Philadelphia Phillies manager Rob Thomson, of Sarnia, Ont., is trying to keep things on an even keel amidst the team’s struggles and questions about his job security.
The Phillies snapped a 10-game losing streak - the franchise’s longest since 1999 - on Saturday, but fell back in the losing column on Sunday with a 6-2 trouncing by the division-leading Atlanta Braves.
That loss dropped the Phillies - who have qualified for the postseason in four consecutive years, and went to the World Series in 2022 in Thomson’s first year as manager - to 9-19, tied for the worst in the major leagues through the first month of action.
After the Boston Red Sox made waves around the league by firing manager Alex Cora and many members of the Red Sox coaching staff over the weekend, pundits around the league expect Thomson to be next if the early-season struggles continue in Philadelphia.
“Well, I mean, that’s natural, right?” Thomson said. “It’s normal. And I’ve never worried about that in my entire career.”
Thomson, 62, owns a sterling 355-270 record as manager of the Phillies. The baseball lifer, who spent three years in the minor leagues as a player in the Detroit Tigers system in the 1980s before moving to coaching in 1988, spent many years working as a coach in the minors in the New York Yankees system.
“I worked for a guy for 28 years [Yankees owner George Steinbrenner] who, as the ‘Seinfeld’ episode will tell you, ‘Fires people like it’s a bodily function,’ and it never bothered me. It didn’t. I don’t have time to think about it. I’m a person that thinks about other people and what can I do to help them? And it’s out of my control. So that’s where I’m at.”
Phillies president Dave Dombrowski told reporters on Tuesday that change is “not being pondered at this point.” But Cora’s firing in Boston - Dombrowski had hired Cora while serving as GM of the Red Sox in 2017 - caused rampant speculation that a reunion between the two, who remain close, per MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki, could happen sooner than later.
Dombrowski refused to comment on the Cora speculation when asked on Sunday.
Not a lot has gone right for the Phillies to this point in the season. Star slugger Kyle Schwarber is hitting .196, third baseman Alec Bohm has a dreadful .412 on-base plus slugging percentage and outside of Cristopher Sanchez, the starting pitchers have largely struggled so far.
Thomson took over for Joe Girardi in May of 2022. The veteran Girardi, a former Manager of the Year and World Series winner with the Yankees, was fired after an off-day when the team was off to a 22-29 start. That Phillies team won 13 of their first 15 games under Thomson to surge back into the playoff race.
The Phillies sit 10 games below .500 and have an off-day on Monday, but Schwarber doesn’t believe a change at manager can be a quick fix now like it was with his team in 2022.
“You feel as a player, you feel responsible for that,” he said. “We’re the ones who are out there. … All of our coaches are here to support and put us in the best positions that we can [be in].
“We’ve gone through those types of spells through different years,” Schwarber added. “Right now, it just kind of feels like we’re all grinding together. Obviously, you don’t want to be in these positions, but I feel like the more that we keep coming together, the more that we’re going to find a way out of it. The more that you keep building, building, building to it, it will be that much sweeter at the end of it. But it doesn’t mean that it’s guaranteed. No guarantee. You’ve just got to keep working for it.”
