out through all those years in Latin America that if you make an effort to try to speak the language, they love it.

"So I make an effort."

As his rookie campaign moves closer toward its conclusion, Maikel Franco has continued to stay hot at the plate.

The Phillies' starting third baseman is hitting .283, third-highest average among rookies, with 12 home runs and 45 runs batted in. Over the previous seven days, Franco hit .304, with one homer, six RBI, four runs and two walks.

Maybe his greatest moment in Philadelphia came on Tuesday night, when Franco hit a go-ahead grand slam to help lift the Phillies to a 6-2 win over the NL West-leading Los Angeles Dodgers.

As far as his approach, Franco says he hasn't changed much. He credits staying true to his work ethic and personality as the key to his success.

"Energy, confidence," he said. "That's what I want to do, because you have to have fun, you have to enjoy the game and enjoy the moment."