Next Gen leader The face of the modern manager looks a lot like Kevin Cash
ST. PETERSBURG — By now, he should be leathery. Face lined, eyes hardened, humor expunged.
He should be rounded as Lasorda, cranky as Weaver and bald as Francona. Instead, the skipper seems refreshed, if a little sweaty, after throwing batting practice to his 11-year-old son J.D. while Rays players are getting dressed in the visiting clubhouse before a recent spring game in North Port.
If Kevin Cash is dated, it is only by accomplishment.
When hired in December 2014, he was the youngest manager in the majors. Now, at 46, Cash is baseball’s longest continuously serving manager.
He is beginning his 10th season in charge of the Rays and is a handful of wins from passing Joe Maddon as the franchise’s all-time leader. Seniority never looked so boyish.
“It’s a little surreal,” said Cash, wiping his brow on the dugout bench at CoolToday Park, “given how volatile the job is.”
For an organization that thrives on innovation and calculated risk, Cash is a rare constant. He is the bridge between a front office unafraid of change, and the groupthink that has ruled clubhouses and dugouts for more than a century. Turns out, his is the stubbled, amiable and perceptive face of the modern manager.
“He’s the same guy that he was when we first hired him, except now he has the experience and the credentials,” said Rays president Matt Silverman, who was in charge of baseball operations at the time Cash was hired. “He has the humility necessary for this job. He has the energy, consistent energy, that’s contagious. And there’s always been a curiosity and a desire to learn and understand everything around him.
“When we were asking people in the industry about him when we were making a list of candidates, the feedback on Kevin was that he was respected by everyone. You’re talking about a backup catcher with the respect of everyone in the clubhouse for a winning organization like the Red Sox. That says a lot about his ability to interact with people.”
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Or,
at least, it wasn’t part of some master career plan.
Cash spent parts of eight seasons in the big leagues as a light-hitting catcher — “Hanging by a piece of dental floss,” is how he describes it — before taking jobs as an advance scout in Texas and Toronto and eventually ending up as the bullpen coach in Cleveland for two years.
If he was marginal as a player, he was in demand as a leader. There was an old-school vibe about Cash around players, but with the intellect to grasp new ideas. The Rays were reinventing themselves after Andrew Friedman left for Los Angeles and Maddon had gone to the Cubs, and were eager to head off in innovative directions.
The marriage was risky for both parties. For Cash, he was a 36 year old with no managing experience who could be kissing his future prospects goodbye if the team’s radical ideas flopped. And for the Rays, who did their best to provide reassurance by handing a novice manager a five-year contract.
Owner Stuart Sternberg’s philosophy is that character and intangibles are more important than experience. Get the right person, and everything else can be learned. It’s not coincidental that Silverman, Friedman, Maddon, Cash and Erik Neander were new to their roles when promoted by Sternberg.
And, yes, those early years were a bit shaky while the team rebuilt following a six-year run with four playoff appearances — the Rays were below .500 in each of his first three seasons — but Cash benefitted from having Evan Longoria’s stamp of approval.
“I was a first-year manager doing things that a 15-year manager would never do,” Cash said. “I was incredibly fortunate to have Longo around. He was already an established superstar — the best player in franchise history — and he could have really made it difficult on me. And maybe even on Erik and Chaim (Bloom) because we were all just coming into our own. But he was just incredibly supportive. He understood what we were doing.
“There were jokes and he would laugh at times. I remember taking Jake Odorizzi out of a game after he had gone five innings and given up one hit. Longo stood on the mound and looked at me like, ‘Are we really doing this right now?’ I would just say, ‘Yup, we are.’ ”
“He’s a player’s manager. Every single player that’s come in has great things to say about him. No one has butted heads with him. No one has left the organization and said, ‘Man, I really don’t like that guy.’ That speaks volumes.”
Brandon Lowe
Rays second baseman on manager Kevin Cash
This is the part that casual fans never get. Because of the revenue gap, Tampa Bay cannot follow the same philosophies as New York or Boston. That would be competitive suicide. So the Rays look to gain advantages in other ways. And that’s where Cash’s talents excel.
He gets players to understand and buy into unorthodox strategies. He gets hitters to accept platoon roles. He gets pitchers to understand they’re not going to face a lineup a third time in a game. He’s open, he’s honest and he heads problems off long before they arrive. Players don’t always agree, but they respect the way they’re kept in the loop.
“He’s a player’s manager,” said second baseman Brandon Lowe. “Every single player that’s come in has great things to say about him. No one has butted heads with him. No one has left the organization and said, ‘Man, I really don’t like that guy.’ That speaks volumes.”
By season’s end, Cash will have managed the Rays for as long as Joe Torre managed the Yankees and Tony La Russa was in Oakland. Longer than Sparky Anderson managed the Reds and longer than Billy Martin’s five stints in New York combined.
And Cash’s job is completely secure. Word around the game is that Cash’s contract extension runs through 2030.
In the last half-century, only five other managers (La Russa, Anderson, Earl Weaver, Tom Kelly and Eric Wedge) have won more games before age 46 than Cash’s 739. And, with his contract, his kids still in school, and his relationship with ownership, Cash sees no reason to consider leaving anytime soon.
“It’s certainly not lost on me that people are taking time off from their day jobs to come watch us today,” said Cash, with a wave of his hand toward the bleachers. “And this is my day job. That’s unbelievable. I’m sitting here just waiting for BP to start. My only stress is whether we can get 150 innings out of a guy as opposed to 120.
“How cool is that? That’s my job.”