WASHINGTON — Dusty Baker walked into the conference room at Nationals Park on Monday, still in his street clothes except for a pair of red flip-flops he had on over his socks — a sign of a man whose mind was elsewhere, or perhaps whose shoes were soaked by pounding afternoon rain.
After a few minutes of the usual baseball chatter, he was asked about Don Baylor, the former major league player and manager who passed away early Monday morning at age 68. Baker was born 13 days before Baylor, and their careers paralleled each other for decades — never intersecting for long, but never too far apart.