Terry Francona
Terry Francona
Terrence Jon "Terry" Francona, nicknamed "Tito", is the current manager of the Cleveland Indians of Major League Baseball. He was a first baseman and outfielder in the majors from 1981 to 1990. After retiring as a player, he managed several minor league teams in the 1990s before managing the Philadelphia Phillies for four seasons. In 2004, Francona was hired to manage the Boston Red Sox, and that year he led the team to its first World Series championship since 1918...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth22 April 1959
CityAberdeen, SD
CountryUnited States of America
It worked out well. We put a nice crooked number up early and we got to stay away from some guys in the ?pen that we wanted to.
The excitement level will be off the charts. You'll see a lot of guys running to the ballpark. I might jog.
When you get down to your last game, you can have a bullpen full of everybody. You can't do that right now. We need somebody to make these starts. While they're still starting, they need to start. Once we get past each guy's start, you may see various guys going out of that bullpen as soon as they're available. That's a definite.
And I went back to make sure he wasn't lying. I checked in the cage, and asked the guys who were throwing to him.
It's hard to be a clubhouse guy without being a great guy. I mean, the nature of the job is, you know, you're picking up dirty clothes and you're doing all the tasks that the players - that nobody else wants to do.
In Boston I got to a point where I thought I was putting out fires more than being a baseball coach. And some of it was my fault. I was getting stubborn. My fuse was a little shorter than it needed to be. And that helps nobody.
I think in any organization you want your manager to have a strong opinion. You don't want them to just say, 'Yes, sir' to things they don't believe in.
There's so much passion and so much interest in the Red Sox in Boston.
I think the outside world can learn a lot about how to act by watching a major league clubhouse. I don't think you want to do everything the same, but there's a lot of things I think people could learn from.
As a manager, the more consistent you are, the better off you are. It's easy to be up when things go well. When things don't go well, the players will follow your lead. So you have to be consistent and upbeat, which takes some work sometimes.
I like information. I love when smart people make me think of something in a new way.
We also told him that if he can't (pitch in relief) then he won't do it. But I think because of the kind of guy he is, he's shooting for it.
I think he felt like somebody might have pushed his buttons a little bit. I try to speak in generalities, because I don't want to ever communicate through the media. I think he felt like maybe I did that a little bit. I certainly don't ever want to do that.
I thought it was pretty obvious that he's not ready to be on the field. We don't need to force him into something he's not ready for.