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Rays Skipper No Ordinary Joe

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 29, 2008

Tampa Bay's professional sports teams have been led by head coaches with humor, fight and character.

Former Bucs coach John McKay had an edgy sense of humor, once telling reporters who asked about his team's "execution" that he was "all for it." Another Bucs head coach, Tony Dungy, kept a steady temperament no matter the outcome - the personification of character on and off the field. And former Lightning head coach John Tortorella was a master motivator, telling the coach of the Philadelphia Flyers to "shut" his "yap" during the Bolts' Stanley Cup championship run a few years ago.

And more recently, Lou Piniella, former manager of the team formerly known as the Devil Rays, earned a starring role in a television commercial for his foot-stomping, dirt-kicking rants at the umpires.

Now we're being treated to character of a different sort, that of Rays manager Joe Maddon, whose mix of philosophy, the arts, optimism and behavioral management has taken Bay area sports to a new level.

Maddon, the fourth manager in Rays' history, is in his third season. A former catcher, he majored in economics at Lafayette College in his home state of Pennsylvania and spent 31 years in the Angels organization, mostly in coaching and scouting.

In a sport where cliches fly like baseballs out of the infield, Maddon has an analytical way of explaining the game. Sometimes, his commentary sends fans to the dictionary or history books. And he doesn't limit himself to the nuts and bolts of the game, either, which makes it more fun for fans.

Before the Rays took the field for his first game as manager, Maddon called upon Michelangelo for motivation. "Michelangelo aimed high," he said. "Look at the history of this man. The David is pretty cool. The Sistine Chapel is pretty neat also. He talks about if you aim low, the concern is that you might hit the mark. So we're not going to aim low; we're going to aim high and see what happens."

And check out this recent Maddonism: "A mind once stretched can never go back to its original form." Maddon was talking about relief pitcher Grant Balfour rising to the mental challenge of pitching more than one complete inning near the end of a game.

And consider his response when asked whether he needed to talk to Yankees manager Joe Girardi after a dustup between the two teams during a preseason game:

"If he would like to have a conversation, I'd like to talk about politics. I'm good with global warming. I'm good with a lot of different topics on a daily basis. I like iTunes. I download some stuff off iTunes. I like different restaurants. I like red wine. I have a lot of different areas I can go conversationally."

Just what we like - a well-rounded manager with class, on and off the field.

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