Who is the best candidate to replace John Gibbons in Toronto?
With the expected move to dismiss John Gibbons, here are some candidates to be the next Toronto Blue Jays manager.
Rumors have pointed that direction for a while, but on Wednesday the Toronto Blue Jays will reportedly officially announce that manager John Gibbons will not be back next season.
After making the playoffs in 2015 and 2016, the Blue Jays fell to 76-86 last year and they are 71-87 as this season winds down. Gibbons seems to have accepted this fate, previously saying he didn’t want to go through a total rebuild and acknowledging the young players in Toronto’s pipeline would probably benefit from a fresh voice.
Jon Heyman of Fancred Sports previously reported along those lines, suggesting the Blue Jays will hire a young manager with an eye on competing on 2020 or 2021. That latter note is not something Blue Jays fans want to hear. But a realistic look at the current situation in the AL East should automatically put a focused eye on a couple years down the road within the organization.
Sources indicate that the #BlueJays will announce before today’s game vs #Astros that John Gibbons will not return as manager in 2019. He will likely finish the season with the club.
— Steve Phillips (@StevePhillipsGM) September 26, 2018
Gibbons will finish out the rest of the season, as expected as he surely wants to do so and the Blue Jays will allow him to have a decent exit. But here are four potential replacements for Gibbons as the manager in Toronto looking to 2019.
4. Eric Chavez
Chavez has been working as a special assistant in the Los Angeles Angels’ front office since his playing career ended, and he stepped in to manager the team’s Triple-A affiliate at the end of this season when manager Keith Johnson was promoted to Mike Scioscia’s staff to finish out the big league season.
With that latter note in mind, Chavez has quickly surfaced as the favorite to replace Scioscia as Angels manager next year. Scioscia has said he wants to keep managing, but he does not have a contract or next year and the Angels are in line to make an overdue change.
Chavez fits a recent template for managerial hires, as a former player with little or no experience as a coach or manager. He may want to stay with the Angels if he’s being pegged as Scioscia’s successor, but the Blue Jays should be in the mix to pull him away.