$Unique_ID{BAS01175} $Pretitle{} $Title{The Manager Roster: Introduction} $Subtitle{} $Author{} $Subject{Managers Manager Roster Rosters} $Log{} Total Baseball: Registers, Leaders, and Rosters The Manager Roster: Introduction This section details the managerial record of every man who ever held the reins of a major league club from 1871 through 1993. For many years, the assignment of wins and losses was thought a relatively simple task--almost as simple as identifying the managers themselves. In recent years, however, Richard Topp and Robert Tiemann wondered how it was that "managers" who never set foot on the field to lead their charges or even accompanied their clubs on road trips could be regarded as managers at all, at least in the commonly understood sense of field manager rather than business manager. Topp and Tiemann wondered how John McGraw, for example, could be credited as manager of the New York Giants for all of 1924 when a knee injury kept him from the bench for seven weeks: Somebody else must have run the team, they figured, so why not credit that man as interim manager? That there were record-keeping errors in the 1870s or even the early 1900s may strike the average fan as unsurprising, but the incorrect assignment of decisions to helmsmen has been characteristic of every decade, up to and including the 1990s. Tiemann and Topp undertook a complete review of managerial records dating back to the National Association and found that the records published in previous baseball encyclopedias were wrong--so wrong that they had to be refigured from scratch. Here are the criteria they established for their groundbreaking study: 1. Definition: A manager is the person designated by the club ownership to run the club on the field. 2. Absences: When the regular manager is unable to be with the team for 30 or more days, the assistant in charge during his absence should be credited with the team's record from the time the absence begins until the regular manager returns to active duty. 3. Interim manager: When a manager is removed, either by resignation or by being fired, and his designated replacement is not present to replace him, the assistant temporarily in charge of the team shall be credited with the team's record during the interim. 4. Head coaches: From 1961 through 1964, the Chicago Cubs had a "panel of coaches" rather than a single manager. One of these coaches was designated head coach for a period of time; and that coach is credited with the team's record during his term as head coach. 5. Captains: During the early years of professional baseball, the man who had the title of "manager" often served merely as the club's business manager, while the captain (a player) was responsible for the team on the field. Some captains were also managers. Each ambiguous situation is judged according to its particular circumstances, but in general the captain, rather than the manager, is credited with the team's record if the manager did not travel with the team or did not have previous baseball experience. 6. Suspended games: If a game was suspended when one man was managing the team and was completed on a later date when another man was managing, the second manager is credited if the game was suspended before five innings were completed. If the game was suspended after five or more innings were played, then: (a) credit the first manager with a win if the team was leading at the point of suspension and maintained the lead to win the game; or (b) credit the first manager with a loss if the team was losing at the point of suspension and remained behind to lose the game; or (c) credit the second manager with a win (or tie) if the team was losing at the point of suspension but came back to tie the score or win the game; or (d) credit the second manager with a loss if the team was winning at the point of suspension but then lost the lead and/or game; or (e) credit the second manager with the win or loss if the score was tied at the point of suspension. 7. Protested games: If a protest was granted and the game was ordered resumed from the point of protest, then the same rules used for suspended games apply. If a protested game of at least five innings' duration was ordered replayed in its entirety, then no win or loss is credited, but both managers are credited with a no-decision game. 8. Forfeited games: All forfeited games are counted as games managed, even if the game did not start or if it did not go five innings. 9. Split seasons: In 1892 the National League played a split season, the winners meeting for the championship. In 1981, because of a players' strike, the National and American Leagues played split seasons. The managers' totals will have entries for each half-season. 10. Replacement clubs: In the American Association (1882-1891), there were three instances in which one club dropped out and was replaced by another club. In 1884 Richmond replaced Washington; in 1890 Baltimore replaced Brooklyn; and in 1891 Milwaukee replaced Cincinnati. In each case, the new club inherited the old club's record. Therefore, the manager of the new club is credited with starting in the position (standing) in which the old club finished. In the Union Association (1884), when a new club replaced an old one, the new club started with a 0-0 record rather than inheriting the old club's record, except in the case of the Chicago franchise, which moved to Pittsburgh. Therefore, all such Union Association managers are credited with a finish as if their teams had begun their season at the beginning of the league season. The finish for each manager is his club's standing in the eight-team league when (a) he left the job, (b) his club dropped out of the league, or (c) his club finished the season. The clubs that dropped out were Altoona (replaced by Kansas City); Philadelphia (replaced by Wilmington); Wilmington (replaced by St. Paul); and Pittsburgh (replaced by Milwaukee). In a typical entry in the Manager Roster (a hypothetical entry has been created below), the column marked STANDING will, in cases where a team has had only one manager throughout the year, show the team's final standing (in the example below, see the entry for 1972). In the case of a manager who began the season but was replaced midway, however, the figure on the left of the column shows the team's standing when he departed and the figure on the right shows the team's final standing (in the example below, see the entry for 1976). In the case of a manager who finished the season but did not begin it, the team's standing when he took over is shown on the left and the final standing on the right (see the entry for 1978). In the case of a manager who began when the season was already under way but who failed to finish, the figure on the left of the column shows the team's standing when he took over; the middle figure shows the team's standing when he departed; and a third figure shows the team's final standing (see the entry for 1977). The figure in the next column represents the number of wins predicted by the team's runs scored and runs allowed, with about ten extra runs being required for each win beyond .500. Last, the number of wins in the A-E column, which may be a positive figure or a negative figure, reflects the extent to which a manager may have stretched (or hindered) his available talent. The bottom line of a manager's entry provides his career totals, beginning at the left with the number of years, full or partial, in which he managed a major league club. The symbols shown in the sample entry are explained after the example. Blow, Josiah H. "Joe" ============================================================================= YEAR TM/L G W L PCT [ STANDING ] M/Y W-EXP A-E ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1969 Det-A* 134 71 63 .530 3 E 3 E 1/2 66.8 4.2 1971 Tex-A* 23 9 14 .391 6 W 6 W 3/3 12.0 -3.0 1972 Tex-A 161 84 76 .525 2 W 79.1 4.9 1973 Tex-A 95 44 51 .463 4 W 3 W 1/2 44.2 -0.2 1973 NY-A 56 30 26 .535 3 E 3 E 2/2 28.7 1.3 1974 NY-A 159 97 62 .610 ^%1 E 82.8 14.2 1975 NY-A 162 100 62 .617 %1 E 90.0 10.0 1976 NY-A 94 52 42 .553 3 E #%1 E 1/3 53.8 -1.8 1977 Bos-A 95 55 40 .579 4 E 4 E 2 E 2/3 50.4 4.6 1978 Oah-A 152 83 69 .546 5 W +2 W 2/2 75.2 7.8 1979 Oak-A 60 37 23 .617 1 W 2 W 1/2 33.0 4.0 1980 Oak-A 49 27 22 .551 2 W 3 W 2/2 27.4 -0.4 1981(1) Oak-A 62 24 38 .387 6 W 32.4 -7.6 1981(2) Oak-A 100 44 56 .440 S W 57.0 -13.0 1982 NY-A 162 91 71 .562 3 E 61.5 10.5 1983 NY-A 145 91 54 .628 7 E 2 E 2/2 84.0 7.0 14 1709 939 769 .550 898.3 42.5 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Whenever a manager served two or more teams in the same year, the totals for each club are shown separately (see the entry above for 1973). The split seasons of 1892 and 1981 are indicated with separate records for each half. A figure to the right of the year indicates first half or second half (see entry above for 1981). TM/L Team and League G Games managed (including ties) W Wins L Losses PCT Percentage of games won M/Y Manager/Year (The latter figure indicates how many managers the team employed that year, while the former indicates the chronological position of the manager whose entry it is; "2/5," for example, would mean that this manager was the second of the team's five managers during that year.) W-EXP Expected Wins Calculated for the team based on its actual runs scored and allowed, not its predicted runs scored and runs allowed. A team that allows exactly as many runs as it scores is predicted to play .500 ball. The equation for expected wins is: (Runs Scored - Runs Allowed/Runs Per Win) + 81 A-E Actual Wins Minus Expected Wins (A measure of the extent to which a team outperformed or underperformed its talent; for a single season or two a high figure may be attributable to chance, but over time one must credit good managing.) E Eastern Division W Western Division * Indicates playing manager; for vital statistics, consult the player or pitcher register # Tied for first place, involved in league or division playoff + Tied for position in standings % League Championship Series win ^ World Series win The team and league abbreviations used in this section can be found in the last entry of the Contents. For a prose account of the history of managers (and coaches), see the feature article by Fred Stein.