Jump to content

Tony La Russa

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 67.181.140.181 (talk) at 06:20, 16 September 2005. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Anthony La Russa, Jr. (born October 4, 1944, in Tampa, Florida) is a manager in Major League Baseball, currently with the St. Louis Cardinals. He is one of six managers in history to win pennants with both American and National League teams. He is ranked third all-time for total number of career wins, trailing only Connie Mack (3,731) and John McGraw (2,763). He is one of only two managers to be named Manager of the Year in both of baseball's major leagues.

Playing career

La Russa (often misspelled LaRussa) was signed by the Kansas City Athletics as a middle infielder prior to the start of the 1962 season. He came up to the A's the next season, making his debut on May 10, 1963. In the following off-season he suffered a shoulder injury while playing softball with friends, and the shoulder continued to bother him during the remainder of his playing career.

Over the next six seasons, La Russa spent most of his time in the minor leagues, making it to the now-Oakland A's roster in 1968 and 1969. He spent the entire 1970 season with the big club, and then late in 1971 the A's traded him to the Atlanta Braves. His final big league playing stop was with the Chicago Cubs, where he appeared as a pinch-runner in one game, on April 6, 1973. He also spent time in the organizations of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Chicago White Sox, and St. Louis Cardinals.

Managerial career

Before becoming a manager, he earned a Juris Doctor (J.D.)degree from Florida State University, but never entered the legal profession. La Russa has been quoted as saying, "I decided I'd rather ride the buses in the minor leagues than practice law for a living." He is the fifth major league manager in baseball history to have earned a law degree. The other four are Monte Ward (New York Giants, Brooklyn and Providence, late 1800s), Hughie Jennings (Detroit, 1907-20, New York Giants, 1924), Miller Huggins (St. Louis Cardinals and New York Yankees, 1913-29) and Branch Rickey (St. Louis Browns, 1913-15, St. Louis Cardinals, 1919-25, later the creator of the modern farm system in baseball and still later the executive who broke the color line by signing Jackie Robinson). All of La Russa's attorney-manager predecessors are in the Hall of Fame—Ward as a player, Jennings and Huggins as managers, and Rickey for his accomplishments as an executive.

The White Sox hired La Russa as their manager two-thirds of the way through the 1979 season. He was named American League Manager of the Year in 1983, when his club won the AL West but fell to the Baltimore Orioles in the American League Championship Series. The White Sox fired La Russa after the club got off to a 26-38 start in 1986.

La Russa had a vacation of less than three weeks before his old club, the Athletics, called him to take over as manager. With the A's, he led the club to three consecutive World Series, from 1988 to 1990, sweeping an earthquake-delayed series from the San Francisco Giants in 1989. He earned two additional Manager of the Year awards with the A's, in 1988 and 1992.

After the 1995 season, in which the A's finished 67-77, the Haas family, with whom La Russa had a close personal relationship, sold the team after the death of patriarch Walter Haas Sr. La Russa left to take over the helm of the St. Louis Cardinals. The team promptly won the National League's Central Division crown in 1996, a feat his club repeated in 2000, 2001, and 2002 (his fourth Manager of the Year award).

However, it was not until 2004 that the Cardinals finally won the pennant under La Russa. The team had the best record in the majors at 105-57, and defeated the Los Angeles Dodgers, 3 games to 1, in the National League Division Series, and the Houston Astros, 4 games to 3, in the 2004 National League Championship Series. That put the club in the 2004 World Series against the Boston Red Sox, the Cards' first Series appearance since 1987. However, they were swept by the Red Sox, losing four games to none.

As of 2004, La Russa's regular season managerial record is 2114-1846 (.534), including 794-663 (.545) with the Cardinals. He credits Paul Richards with first inspiring him to believe he could succeed as a major league manager.

In Three Nights in August

In 2005, La Russa was the focus of a book by sportswriter Buzz Bissinger. Bissinger's Three Nights in August delves into La Russa's role as manager during a 3-game series in 2003 between his Cardinals and manager Dusty Baker's Chicago Cubs, their longtime rivals. The book received much praise from both fans and critics, though some complained that Bissinger sets out to glorify La Russa's "old school" managerial style as a direct challenge to the theses of Michael Lewis's 2004 book Moneyball.

Personal life

La Russa and his wife Elaine are the founders of Tony La Russa's Animal Rescue Foundation, headquartered in Walnut Creek, California, which saves abandoned and injured animals as well as running programs to bring dog and cat visits to abused children, hospital patients, seniors and shut-ins.

Note: baseball-reference.com below misspells La Russa's name, as is common. The Tony La Russa's Animal Rescue Foundation site below shows the correct spelling.

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Tony_La_Russa&oldid=23328092"