SAN DIEGO – Last year at this time, Terry Francona didn’t have a care in the world. He was one year into his retirement after 23 years of managing in Major League Baseball and loving it.
“It was wonderful,” the man, who’s nicknamed Tito after his ballplaying father of the same name, said this week during several interviews at Petco Park. “I had no intention of coming back. I was thinking about what I wanted to do, because I was doing nothing. But I was not thinking about managing.”
Then, the Cincinnati Reds came calling, and that all changed.
“They flew out to talk to me in my rocking chair,” Francona, 66, said. “It just seemed right.”
A year ago, the Reds lost 85 games, and incumbent manager David Bell was fired before the season was over. With less than three weeks to go in this regular season, the team’s current 74-72 record is a significant improvement. They’d have to go 3-13 in their final 16 games to match last season’s record. It could happen but probably not.
Same goes for making the playoffs—the team is two games behind the New York Mets, who hold the National League’s last wild-card spot, tied with the San Francisco Giants. It could happen but maybe not.
It wouldn’t surprise San Diego Padres manager Mike Shildt, though, if they do it with Tito managing the team.
“Winners win,” Shildt said Wednesday night after the Reds came from behind for a 2-1 victory to take the last two of the three games in the series here.
This season, Francona has done what he does best: take a low-payroll team and exceed expectations. The Reds have a luxury-tax payroll of $140.8 million, 22nd in the league and fourth in their own NL Central. In 11 seasons managing Cleveland, he dwelled in baseball’s bargain basement and still made the postseason six times, a stark departure from the Boston Red Sox, which spared no expense when building the Francona teams that won the World Series in 2004 and 2007. His Indians lost to the Chicago Cubs in a thrilling seven-game 2016 Fall Classic.
Francona said he doesn’t mind dealing with the low payroll as long as he has some autonomy over decisions on the field.
“I’m at an age where doing it in a place I prefer is probably more meaningful than having a high payroll,” he said. “I mean, I’ve been treated great. Nobody ever tells me what lineup to make out or things like that. I don’t mind input, but I’m probably too…