Oldie: Joe Girardi Recieves NU Engineering Award

Evanston, Ill. - Former pro baseball player Joe Girardi visited Northwestern University on Tuesday where he was presented with the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Department of Industrial Engineering/Management Sciences. The award was created 4 years ago and recognizes the notable achievements and leadership roles of selected department graduates.

In his illustrious pro baseball career, Girardi caught for 4 major league teams over 15 seasons and collected 3 World Series rings. He retired as a player in 2003, but returned to baseball to manage the Florida Marlins last year. Despite being named the National League Manager of the Year for his ability to work with Florida’s young talent, he was fired by the Marlins last October.

Girardi, a three-time Academic All-American and two-time All-Big Ten selection in his four years at Northwestern, praised his alma mater in a brief speech before about 80 people.

“A Northwestern education is going to open doors for you,” said Girardi. “My favorite four years of life as a baseball player were right here. I absolutely loved it.”

“I didn’t understand the importance of what my parents did [to send me to NU] until I was about 25. A lot of you appreciate where you are now, and you’ll appreciate it more as you get older,” he said.

The Fort Lauderdale resident also spoke about how his Northwestern education and degree, which seems quite engineering-specific, helped him with his baseball career.

“You think about industrial engineers as being problem solvers, and in baseball, that's all you do," said Girardi. “There are situations that come up all the time that you use things that you learned in school on how to solve problems.

“You are going to use your industrial engineering degree in life, in ways you don’t even know yet.”

When Girardi managed an inexperienced Marlins team last year, fan and media expectations were incredibly low. However, after an abysmal start, Girardi led Florida to a respectable 78-84 record. He discussed how, as a leader, he motivated his young team.

“Just because you’re young doesn’t mean you can’t do your job,” said Girardi. “You have to show them. A lot of times people want to manage from a piece of paper. But that can’t account for the heart, which can get a lot of people through things.”

“I don’t think you should ever set limits on people,” he said. A manager’s job is to instill confidence. My goal was to win the World Series, not win 70 games.”

Andrew Pellegrini, a sophomore at Northwestern studying economics, was glad to hear Girardi speak.

“Being the Manager of the Year in baseball doesn’t happen by accident,” said Pellegrini. “He dealt with one of the most difficult and accountable positions in the business world, and last year, he dealt with it the best.”