Obituaries

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_McNamara_(baseball) was an American professional baseball manager, coach and player. After spending over 15 years in the minor leagues as a player and player-manager, McNamara helmed six Major League Baseball (MLB) teams for all or parts of 19 seasons between 1969 and 1996. He directed the 1986 Boston Red Sox to the American League pennant, and was named his league's "Manager of the Year" by both the BBWAA and The Sporting News. However, the Red Sox were defeated by the New York Mets in seven games in the 1986 World Series when they failed to hold a two-run, two-out, two-strike lead in Game 6, and a three-run advantage in Game 7.


Minor leagues


McNamara began his managing career with the Lewis-Clark Broncs in Lewiston, Idaho, of the Class B Northwest League in 1959, and when the club became an affiliate of the Kansas City Athletics in 1960, McNamara joined the Athletics' system. He won Southern League pennants with the Birmingham A's, Kansas City's Double-A affiliate, in 1966 and 1967, where he groomed many future members of the Oakland Athletics' early-1970s dynasty (Baseball Hall of Famers Rollie Fingers and Reggie Jackson, as well as Sal Bando, Blue Moon Odom, Joe Rudi and others) during his tenure as the organization's Double-A manager. At the same time, McNamara also mentored future Hall of Fame manager (then an infielder) Tony LaRussa and future pitching coach (then catcher) Dave Duncan. Jackson, in particular, credits McNamara with helping him through his time with Birmingham, with the racial tensions that existed in the Deep South at the time.[2]

Oakland Athletics

McNamara served as a coach at the major-league level for Oakland from 1968 through September 18, 1969. On that day, A's owner Charlie Finley fired manager Hank Bauer and promoted McNamara, then 37, to succeed him. The Athletics were in second place in the American League West Division, nine games in arrears of the Minnesota Twins. They went 8–5 under McNamara for the rest of the campaign, then finished second to the Twins again in 1970 with an 89–73 mark.[2] Finley replaced him with Dick Williams at season's end,[2] and the A's would go on to win five successive division titles and three straight American League pennants and World Series titles under Williams and Alvin Dark.[6]

San Diego Padres

McNamara returned to the coaching ranks from 1971–73 with the cross-bay San Francisco Giants before he took over the struggling San Diego Padres as their manager in 1974. The Padres improved incrementally, winning 60, 71 and 73 games through 1976,[1] then signed free agents Fingers and Gene Tenace away from McNamara's old team, the A's.[2] Expected to dramatically improve in 1977, instead the Padres stood at only 20–28 on May 28,[1] when McNamara was fired and replaced by Dark. He spent 1978 as a coach for the California Angels, then was hired to succeed Sparky Anderson, also a future Hall of Fame manager, as skipper of the 1979 Cincinnati Reds.[2]

Cincinnati Reds

The Reds had finished second to the Los Angeles Dodgers for two consecutive seasons in the National League West Division, and Anderson had been fired amid controversy,[7] reportedly because he refused his front office's order to fire members of his coaching staff.[8]
McNamara's 1979 Reds, minus legend Pete Rose, who had defected to the Philadelphia Phillies as a free agent, won 90 games—two fewer than Anderson's 1978 team. But they edged the Houston Astros by 11⁄2 games to win the NL West and became McNamara's first postseason entry. In the 1979 National League Championship Series, however, the Reds dropped the first two games at home in extra innings to the Pittsburgh Pirates, then were swept out of the playoffs in Game 3. Pittsburgh went on to win the 1979 World Series. McNamara's 1980 Reds won 89 games but finished third, 31⁄2 lengths behind Houston. Then came Cincinnati's frustrating 1981 season: the Reds compiled the best overall record in the National League West (66–42, .611), but the split-season format adopted because of the 1981 Major League Baseball strike denied them a place in the playoffs because they finished second (initially to the Dodgers, then to the Astros) in each half-season. The 1981 campaign became all the more distressing because the 1982 Reds unraveled, losing 58 of their first 92 games, falling into the division basement. McNamara was fired on July 20, 1982, with Cincinnati 23 games out of first place.[1][2]

California Angels

Buzzie Bavasi had been the president of the Padres when McNamara became their manager in 1974, and had moved to the California Angels after the 1977 season as general manager. Along with then-manager Dave Garcia, he had hired McNamara as an Angels coach in 1978, before the Reds job opened up. After the 1982 season, when the Angels lost a heart-breaking ALCS to the Milwaukee Brewers, their veteran manager, Gene Mauch, retired.[2] Bavasi then hired McNamara a third time, this time as skipper of the 1983 Angels, although that team dropped precipitously in the standings, winning only 70 games[2] – 23 fewer than in 1982 – and finishing 29 games behind the Chicago White Sox.[9] The following year, the 1984 Angels clawed back to .500 at 81–81, but came within three games of the division champion Kansas City Royals, who won only 84 contests all season.[10]

Boston Red Sox

Further information: 1986 American League Championship Series
When Ralph Houk, 65, retired as Boston's manager at the close of the 1984 season, the Red Sox approached the Angels about McNamara's availability for the opening; he and Haywood Sullivan, the Red Sox' chief executive officer and co-owner, had managed together in the Athletics' organization in the mid-1960s. With Mauch ready to return to the dugout, the Angels agreed to let McNamara go to Boston, and in 1985, he led the Red Sox to another .500 season; but at 81–81, they finished 181⁄2 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays in the American League East Division.[2]
However, 1986 would be a different story. With fireballing Roger Clemens winning his first 14 decisions en route to the Cy Young Award and American League Most Valuable Player Award, the Red Sox won 95 games and captured the division title, setting the stage for McNamara's second and final postseason appearance as a manager.[1] First, they battled back from a three-games-to-one deficit to defeat Mauch's Angels in the 1986 American League Championship Series, reaching the World Series against the National League champion New York Mets.[2]

Cleveland Indians and interim Angels' pilot

McNamara's managing career was not over, however. He spent 1989 as a Seattle Mariners scout, but on November 3, 1989,[17] the Cleveland Indians hired him as their skipper for 1990. Under McNamara, the 1990 Indians improved by four games compared with the 1989 edition, going 77–85 and finishing fourth in the AL East, only 11 games behind the Red Sox.[18] But in 1991, Cleveland took a major step backward; they won only 25 of 77 games under McNamara until his firing on July 5,[1] and dropped 105 of 162 games that season.[19]

McNamara returned to the Angels' organization as a minor league catching instructor, but was called to manage in the majors a final time in 1996 at age 64. He became interim pilot upon Marcel Lachemann's resignation on August 6, and had directed them to a 5–9 record when he was hospitalized for a blood clot in his leg on August 20.[20] After coach Joe Maddon helmed the Angels for three weeks while he was treated, McNamara was able to return to the Angels and finish the 1996 season.[2] He compiled a 10–18 overall record,[1] and was eventually succeeded by Terry Collins for 1997.[21]