Chris Chambliss hit lots of big home runs as a player, including one that sent the New York Yankees to the 1976 World Series. He is moving closer to hitting his first as a managerial candidate.
According to major-league sources, Chambliss is prominent on the short list the White Sox quietly are compiling in anticipation of possibly firing manager Terry Bevington after the final game of the season Sunday. Chambliss managed four years in the minor leagues and has spent the last five years as Joe Torre’s hitting instructor, three in St. Louis and the last two with the Yankees.
“He has paid his dues,” Yankees General Manager Bob Watson said Monday. “He had a long career as a player, has worked in player development, as a major-league coach, a minor-league manager. He has been with winning clubs. I think it’s high time for Chris to be given an opportunity.”
Chambliss, according to major-league sources, is well regarded by Ken Williams, the White Sox’s vice president of player development. Anaheim first base coach Larry Bowa, Texas dugout coach Bucky Dent, Iowa Cubs manager Tim Johnson, St. Louis third base coach Rene Lachemann and Los Angeles first base coach Mike Scioscia are among the others who may be contacted if a search is launched.
Chambliss, 48, was a finalist for the job given to Terry Collins last year in Anaheim. The former first baseman retired to become a coach with the Yankees in 1988. Chambliss spent the next four years as a manager at the Double-A and Triple-A levels, compiling a 300-266 record.
He earned Manager of the Year honors with Detroit’s London team in the Eastern League in 1990 and with Atlanta’s Greenville team in the Southern League in 1991. Rico Brogna, Vinny Castilla and Ryan Klesko are among players he helped develop.
Chambliss is an African-American. That could be relevant to any Sox search because Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf chairs a committee of Major League Baseball owners on minority hiring.
Larry Doby, who managed 87 games with the Sox in 1978, is the only African-American who has managed either of Chicago’s major-league teams. San Francisco’s Dusty Baker, Colorado’s Don Baylor and Toronto’s Cito Gaston are the only African-Americans among the 29 major-league managers currently under contract. Gaston is expected to be fired at season’s end.
While improving its hiring record with minorities and women in the front office, Major League Baseball continues to move slowly in promoting African-Americans to positions of authority. Since the off-season in 1992-93–when Baylor was hired in Colorado and Cuba native Tony Perez was hired in Cincinnati–there have been 31 managerial changes, nine since the end of last season. No African-Americans have been hired.
Pursuing Chambliss could prolong the White Sox’s search until after the World Series. Watson says he will not give other organizations permission to interview any of his staff members during the postseason.
“Clubs understand that while you’re still playing it’s hard to have your staff going all over the place,” Watson said.
Access to Chambliss will be a moot point if the Sox retain Bevington. That appears highly unlikely.
General Manager Ron Schueler plans to review Bevington’s status after the season, saying a decision will be made shortly after the end of the season. The White Sox began the season with the third-highest payroll in the major leagues and are 77-78 entering the final homestand.
While the Sox previously have said that Bevington is working under a two-year contract, Schueler now says the manager’s contract holds only a club option for 1998, with some money guaranteed as severance if Bevington isn’t retained.
Bevington has gone 219-211 since succeeding Gene Lamont 31 games into the 1995 season. Lamont had managed the White Sox to a 252-210 record, including 94 victories and a division championship in 1993.
If Reinsdorf and Schueler were undecided on Bevington entering September, events over the last two weeks could have made it difficult to keep him. Bevington was booed vigorously at Comiskey Park during the last homestand, with the antipathy peaking when he made eight pitching changes in the last three innings of an 8-3 loss to Cleveland on the day Carlton Fisk’s number was retired.
Bevington was involved in a heated confrontation with third baseman Robin Ventura on a team flight from Kansas City to Boston Thursday night. The incident followed an awkward scene en route to the airport when as many as 20 White Sox players chose to ride to the airport on a staff bus rather than sharing the players’ bus with Bevington.
Bevington professes not to be concerned about his job status.
“I’m not going to waste time thinking about it,” Bevington said. “I’ve been with this organization for 10 years. Things usually turn out pretty good for me.”
