[bigboydan]

boy do i feel sorry for this guy, i guess he's gonna be the next d-ray manager to fail miserablely

Devil Rays hire Angels bench coach Joe Maddon as manager

November 14, 2005
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (AP) -- The Tampa Bay Devil Rays have hired Los Angeles Angels bench coach Joe Maddon as manager, six weeks after beginning their search to replace Lou Piniella.

The team confirmed Maddon's hiring Monday. The St. Petersburg Times and Tampa Tribune reported in Monday editions that the team selected Maddon over incumbent Devil Rays bench coach John McLaren the day before.

"I'm very happy, excited, eager, all those things," Maddon told the Times. "It's a great situation and I'm really looking forward to it."


The Devil Rays scheduled a news conference for Tuesday. Maddon did not immediately return phone messages left by The Associated Press.

Maddon, 51, inherits a team with a promising nucleus of young talent that made the job attractive.

"I'd like to congratulate Joe Maddon," McLaren told the Tribune. "He's been in the trenches a long time as I have, and he's very deserving."

Andrew Friedman, Tampa Bay's new executive vice president of baseball operations, interviewed nine candidates and also had discussions with former New York Mets manager Bobby Valentine.

Valentine was a finalist even though he was thought to be a longshot because the salary he would have commanded after leading the Chiba Lotte Marines to this year's Japan League championship.

The selection of Maddon over McLaren brings yet another fresh face to the Devil Rays, who have undergone a massive overhaul in the front office in the past six weeks. He has been was been a coach with the Angels for the past 12 seasons, with much of that time spent as manager Mike Scioscia's right-hand man.

McLaren, meanwhile, offered the prospect of retaining some continuity after serving as Piniella's bench coach. Three others from within the organization -- coaches Billy Hatcher and Tom Foley, and minor league manager Bill Evers -- were interviewed during the first week of the search.

The other candidates were Hall of Famer Mike Schmidt, former Detroit manager Alan Trammell and Atlanta batting coach Terry Pendleton.

Former New York Yankees bench coach Joe Girardi also interviewed with Tampa Bay before the Florida Marlins hired him as their manager.

[Dead Money]

The Devil Rays went 39-34 after the All-Star break, only the third time in club history they have played above .500 mark over a stretch of 70 games. ... It also marked the first time in team history that the Devil Rays had a winning mark in the second half of the season. They also had their first winning seasons against the New York Yankees (11-8), Cleveland (6-4) and LA (5-4). ... The Rays finished 40-41 at home and fell one win shy of the club record for most home wins. ... LHP Mark Hendrickson threw a complete game Saturday night, the team's first of the season. ... Tampa Bay led the majors in most walks allowed (612) and fewest walks received (409). The last team to make that claim was the 1972 Angels. ... The team batted .274, third in the majors behind Boston (.280) and the Yankees (.276). ... OF Carl Crawford (46) and IF Julio Lugo (39) came up short of becoming the first set of teammates with 40-plus steals since 1993, when Montreal's Marquis Grissom (53) and Delino DeShields (43) and Anaheim's Luis Polonia (55) and Chad Curtis (48) each did it. ... LHP Scott Kazmir finished with the third-most strikeouts by an AL rookie in the last 25 years. He had 164 in 186 innings. ... IF Jorge Cantu set a club record for RBI with 117. It was the most by a player before the age of 24 since Albert Pujols had 124 with St. Louis in 2003 and the most by an AL player at that age since Alex Rodriguez in 1998.


If Rocco is back this year they will be decent. The biggest problem for them is they play in the AL EAST

[onlooker]

If Rocco is back this year they will be decent. The biggest problem for them is they play in the AL EAST

Well as long as they stay in that division, they will fail miserablely.

[bigboydan]

Well as long as they stay in that division, they will fail miserablely.

and then some