Brian Graham was the manager of the Kinston Indians during the 1990 and 1991 seasons — the two best seasons in Kinston professional baseball history.

Editor’s note: This story is the second of a five-part series on the historic run by the 2019 Down East Wood Ducks. The next parts of the series will publish around noon the next three days.

By Bryan Hanks

The pace the 2019 Down East Wood Ducks are on — following Tuesday’s victory against Fayetteville, the Woodies are only six wins from setting the all-time single-season victories mark for Kinston professional baseball — brings to mind a pair of the greatest seasons in the city’s history.

Two of the three best seasons in Kinston’s history were led by Brian Graham in 1990 and 1991, when he was the manager of the Kinston Indians.

Starting in 1990, Graham managed Cleveland Indians farm teams to eight consecutive playoff appearances, including his only two seasons in Kinston. In 1991, he led the K-Tribe to an 89-49 regular season record and the Carolina League title, that is tied with the 2001 team for most wins in a regular season. The season before, he led the Indians to an 88-47 regular season mark, which is tied for third for most wins but is the best record for a Kinston pro team in winning percentage (.652).

“Honestly, we had good players and we had a good organization with the Indians,” said Graham during a phone interview on Tuesday. “There was a good structure in place and overall, it was a good development program.”

Graham credited his starting pitching of Curtis Leskanic, Oscar Munoz and Paul Byrd, all of whom went on to make it to the big leagues, for a big part of the 1991 team’s success.

“When you have guys like that who eventually make it to the big leagues and can go to the mound every fifth day, it really gives you a good chance,” Graham said.

Brian Giles, who went on to have a 15-year MLB career, hit in the middle of the lineup for Graham and the K-Tribe.

“We had Brian and we had an extremely, extremely fundamentally sound team,” Graham said.

Graham, the Carolina League Manager of the Year in 1991, left the Indians organization and worked for the Pittsburgh Pirates system, where he eventually became the senior director for player development and the interim general manager of the Pirates in 2007 following the firing of Dave Littlefield.

Graham joined the Baltimore Orioles system three weeks after leaving the Pirates in 2007, and was promoted to director of player development for the organization in 2013. He remained in that position until he was named interim general manager of the O’s in October 2018, but was released from that position in December.

Graham, who is under contract with Baltimore until October, said he cherishes his memories of Kinston.

“I loved being in Kinston,” he said. “The playing surface was tremendous; I remember how great the field used to be. I always felt like we had home field advantage there.”

Graham made it a point to credit the front office of the K-Tribe, led by then-General Manager North Johnson, for the success of those teams in 1990 and 1991.

Johnson took over as the general manager of the Kinston Indians franchise in 1987 and became co-owner of the team with Cam McRae in 1993. Johnson oversaw the franchise’s success — both on the field and at the turnstiles — until he left town following the 2003 season. Although he left Kinston to be a general manager in the Atlanta Braves farm teams, he remained the managing partner of the Indians franchise until it was sold in 2011.

Currently the chief operating officer of the Florida Fire Frogs of the High Single-A Florida State League in Kissimmee, Fla., Johnson said he fondly remembers the glory years of 1990 and 1991 when Graham led the Indians to a remarkable 177-96 record (.648 winning percentage).

“It was a lot of fun because we were winning,” Johnson said. “When you’re winning, everything is a lot more fun.”

While Johnson echoed Graham’s sentiment about the high level of talent in Kinston during that time, he also credited Graham’s baseball intellect for the K-Tribe’s success.

“He was one of the most intelligent guys I ever met in the game,” Johnson said of Graham. “He was a really, really bright guy. I think some people may have been intimidated by his intellect. But he knows the game and loves the game and managed those teams well. He knew how to treat the players individually.”

The Cleveland Indians certainly played much better once the players who had come through Kinston and their farm system in that 1988-92 span made it to the show, winning division titles and even advancing to the World Series. Johnson said that’s something Kinston fans can expect with this history-making group of Wood Ducks.

“When you have that much talent at this level that (the Wood Ducks) have, a lot of those guys are going to make it to the big leagues,” Johnson said. “If a player has success at the advanced Class-A level, he can certainly play in the big leagues.”

Part 3 of this five-part series — a breakdown of the historic first half of the 2019 DEWD season — will publish Thursday on Neuse News.

Notes: Sources for this series include Baseball-Reference.com, The Free Press archives, Statscrew.com, Neuse News archives, Distributed Wikipedia and Down East Wood Ducks Director of Broadcasting Matt Present. … The author of this story has been the public address announcer for the Down East Wood Ducks since the team’s inception in 2017.