Dungy talks with Yankees about being a team
Former Indianapolis Colts coach Tony Dungy, left, greets Boston Red Sox manager Terry Francona before the game at Yankee Stadium. (Sept. 25, 2010) Credit: John Dunn
Seeking to motivate his players as they close in on another postseason berth, manager Joe Girardi on Saturday turned over the Yankees' clubhouse to a football coach with a Super Bowl win on his resume.
Enter Tony Dungy, the positive thinker who led the Indianapolis Colts to victory against the Chicago Bears in Super Bowl XLI.
Speaking to reporters on the field about an hour before the game, Dungy estimated that he spoke to the Yankees in the clubhouse for about five minutes, focusing on perseverance and "hanging together down the stretch."
Dungy said he used examples from the Colts' Super Bowl run in speaking to the Yankees about the importance of being a team in every sense of the word. "In the important games,'' he said, "it's not necessarily who has the most talent but who sticks together and executes their fundamentals the best."
Girardi originally tried to get Dungy to speak to the team during spring training, but Dungy said his schedule never worked out. So they put it on hold until this month, which worked much better for Dungy; he is in New York every weekend during the NFL season because of his work with NBC's "Football Night in America."
"I admire him tremendously - for his faith, for his beliefs, the type of man he is, the type of family man, the type of coach," Girardi said. "I've read his books. I subscribe to his website. Yeah, a ton of respect."
Dungy said he has given motivational speeches to college football and basketball teams but had never spoken to a major-league baseball team. He said the Yankees did not pay him.
Said Phil Hughes, "It's nice to have guys like that who have had so much success in other sports, not necessarily talking to you about the fundamentals of baseball, more about preparing for what's ahead of us."
With Erik Boland
