Top Blue Jays Manager #1: Cito Gaston
Years Managed: 12
(1989-1997, 2008-2010)
Win/Loss Record: 894-837
Division Titles: 4
(1989, 1991, 1992, 1993)
American League
Pennants: 2 (1992, 1993)
World Series Champs: 2
(1992, 1993)
Best Season: 1992
(96-66, Won World Series)
Like John Gibbons, Cito Gaston
was under constant scrutiny and criticism throughout his managerial career with
the Toronto Blue Jays. He was reluctant to take the job after Jimy Williams was
fired 36 games into the 1989 season, but he would lead the Jays to a division
title. The media vilified him over the next couple of seasons, demanding he be
fired after every tough loss, but failing to give him the credit he was due
after the big wins.
Even after winning two World
Series Championships, his critics said it was more due to the calibre of the
players in the Jays’ lineup than any decisions he made. While I won’t venture
too deep into the subject, I can guarantee that if Cito had been white, those
criticisms would never have even entered into the question. And if you scoff at
that, answer why a World Series-winning manager, after being fired from the
team he led to those World Series wins, was never even offered a job managing
another team. Yes, the discriminations that supposedly ended in baseball in
1947 still exist in some form or another in the game today. But enough of that.
Let’s move on.
Unlike most of the managers that
took the helm in Toronto, Clarence Edwin Gaston was an All-Star calibre ball
player during his career. After debuting with the Atlanta Braves for nine games
in 1967, he played six years as a regular in the outfield for the San Diego
Padres from 1969 until 1974. During those years, he pounded 77 home runs, 316
RBIs, had a .257 batting average and played solid defense. His best season was
1970, when he batted .318, hit 29 homers and added 93 RBIs while scoring 91
runs. He earned his only All-Star Game invitation that year and even received a
few votes for the National League’s MVP Award.
In 1975, Gaston moved back to
the Braves, where his play became limited. He played in no more than 70 games
in any of the four years in Atlanta, and after two games for the Pittsburgh
Pirates, retired in 1978, having played 1026 games in the big leagues.
Cito’s coaching career began in
1982 when then-Blue Jays’ manager, Bobby Cox, hired him to be the team’s
hitting coach. When Cox was replaced by Jimy Williams prior to the 1986 season,
he remained as the hitting instructor. In 1989, the Jays got off to a horrible
12-24 start and Williams was let go. Informed by general manager Pat Gillick
that a meeting was needed, Gaston feared he would be getting fired as well.
Instead, Gillick and president Paul Beeston offered him the manager’s job.
At first, Cito refused, saying
he was happy as the hitting instructor, but eventually agreed to do the job on
an interim basis until a new manager was found. One of the candidates the Jays
were seeking was Lou Pinella, who had been fired by the New York Yankees after
the 1988 season. But Toronto’s management preferred to keep some stability
among the coaching staff and Gaston was kept on as the club began to win.
In 1989, the Jays were 10 games
behind the Baltimore Orioles in June. But a strong second half, combined with a
complete collapse by the Orioles, found the Jays in first place by two games
when the season ended. After a five-game loss in the ALCS to the eventual World
Champion Oakland Athletics, much was expected from Toronto in 1990.
Unfortunately, the team
underachieved, perhaps getting old and relying too much on past success rather
than playing in the present. A second-place finish led to some grumblings and
dissatisfaction among the media and some fans (a rather unsilent minority) and
they started calling for Cito’s job.
But Gillick was never one to
listen to, or cave into, outburst and demands from media-types. He kept Cito as
the Jays’ manager and was about to be rewarded for his faith in the skipper
with the best three-year period in the team’s history.
A 91-71 record led to another A.L.
East title in 1991, but after falling short in the ALCS again, this time to the
Minnesota Twins, Toronto would add key free agents and traded for players
needed to complete the quest for Toronto to become World Series champions.
In 1992, the Blue Jays won the
East, the A.L. Pennant and then the World Series. Cito’s defining moment in his
Blue Jays’ manager career came in the 11th inning of the
Series-clinching Game 6. With Atlanta speedster, Otis Nixon, at the plate, the
tying run at third and the Jays one out from becoming champions, Cito took an
educated guess and brought in right-hander Mike Timlin. Nixon, a switch hitter,
would be batting left—his better bunting side. Cito wanted Nixon to bunt and
when the Braves outfielder squared around and dropped one down, Timlin (having
been alerted to the bunt possibility) pounced on the ball and his throw to
first beat Nixon to give Toronto their first championship.
The Jays repeated as World
Champs in 1993, but then the team started to decline, due to age and players
moving on as more and more teams started to throw bigger money around to lure
free agents in an attempt to buy World Championships. After a 95-67 season in
1993, Toronto slipped to 55-60 in the strike-shortened 1994 season, before
bottoming out at 56-88 in 1995.
Two more sub-.500 seasons
followed and Cito was fired with five games remaining in the 1997 season. After
receiving no other offers to manage (still seems a bit strange), he was rehired
as Toronto’s hitting coach for the 2000 and 2001 seasons. Midway through the
2008 season, Cito was offered the manager’s job of the Blue Jays for his second
stint, following the firing of John Gibbons.
While Toronto had no chance of
competing, Gaston still eventually got the Jays back in winning form as they
finished the 2010 season with an 85-77 record. He officially retired from
managing following that season, finishing with 894 wins, still tops among all
Blue Jays’ managers.
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