Manuel in Wisconsin Rapids

Nice pictures to go along with this Philadelphia Inquirer story about Charlie Manuel, current manager of the Phillies and one time manager of the Wisconsin Rapids Twins.

This was 1983, long before that bench-jockeying manager won a World Series and now has the Phillies back in the Series looking to repeat. Charlie Manuel's first managerial job was for a single-A club in a Wisconsin paper-mill town.

"I could fish at night when the game was over," Manuel said Friday when asked about his season managing the Wisconsin Rapids Twins. "I could walk right outside the locker room, there was a river about a block away. I'd walk down there and have . . . a Grain Belt beer, or Old Style. I used to say Old Style was my lucky beer."

If all that sounds like Charlie, understand this was a 39-year-old version. Known as a patient type now, he rarely held back in those days - once challenging his entire team to a fistfight.

It's a longer article -- four pages on the web -- and I recommend it for a few reasons. I can't copy and paste the picture of Witter Field's entrance that is in the slideshow and there are stories like this:

Manuel stood up for his guys. One time, the entire team was fined for a bench-clearing brawl. Manuel thought the franchise, which was owned by the paper mill, should pay the fine, not the players.

"Charlie had his way of thinking about things," Klump said. "He said, 'I would have fined you if you had stayed on the bench during the fight. You shouldn't get fined individually for going out.' "

So Manuel told his players to go home, they were going to forfeit that night.

Later, Klump said, he drove by the field and saw the lights on and the game going. He found out the front office had agreed to pay the fine, and Manuel had rounded up enough players to take the field.

"I just kept going," Klump said. "I wasn't pitching that night."

Read it all the way to the end for the story about one of Manuel's WR Twins players showing up in Miami for a Phillies game and trying to get Manuel's attention after a loss.