Don Mattingly and the Marlins made things official this morning, holding a press conference to announce his four-year contract and introduce the team’s new manager to the local media who covered eight managers in the previous six years.
The vibe of the press conference put forth by the Marlins and Mattingly was that he’s different than all those other managers, which would be fine except similar things were said about Ozzie Guillen and Mike Redmond before they were fired midway through multi-year contracts.
Mattingly had a .551 winning percentage in five seasons as the Dodgers’ manager, including three straight division titles, but Guillen was a World Series-winning manager with a .524 winning percentage in eight seasons with the White Sox when the Marlins hired him for huge money and he lasted exactly one season.
One of Mattingly’s quotes stood out to me:
I signed a four-year deal. I plan on being here at least 10.
The last Marlins manager to complete four full seasons on the job was … no one. In the 23-year history of the team no manager has completed four full seasons without a change being made and Mattingly is the 15th different manager since 1993. Good luck, Donnie.
