Chicago Cubs: David Ross, meet Yogi Berra
By Jeff Kallman
Chicago Cubs: David Ross, meet Yogi Berra
Ross makes his case for being named manager
“I said this in my opening speech,” Ross tells The Athletic‘s Jayson Stark. “I know what championship at-bats look like. And I know what they look like from guys in this group. And when I don’t see that, I will say something. When I don’t see a championship effort, a championship at-bat, they’re gonna be held accountable for that because I know they can do it. I’ve seen it . . . So don’t tell me you don’t have that in you.”
And Ross believes to his soul that because he knows enough guys in the group, not to mention being more or less groomed for the job for a couple of years before he landed it, the last thing he’s afraid of is being the wrong man in the job.
“I feel like I can get something out of these guys that maybe nobody else can,” Grandpa Rossy tells Stark. “I truly believe that. I know that at the end of the day, they’ve got to go out there and play. But this is such a unique group in that way because we’ve known each other for such a long time, and it really humanizes me, I think. Yeah, I am the boss, and I’ve got to organize everything and make the tough decisions. But I’m the same dude. You guys know who I am. Now it’s my time to just go out there and do my thing — to lead.”
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Stark took a look at the past half century’s worth of men who were hired to manage the men with whom they were teammates/friends within three years prior. In that time frame, Ross becomes the fifth. (The other four: Frank Quilici, 1972 Twins; Hall of Famer Joe Torre, 1977 Mets; Lou Piniella, 1986 Yankees; and, John Wathan, 1987 Royals.) Go beyond half a century and there was Hall of Famer Red Schoendienst starting with the 1965 Cardinals.
A year before that, though, there came a manager who’d been handed the job of managing his teammates/friends almost immediately after his playing career ended. Hall of Famer Yogi Berra probably thought he and his 1964 New York Yankees had known each other long enough to humanize him, too. But what happened him turned out one of the dirtiest deals baseball has ever known.