Winning isn't everything The "winningest" manager of the Montreal Expos doesn't recall all his wins as his greatest achievement but catching a fish. by Victor Lee       The tropical storm was heading straight for Haina, Dominica Republic. The Alou family had little to eat, and it would be days before the waters would be calm enough to fish. With little time to spare, Jose Alou raced to the beaches to take one desperate shot at feeding his family.     Fourteen-year-old Felipe followed his father and watched as he cast the line from his bamboo pole into the storm-driven waves. Time after time Jose tried, but caught nothing. All the while Felipe begged for one chance, But his father feared the waves would overtake his son. Finally, Jose said Felipe could try once.     The father watched anxiously, staying close by in case the waves swept over his son. Felipe flung the line as far it would go. “Immediately I felt something,” Felipe says. “It was a 4- or 5-pound grouper.”     The family ate. The storm passed. But the memory has stuck in the heart and mind of Felipe, 62, who is perhaps his county’s most revered and accomplished athlete ever. He was a baseball and track star as an amateur in the D.R. Then he played 17 season in the major leagues, amassing 2,101 hits, 206 home runs, and 852 RBI while hitting .286. He and brother Jesus and Matty made history with the San Francisco Giants in 1963 as the only three brothers ever to play in the outfield.     Alou will become the Montreal Expos’ all-time winningest manger this season and has 884 wins in the minors. In 1994 he was National League Manger of the year.     But Felipe says, “To me, catching that fish is the biggest achievement of my life, because that day we ate.     There were no odds possible for catching that fish, but I caught that fish This happened 48 years ago, and I still feel really excited about this.”     For Alou, honours do not reflect the man; honour does. Alou is a faithful man, and an immensely respected one. He does not have to yell at or intimidate his player—a look from Alou will draw a young man to him for guidance. He wears his wisdom well, and he is careful to give credit where it is due.     “I found out in life that you’ve got to be humble,” he told me once as we stood on a pier over the ocean off South Florida, doing what Felipe best—fishing. “You’ve got to stay low-key when you’re way up there, especially in sports. You can be humiliated at any time. I don’t want to boast about anything. God has given me every good thing I have. You must stay humble.”     Alou remained humble and patient through a long minor league managerial career. “I was hear in the West Palm for six years managing Class A, and baseball-wise I didn’t have any future,” Alou said on a March day during spring training in South Florida. “And I wasn’t complaining about not having any future or worrying about it. I was very happy to be here because the six years I had here were the most wonderful years of my life as a Christian, as a manager, and also as a fisherman.”     Then his wife, Lucie, a Montreal native, announced they were going to have their second child. Class A managers don’t make a lot of money.     At 57, Felipe was concerned about his family’s well-being. When the Expos called to say they wanted him back in the big leagues, this time as a coach,    Felipe saw that as God’s provision for his family. Less than two months into the season, the Expos manager was fired and Felipe took over, beating the odds become a big-league manager at age 57.     It appeared Alou would lead his team to the World Series. The Expos had the best record in baseball in 1994, but a strike came and there was no World Series . Since then. the club’s financial woes have forced it to trade most of its outstanding players, consistently leaving Alou with up-and-coming talent that is always going somewhere else for its prime.     He could be frustrated but Felipe sees God’s hand, “After the 1994 baseball season, when we didn’t get the chance to win, the Lord seemed to tell me, ‘I didn’t send you here to win the pennant; I sent you here to be a witness for Me.’     “We will try to win, but the main purpose of my being here was not to win the pennant. There is a greater purpose.” To be watched. To be learned from. To be a beacon for Christ. Dave Jauss, a former coach under Alou and now first base coach for the Boston Red Sox, sums it up best. “When you talk about Felipe the player, he was outstanding,” Jauss says. “The man is better.”     Victor Lee is a freelance writer living in Wake Forest, NC. This is a revision of a story that originally appeared in Sports Spectrum. [LLN-Online] [Adopt-a-Block] [Newsbriefs][Event Calendar] [Lifestyles] [Juke Box] [Cover to Cover] [Movieguide][Casting the Net] [Viewpoints] [General Info] [Rates & Sizes][Marketplace/Classifieds] [Volunteer Ops] [Writing Guidelines] [Contact Us] [Subscribe][Archives][Good News] [About Us][Links]