TORONTO – As Ross Atkins takes over the general manager’s office, Tony LaCava continues to do the general manager’s job.
The awkward exit of Alex Anthopoulos set in motion an awkward transition. While waiting to see if he would get the job his old friend held, LaCava — the Blue Jays’ interim GM — rallied the Anthopoulos loyalists in the front office and mapped out an off-season plan, which evolved with significant input from the new president, Mark Shapiro.
A couple of days ago, Shapiro hired Ross Atkins, his old friend from the Cleveland front office, to replace Anthopoulos. LaCava was left with a load of disappointment, a contract extension and a gussied-up job title. And since Atkins came so late to the game, LaCava — the team’s senior assistant GM — also agreed to lead the management team into the crucible of baseball’s annual winter meetings, which start Monday in Nashville.
“Tony LaCava, for now, will hold that charge,” Atkins said Friday during his introductory news conference. “He’ll hold the lead there. He will work us through the winter meetings and through this off-season as the leader of our decision-making, and I’ll look to support and complement him in any way that I can.”
All of which makes sense. Atkins has a lot of catching-up to do. LaCava, a longtime Anthopoulos lieutenant, had already signalled he would stick around and do whatever Shapiro felt necessary. At some point – nobody is saying when – Atkins will get up to speed and slip past LaCava in the Blue Jays’ hierarchy.
Shapiro and Atkins made it sound like the process would be seamless and comfortable and collaborative. Perhaps it will be, given LaCava’s loyalty – that is no act – and his inherent benevolence, to say nothing of his deep experience and expertise.
But that was not enough to win the GM’s job. Both Shapiro and Atkins heaped praise upon LaCava during Friday’s media session. Shapiro said he had to choose between “two guys who could do a great job.” Understandably, he did not say what separated the two.
The obvious difference is that Shapiro has known Atkins for close to two decades, since Atkins was a minor-league pitcher in the Cleveland system. Atkins was not a prospect, but he was smart and inquisitive. That caught Shapiro’s attention as he began his ascent through the ranks in Cleveland. And Atkins the pitcher got an early message that he might do well to consider a new career path.
In the spring of 1995, his first season as a pro player, Atkins was standing in the outfield when veteran Indians pitcher Bud Black approached him.
“Bud Black asked me what my life was going to be after baseball, while I was still in uniform,” Atkins recalled. “So I knew all too soon that I needed to think about that.”
He pitched for five years, reaching Double-A. Then, at 26, he switched to coaching, and then quickly to the player development side. Over 15 years in Cleveland, he worked in virtually every area of baseball operations, including supervision of the Indians’ Latin American operations. This past season, he was vice-president of player personnel.
All the while, he followed Shapiro up the ladder. After the Jays hired Shapiro to replace Paul Beeston as president and CEO, and Anthopoulos decided he no longer “fit” following the Jays’ breakout season, insiders immediately began to predict Atkins would become the GM.
It took awhile, Shapiro said, because he was determined to make a thorough search. He wrote out a detailed list of criteria, then set out to find candidates who might fulfill them. After narrowing the hunt to four, he hired Korn Ferry, a sports headhunting firm. Jed Hughes, a Korn Ferry vice-president, sat in on the first round of interviews to provide “an unbiased opinion,” Shapiro said.
Besides Atkins and LaCava, Shapiro interviewed Royals assistant Rene Gonzalez, who fulfilled MLB’s requirement that a GM search include a minority candidate. Shapiro refused to name the fourth candidate.
All the while, LaCava and his aides were working toward the winter meetings and beyond. Atkins joined the discussions Thursday.
Atkins said his breadth and depth of experience, from player to vice-president, have prepared him well. He said he is excited about the division-championship team and the front-office staff he inherited from Anthopoulos. He repeated the Shapiro mantra about building a “sustainable” winner.
“Ultimately, this is all about the players, this really is,” Atkins said. “I’ve always felt that if you can create an environment where players want to be a part of something bigger than themselves, they want to be a part of a team … if you can create that environment, it takes the pressure off of players.”
He and Shapiro kept stressing the importance of process, which raised a question that boiled up when Anthopoulos made it clear he felt he could not work with a new boss who would be heavily involved baseball decisions, including the sort of decisions Anthopoulos was accustomed to making.
Someone asked Atkins how that process will work, for example, in the lead-up to a trade.
In reply, he talked about balancing short- and long-term impact, and about assigning the right people to collect the right information on a player sought in a trade. He talked about the challenge of deciding how much weight to assign the pieces of information. He stressed the importance of taking emotion out of the decision.
Then, Shapiro will rule, he said.
“I will ultimately put together a recommendation that I’ll take to Mark with what I think is best,” Atkins said. “But that’s not any different than how it is in most organizations that I’m aware of.”
Before Atkins answered, Shapiro smiled and said the question sounded like something he would ask when interviewing candidates for the GM job.
And after all those years with Shapiro in Cleveland, Atkins knew the answer.
