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John Gibbons Hopes To Interview For Managerial Vacancies

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Former Toronto Blue Jays manager John Gibbons is throwing his hat in the ring for the many managerial openings across Major League Baseball, per MLB Network’s Jon Morosi (via Twitter).

Gibbons last managed a major league team in 2018 when he led the Toronto Blue Jays to a record of 73-89. It was the final season of a 6-year stint in Toronto during which the Blue Jays went 488-484, winning the AL East with a 93-win season in 2015. Toronto came within two wins of reaching the World Series, falling in six games to the eventual World Series champion Kansas City Royals in the ALCS.

They made the playoffs twice in Gibbons’ tenure, also capturing the Wild Card in 2016. The Blue Jays won that WC game in thrilling fashion when Edwin Encarnacion walked off Ubaldo Jimenez in the bottom of the 11th with a 3-run home run. That game is more famous for the decisions made in the opposing dugout, as Buck Showalter never got uber-closer Zack Britton into the ballgame, despite owning a 0.54 ERA across 69 games on the season. Showalter’s decision certainly played a role in the expansion of the fireman concept in contemporary bullpens, as teams are far less likely these days to save someone like Britton for a save situation that may never come.

Gibbons’ teams performed well in the postseason, winning not just the WC game but also sweeping the Rangers in the ALDS. Losing two straight seasons in the ALCS won’t etch Gibbons name anywhere in Cooperstown, but it was an achievement nonetheless. He helped end a 22-year postseason drought that extended from their World Series victory in 1993 until the division title in 2015.

Of course, Gibbons was well aware of the drought, as his first and only other managerial experience came with the Blue Jays from August 2004 until June of 2008. Those Blue Jays teams were always competitive, despite never reaching the postseason. His entire Blue Jays tenure ended with a record of 793-789, a .501 winning percentage.

There are a number of managerial vacancies around the MLB at present, including high profile offices in New York and Chicago. The Royals, Padres, Pirates, Giants and Angels are the other clubs hunting a new field manager. For what it’s worth, Gibbons began his professional coaching career with the Mets in 1990. He also served as a bench coach in Kansas City, and Double-A manager in the Padres system for the 2012 season.

Managerial Rumors: Angels, Maddon, Giants, Ibanez, Farrell, Gibbons

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Joe Maddon is reportedly a leading candidate to take over as the Angels’ next manager, but he’s not the lone possibility to replace Brad Ausmus. General manager Billy Eppler stated Tuesday that the Angels “plan on sitting down with a number of candidates” to discuss the job, per Maria Torres of the Los Angeles Times. Maddon’s a highly accomplished manager who earlier spent three decades with the Angels organization in several different roles, which seems to make him a slam-dunk choice for the position. However, it’s worth noting that Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reported last week that the Angels might be hesitant to meet Maddon’s asking price. Maddon made $6MM this year with the Cubs, who moved on from him after they fell way short of expectations in 2019.

  • The Giants, who are seeking a successor to Bruce Bochy, are interested in ex-major league outfielder Raul Ibanez, Jon Morosi of MLB.com reports.  Ibanez has been working as a special assistant to Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman since 2016, giving him familiarity with the Giants’ Farhan Zaidi. Before Zaidi took the reins as San Francisco’s president of baseball ops last offseason, he worked as the Dodgers’ general manager.
  • Former big league skipper John Farrell remains interested in a third go-around as a manager, Rosenthal tweets. The 57-year-old last managed in 2017, when he oversaw a Red Sox team that finished 93-69 and earned an AL East title. Farrell managed three division winners and a World Series champion (2013) in Boston over five years, though he also guided two last-place clubs during his uneven reign. Prior to that, he managed the Blue Jays to a 154-170 record from 2011-12. Farrell has served as a scout and a pitching consultant in Cincinnati since 2018, and he interviewed for the Phillies’ and Reds’ managerial openings during the previous two offseasons.
  • Fellow ex-Jays manager John Gibbons also could be a possibility for clubs, Mark Feinsand of MLB.com relays. The 57-year-old wants to manage again or at least serve as a bench coach, according to Feinsand. Gibbons lost his job in Toronto after 2018, ending a two-stint, 11-year run with the franchise. He led the club to a 793-789 record with a pair of playoff berths.
  • Astros first base coach Don Kelly is a candidate to draw managerial interest in the coming weeks, Morosi hears. The 39-year-old Kelly, best known for his run as a major league utlityman for the Pirates, Tigers and Marlins from 2007-16, is only in his first season as a coach. He spent the previous two seasons in a pro scouting role with Detroit.

Blue Jays’ Managerial Search Enters Second Round

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Since announcing the departure of manager John Gibbons, the Blue Jays have begun their search for a new skipper as they look to return to contention for the first time since back-to-back playoff appearances in 2015 and 2016. The search is now well underway, with the Jays narrowing a broad list of candidates to a smaller group that warrants closer consideration.

As of Oct. 18, the Blue Jays were “believed to be down to five candidates,” per Shi Davidi of Sportsnet.ca. He cited Astros bench coach Joe Espada, Rays field coordinator Rocco Baldelli, Cubs bench coach Brandon Hyde and Giants director of player development David Bell as finalists, though Bell’s name is obviously no longer in play since he’s been hired by the Reds as their new manager. Here’s where things presently stand…

Latest Update – October 23

  • Rays bench coach Charlie Montoyo interviewed with the Jays today, per Fancred’s Jon Heyman (Twitter link). It’s not clear if it was a second interview and Montoyo had already emerged as one of the reported finalists or if the Jays set up additional interviews after the Reds hired Bell (a reported Jays finalist) away. That brings the Blue Jays to 15 or more candidates interviewed for the managerial vacancy.

Full summation of the Blue Jays’ managerial search below:

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Blue Jays Announce They Will Not Retain Manager John Gibbons

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12:03pm: GM Ross Atkins announced in a joint press conference with Gibbons that the latter will not return to his position.

9:06am: The Blue Jays will announce today that they will not retain manager John Gibbons for the 2019 season, according to Steve Phillips of MLB Network Radio (via Twitter). As Shi Davidi of Sportsnet.ca explains in reporting the same, this news represents a formal acknowledgement of an outcome that was more or less already decided.

Gibbons, 56, has run the dugout for the past six seasons in his second stint with the organization. He originally took over the team in the middle of the 2004 season but was let go in the midst of a disappointing 2008 campaign. After a few years in the Royals and Padres organizations, Gibbons returned for the 2013 season after the Jays allowed John Farrell to move to the division-rival Red Sox.

Most recently, Gibbons signed an extension that included a guarantee for the 2019 campaign. Accordingly, he’ll be paid under that deal regardless of where he ends up. As Davidi writes, Gibbons says he’d prefer to continue managing. Whether that’ll come to pass in the near term isn’t clear, but it seems to suggest that he’ll continue to look for opportunities on major or minor-league staffs.

In his return effort with Toronto, Gibbons guided the club to memorable campaigns in 2015 and 2016, including an AL East title in the first of those years. While the Jays were unable to break through to the World Series, suffering consecutive ALCS defeats, the period represented a return to prominence for what had been a dormant organization.

Things have turned south since, of course, though it’s tough to lay the malaise at the feet of Gibbons. In the aggregate, he carries a 791-787 record as the Blue Jays manager. As Davidi notes, that places Gibbon second only to the legendary Cito Gaston in games managed and wins in franchise history.

Managerial/Coaching Notes: Gibbons, Riggleman, Rangers

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Just weeks after Ken Rosenthal wrote that the Blue Jays “seem destined” for a managerial change this offseason, Fancred’s Jon Heyman offers a similar take, reporting that a changing of the guard is a virtual certainty. Per Heyman, it’s “99.9 percent” that the Jays will move on from skipper John Gibbons, who is still signed through the 2019 season. Gibbons tells Heyman the plan is to sit down with the Jays after the season and “see what direction we’re going to go, myself included,” though he’s previously suggested that he may not be the man to oversee a rebuilding effort. Whether the Jays go that route remains to be seen, though Heyman indicates that president Mark Shapiro and GM Ross Atkins are leaning toward a younger manager with an eye toward contending in 2020-21.

More rumors pertaining to the managerial and coaching staffs throughout the league…

  • Jim Riggleman hasn’t spoken to the Reds’ front office yet about shedding the interim label from his job title, John Fay of the Cincinnati Enquirer recently wrote. Though Cincinnati has performed better under Riggleman than under Bryan Price earlier this season, Riggleman told Fay he still expects to be one of many candidates. “When the change was made, Dick [Williams] was the GM,” said Riggleman.“He basically said we’re going to interview a lot of people and have a long list. … My understanding is that’s what’s going to happen.” Fay notes that Riggleman is a favorite of team owner Bob Castellini, suggesting that if the Reds go with a more “old school” approach in the dugout, Riggleman is the favorite to stay with the Reds on a more permanent basis. The organization has become more analytical under the current front office regime, though, and it’s not clear what style of manager they’d prefer.
  • It’s been an ugly season for the Rangers for the most part, though Drew Davison of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram writes that GM Jon Daniels and his staff are drawing some positives from the manner in which their coaching staff has helped a few younger players move forward. Rougned Odor’s rebound season was one positive highlighted by Daniels, who also listed Jose Leclerc, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Ronald Guzman and Jurickson Profar as some players who’ve taken positive strides in an otherwise disappointing season. Davison notes that “signs seemingly point to job security for manager Jeff Banister,” who is currently signed only through next year after a 2019 club option was exercised last offseason. It’s not clear whether the Rangers front office has its sights set on a new deal for Banister or whether he could potentially head into next year’s season with the dreaded “lame duck” status.

AL East Notes: Gibbons, Judge, Davis, Dombrowski

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In an appearance on MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM this morning (audio link), Blue Jays manager John Gibbons addressed a recent Ken Rosenthal report stating that the Jays “seem destined” for a managerial change.  “That’s the reality of these jobs.  Sooner or later it’s going to happen,” Gibbons said, though he didn’t believe he would be replaced anytime in the near future.  As for the longer term, Gibbons raised the possibility that he might not be the best fit for a team “starting to get into a full-blown rebuild,” which could describe the Jays’ approach.  “Maybe they would benefit from getting a new fresh face that could grow with the young players and things like that.  I’m not so sure I want to go through one of those things, a total rebuild, but we’ll probably sit down before it’s all said and done and talk it out,” Gibbons said.  The skipper’s deal runs through the 2019 season, with the Blue Jays holding a club option for 2020.

Some more rumblings from around the AL East…

  • Aaron Judge was originally projected for a three-week absence after suffering a chip fracture in his wrist on July 26, though Yankees manager Aaron Boone told MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch and other media that Judge is going to need more time.  Judge hasn’t yet begun swinging a bat, and an examination on Thursday revealed that the fracture still hasn’t fully healed.  Once the pain subsides, Judge and the team are planning on a fairly quick return to the lineup, as Judge has been otherwise able to stay in game shape and train with the game while on the DL.  Judge told Hoch and others today that he doesn’t anticipate being out of action for much longer.
  • In a wide-ranging and very candid interview with MASNsports.com’s Roch Kubatko, Orioles slugger Chris Davis provides some insight into his disastrous 2018 season.  Davis is struggling to a near-historic extent, hitting just .159/.242/.297 over 388 PA and posting the worst fWAR (-2.3) of any player in the league.  “I’d be lying if I said the frustration and the negativity and just the overall lack of performance wasn’t weighing on me. I think it’s definitely taken a toll on me this year more than ever,” Davis said, even noting that he’d thought about quitting the game.  The interview is well worth a full read, as Davis details the various tactics he and the O’s have tried to get him back on track, the extra pressure he put on himself after signing his seven-year, $161MM contract to remain in Baltimore, and his clubhouse role as one of the few veterans left after the Orioles cleaned house at the trade deadline.
  • The powerhouse Red Sox roster has come at the expense of a rather depleted farm system, though president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski tells the Boston Herald’s Jason Mastrodonato that it wasn’t his intent to deal away as many prospects in Boston as he did in his previous job as the Tigers’ GM.  When the White Sox approached Dombrowski about dealing Chris Sale, however, it was an opportunity Dombrowski couldn’t pass up.  “The Chris Sale trade came out of the blue, because we were not anticipating the White Sox (trying) to trade him and we wanted to get involved and we traded some talent,” Dombrowski said.  While Boston has dealt a lot of blue chip talent, however, it was also firm in holding onto other youngsters that the Red Sox feel are cornerstone pieces, such as Andrew Benintendi and Rafael Devers.  “I don’t think it was ever tempting to trade Devers,” Dombrowski said. “People continue to ask about him a lot. But we like him a lot, same thing with Benintendi.”

GM Ross Atkins On Blue Jays’ Offseason Needs

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Blue Jays general manager Ross Atkins met with reporters (including Sportsnet.ca’s Ben Nicholson-Smith and MLB.com’s Gregor Chisholm) today to discuss his team’s season and how the Jays plan to move forward going into the winter.  Some highlights…

  • The Jays will be “open to trades” and “open to any possible way we can make our team better,” Atkins said, stressing the need for added depth and versatility.  The GM reiterated that the Jays aren’t looking to trade from their Major League roster unless they find a deal that improves the big league team.
  • The Blue Jays want to “add one impact arm and one impact position player for sure,” though Atkins wasn’t necessarily sure that the position player would play right field, which is the only clear opening in the lineup.  Teoscar Hernandez has “certainly earned the right” to compete for the everyday right field job in the wake of an impressive September.  The “impact arm” also could be either a starter or a relief pitcher.
  • Lack of team speed “is a clear issue for us,” though one that Atkins admitted is “really hard to [address] in free agency” given that most of the available veterans are generally on the older side and lacking in quickness.
  • Middle infield is an area of concern, as “we can’t rely that we will have an absolutely healthy Troy Tulowitzki and Devon Travis for the entire year, and we need to build depth around them.”  Injuries limited Tulowitzki and Travis to just 116 games combined last year, and both players have exhibited a lack of durability over the last few seasons.
  • Atkins confirmed that the Jays will not be exercising their end of Jose Bautista’s mutual option for 2018.  (Sportsnet.ca’s Shi Davidi recently reported that Bautista was informed of the team’s decision a few weeks ago.)  It is “very unlikely,” Atkins said, that Bautista will return to the Jays even on a smaller deal in 2018, though the door isn’t closed on the longtime slugger eventually returning to the franchise.  “When he comes back here, he will be celebrated in a very strong way,” Atkins said.
  • No changes are coming to the coaching staff, and there weren’t any strong rumblings about a possible managerial change, Atkins confirmed that John Gibbons would also return to the dugout.  “I feel strongly that he’s a part of our solution, and I love going to work with him every day,” Atkins said about the manager.

Blue Jays Extend Manager John Gibbons

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APRIL 1: The deal is now complete, as Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi tweets.

MARCH 22, 7:54am: An agreement is in place, with the full deal “basically finished,” according to Shi Davidi of Sportsnet.ca.

MARCH 21, 4:23pm: The extension would cover the 2018 and 2019 seasons, according to the MLB Network Radio Twitter feed.  The Jays would also have a club option on Gibbons for 2020.

11:58am: The Blue Jays are “finalizing” a new contract with skipper John Gibbons that will keep him in Toronto for multiple future seasons, according to Jon Heyman of Fan Rag. Rob Longley of the Toronto Sun reported last week on Twitter that the club believed it would likely strike such a deal with the manager.

Gibbons, 54, is in his second stint as the head of the Jays’ field staff. He has delivered three consecutive winning campaigns and guided the club to the postseason in each of the past two seasons, both of which ended with ALCS losses. All said, Gibbons carries a 644-614 record over parts of nine seasons as the Toronto skipper.

When the Jays changed front-office leadership last winter, the organization renegotiated its agreement with Gibbons to eliminate the anti-lame duck provision that had previously governed. Under the earlier deal, the team faced a decision on January 1st of each year. If Gibbons was still in his position at that point, the following year’s option would be picked up automatically and a new option year would arise.

With that new arrangement in place, 2016 figured to represent an important campaign as president Mark Shapiro and GM Ross Atkins assessed the organization and Gibbons’s leadership. As it turned out, the skipper drew high praise from Shapiro at the close of the campaign, when it was announced that Gibbons would return. Now, it seems there’ll be a lengthier commitment binding Gibbons to the Jays.

John Gibbons Will Manage Blue Jays In 2017

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The Blue Jays’ 2016 season ended with disappointment tonight as the team lost 3-0 to the Indians, who will move on to the World Series after topping Toronto 4-1 in the American League Championship Series. While the offseason comes with plenty of uncertainty for Toronto — Edwin Encarnacion, Jose Bautista, Michael Saunders and Brett Cecil are all free agents — Jays president Mark Shapiro tells Sportsnet’s Shi Davidi that manager John Gibbons will return to manage the team in 2017.

The 54-year-old Gibbons will be entering the fifth season of his second stint as the Blue Jays’ skipper and will look to guide the team to its fourth consecutive winning season under his watch. Since coming back to the Blue Jays prior to the 2013 season, Gibbons has compiled a 339-309 record — a successful run that has boosted his career record as a manager to 644-614. Each of the 1258 games that Gibbons has managed at the big league level has come in a Blue Jays uniform.

“There’s a level of consistency with him in approach that is unflappable and I think that translates into toughness,” Shapiro tells Davidi. “He’s the same guy and in a role like this, when people tend to go with the wind and get so impacted by the emotion that flies all around us, that stability, that strength and that toughness from a leader is a real asset.”

There’d been some thought that Gibbons was in a “postseason-or-bust” situation with the Blue Jays, and while it’s unclear if that was truly the case, Toronto’s fairly deep playoff run rendered that a moot point. Gibbons will be entering his 10th season at the helm of the Blue Jays, though it’s unclear whether Jays decision-makers will pursue an offseason extension as Gibbons enters the final year of his contract. That, however, may not be considered a pressing issue for the team with so many roster issues facing them this offseason.

AL East Notes: Gibbons, Yankees, Kelly, Uehara

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Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports breaks down a half-dozen managers who may be on the hot seat. Among them, only Blue Jays skipper John Gibbons could be in a postseason-or-bust position, in Rosenthal’s estimation (he also lists Bryan Price of the Reds, Walt Weiss of the Rockies, Robin Ventura of the White Sox, Chip Hale of the D-backs and Brian Snitker of the Braves — each for other reasons), who points out that Gibbons was hired by former GM Alex Anthopoulos, who is no longer with the organization. Moreover, the Jays have a number of free agents, including Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion, R.A. Dickey and Michael Saunders, and new baseball ops heads Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins could look to make a large transition with such a great deal of roster turnover already likely to be forthcoming.

More from the AL East…

  • With such little certainty in their rotation heading into the 2017 season, the Yankees need to focus on starting pitching this winter, opines ESPN’s Buster Olney (Insider subscription required). Olney surmises that the Yankees have the financial firepower to add via free agency and should target left-hander Rich Hill as a high-upside addition to the staff. While Hill doesn’t come with much in the way of certainty himself, adding him would allow the team to enter the season with a high-upside mix of rotation arms and conserve its prospect depth and make a midseason pitching acquisition at a time when a greater number of targets will be available.
  • Joe Kelly is demonstrating the potential to be a shutdown reliever for the Red Sox and could develop into a late-inning weapon in that role next season, writes Brian MacPherson of the Providence Journal. MacPherson spoke to Red Sox pitching analyst (and former big league pitcher) Brian Bannister about Kelly, with Bannister noting that Kelly has one of the best spin rates of any pitcher in baseball on his curveball. “As a reliever, he can showcase that much more often,” said Bannister of Kelly, who has all but cut out his changeup and slider since moving to the bullpen. “It’s as impressive of a curveball as you’ll see out of anybody. It’s just a matter of finding out how far that can take him.” Kelly would like another chance at starting, however, according to MacPherson, though the Red Sox have yet to have the necessary conversations to determine if they’ll give him that chance.
  • Sticking with the Boston ’pen, the Globe’s Nick Cafardo writes that the return of Koji Uehara has helped to stabilize what was once a weak point for the Red Sox and turn it into a strength. Uehara’s return, paired with Kelly’s emergence, has allowed Robbie Ross Jr. and Brad Ziegler to be used in more specialized high-leverage roles. Uehara’s strong work late in the season makes it imperative that the Sox try to re-sign him this winter, Cafardo opines, despite the fact that he’ll pitch next season at age 42.
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