A Manager Opts Out to Test Free Agency

Joe Maddon Leaves Job as Manager of Tampa Bay Rays

New York Times

SAN FRANCISCO — Joe Maddon was driving west in his R.V. early Friday evening, almost ready to camp down near Pensacola, Fla., for a cookout while watching the World Series. Maddon is bound for his home in California, he said, with a planned stop to see family in Arizona along the way.

“We’re not skipping town,” he said, kiddingly, over the phone.

But Maddon has left his job as manager of the Tampa Bay Rays, the team he guided from underfunded doormat to overachieving contender. He opted out of his contract Friday, exercising a clause that triggered Oct. 14 with the departure of General Manager Andrew Friedman to the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The opt-out clause, Maddon said, was something of a fine-print treasure revealed to him in a call from Matt Silverman, the Rays’ president of baseball operations, just after Friedman left.

“I had totally forgotten about it,” Maddon said. “Andrew leaves, and I get a phone call that I have an opt-out clause. Otherwise I would not have known, I swear to you.”

Maddon joined the Rays before the 2006 season, when the team went 61-101. Two years later the Rays were in the World Series, sparking a run of six winning seasons, five with at least 90 victories.

Maddon was the ideal fit, open to ideas from the analytics-minded front office and popular with players for cultivating a loose clubhouse atmosphere while thriving on competing with the payroll behemoths in the American League East.

He instantly becomes a highly coveted commodity. Maddon said his agent, Alan Nero, would look for opportunities on his behalf. There should be plenty, likely for more than the Rays could have paid him, despite what the team termed a diligent and aggressive effort to extend his contract.

“I’m surprised by it and disappointed,” Silverman said, adding later, “I can only tell you what I know and what Joe and I spoke about, which was his desire to be a long-term Ray. I shared that desire and worked hard to make it a reality, and it didn’t happen.”

Maddon, to his credit, acknowledged that money was a factor in his decision to leave. He pointed out that he turns 61 in February and had family and grandchildren and charities to consider. A chance at free agency, essentially, was too enticing to resist for a baseball lifer who took his first minor league managing job in 1981.

“I’ve never had that moment, and I’ve been doing it for a while,” Maddon said. “I’ve had moments where I’ve asked for a couple of extra thousand bucks and been told no, and what did I do? I signed. But this is different. It’s interesting and exhilarating and scary, all at the same time.”

Maddon praised the Rays’ ownership and front office and said it had been wonderful to work for them, noting that he had always been happy to go along with the company line. Silverman called the Rays’ contract offer “very generous,” but Maddon had a different perspective.

“Fair is always in the eye of the beholder,” he said. “A subject with the Rays has always been limitations, and I’ve always settled for those limitations. I told my wife I really didn’t think I could settle the next time.

“I have a very unique opportunity to exercise my right to opt out, and I think if you take anybody with the same choices, the same everything, I think about a hundred percent would do exactly the same thing.”

The losses of Maddon, Friedman and the ace left-hander David Price, who was traded to Detroit on July 31, pose a challenge to a team that slumped to 77 victories this season while continuing to draw sparse crowds. The Rays have pledged to cut a payroll that was already less than $80 million this season and ranked 28th among the 30 teams.

The Dodgers have the highest payroll, and Maddon, of course, worked closely with Friedman. But Friedman took the unusual step Friday of issuing a statement in support of Manager Don Mattingly, who is signed through 2016.

“I wish him nothing but the best wherever his next stop will be,” Friedman said of Maddon. “However, nothing has changed on our end, and Don Mattingly will be our manager next season and hopefully for a long time to come.”

After such a strong statement, it would undercut Friedman’s credibility if he reversed course and hired Maddon this off-season. The Minnesota Twins are the only team besides the Rays without a manager, but a more likely spot for Maddon could be the Chicago Cubs.

Maddon interviewed with Theo Epstein, the Cubs’ president of baseball operations, when Epstein was Boston’s general manager in 2003. The Red Sox hired Terry Francona instead, but Maddon was said to have made a strong impression, and his years in Tampa Bay have only added to his appeal.

The Cubs finished 73-89 last season, their first under Rick Renteria, who had never managed before in the majors and is signed through 2016. With several top prospects on the verge of making a major impact, room for the payroll to grow and a ballpark under renovation, the Cubs appear poised for a breakthrough.

Maddon seems to shares Epstein’s sensibilities as an engaging personality with an appreciation for both scouts and statistics. If they hired Maddon, the Cubs, with their losing history, would be happy if he could forge the same kind of legacy in Chicago that he described for himself from his time in Tampa Bay.

“That I did my job and was successful,” Maddon said, “and that we created a culture that didn’t exist before.”