Bell says he wants to manage in majors
TRENTON » Jay Bell didn’t anticipate his last media availability to come shortly after the clock ticked past 2 a.m. on Saturday morning, but this was no ordinary night.
The Thunder had just been swept out of the Eastern League playoffs following a 5-1 loss to New Hampshire in a game that was delayed 3 hours, 58 minutes by rain.
“I never started a game this late before,” Bell said. “I’m glad we got it in, especially with the weather. I was hoping to force Games 4 and 5, but we just couldn’t get the big hit and they did.”
It brought to an end a season in which Bell guided the Thunder to a 79-61 record and East Division championship after his team won 10 of its last 11 games to edge the Fisher Cats for the division title.
“What I take away more than anything else is having a group of guys that bought into the simple message that we talked about early in the season about doing their best to play vanilla baseball — playing well defensively and making sure that they pitched well,” Bell said. “Because of that I think that’s why we had consistent success all year long. We didn’t have many stretches of losses. We had a few here and there where we lost three in a row, but overall we were very consistent.”
Bell, 52, played 18 big league seasons and said his goal is to make it back as a manager.
“At this stage of my career, I’m not ready to say I’m a minor league manager,” Bell said. “I’d like to move forward and try to have an opportunity to manage at the major league level. It’s one of those things where we talk about being content in all things but never be satisfied. That’s where I’m at. I’m content right where I’m at and doing my job at this level, but I’m not satisfied. I’d like to make an impact on the organization at the top level in this seat. You can impact a lot of players’ lives from a big league managerial seat.”