[msb-alumni] Bob Watson, 74, Who Was Baseball's First Black General Manager, Dies on May 14, 2020
- From: Steve <pipeguy920@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: <msb-alumni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 16 May 2020 15:42:42 -0400
BlankBob Watson, 74, Who Was Baseball's First Black General Manager, Dies. By
Richard
Goldstein.
A former major leaguer, he shattered a racial barrier in 1994 with the Houston
Astros. Two years later, he was the Yankees' G.M. as New York began a
championship
run.
Bob Watson, the hard-hitting first baseman and outfielder who became the first
African-American general manager in major league baseball, with the 1994
Houston
Astros, then helped take the 1996 Yankees to the franchise's first World Series
championship in 18 years as their newly hired general manager, died on Thursday
in
Houston. He was 74. The Astros announced his death. Watson had kidney failure
and had
been undergoing dialysis since 2016.
"Both my kids offered to donate kidneys to me," he told The Daily News early in
2018,
"and I told them both the same thing: "I've had a good life and I don't want to
take
a kidney from young people who really need them and still have their whole
lives
ahead of them."
Watson played in the majors for 19 seasons, much of that time with the Astros,
and
was a two-time All-Star. He spent 45 years in major league baseball as a
player, a
team executive, a coach and an official in the commissioner's office.
After several seasons as an assistant general manager in Houston, he was
promoted to
the top front-office job in October 1993.
"It's something the minority population can point to now and say, yes, there is
a
black man, or a minority person, in a decision-making role for a major league
club,"
he told The New York Times. "But I don't want to be categorized as a pioneer. I
want
to be categorized as a guy who was the right man for the job."
Watson underwent surgery for prostate cancer in July 1994 and worked for the
Astros
part time during the next several weeks before resuming his full-time duties.
His
Astros, managed by Terry Collins, a future Mets manager, had a 66-49 record
when a
players' strike in August ended the 1994 season. The Astros faded below the
.500 mark
in 1995, when Watson was compelled by management to trade away talent to keep
the
payroll from growing.
He left the Astros in October 1995 to become the Yankees' general manager,
agreeing
to a two-year guaranteed deal with a team option for two more years. The Astros
had
allowed him to speak with the Yankees while he was under contract, then
released him
from its final year.
Although Watson was a racial pioneer in baseball as a general manager, Bill
Lucas, an
African-American, handled most of the Atlanta Braves' trades and contract
negotiations in the late 1970s as their vice president of baseball operations.
The
Braves' owner, Ted Turner, formally held the general manager post as well.
Soon after the Yankee owner George Steinbrenner hired Watson, Steinbrenner
named Joe
Torre as his field manager for 1996, replacing Buck Showalter. Following the
Yankees'
loss to the Seattle Mariners in the 1995 playoffs, Gene Michael had been
shifted from
general manager to scouting director. But he retained an important role,
together
with Steinbrenner, in working with Watson to shape the 1996 roster.
With Derek Jeter named rookie of the year at shortstop, Mariano Rivera
beginning to
emerge as baseball's greatest relief pitcher, a newly arrived Tino Martinez at
first
base and a pitching rotation led by Andy Pettitte, the 1996 Yankees defeated
the
Atlanta Braves in a six-game World Series, their first championship since they
bested
the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1978.
But Watson resigned as general manager after the 1997 season, when the Yankees
were
defeated by the Cleveland Indians in the playoffs. He was replaced by Brian
Cashman,
his assistant, who began a long run as general manager, a position he still
holds.
Reflecting on his resignation in the midst of a turbulent Steinbrenner reign,
Watson
told The Times in 2016, 'I just couldn't take the stress every day that I was
going
to get fired -- the yelling and screaming. 'Growing up, I was always one of the
strongest kids in my neighborhood,' he told Texas Monthly in 1997, 'and I knew
if I
didn't maintain my composure, I could really hurt somebody. And on two
occasions,
when I was put in threatening situations, I unfortunately did hurt some guys.
So I
worked hard to stay on an even keel. And it had a lot to do with me being
consistent
as a player and as a human being. In fact, if I wasn't the type of guy that I
am, I
probably would've broken here last year -- especially with Mr. Steinbrenner.
Robert
Jose Watson was born on April 10, 1946, in Los Angeles and grew up in the South
Central neighborhood. His parents separated before he was born, and he was
raised by
grandparents, who nurtured his passion for baseball. He was a catcher for John
C.
Fremont High School when it won the 1963 Los Angeles city championship, a team
that
also featured the future major league outfielders Willie Crawford and Bobby
Tolan. He
attended Los Angeles Harbor College, then signed with the Astros' organization
in
January 1965. Watson almost quit baseball while playing with the Astros' minor
league
team in Savannah, Ga., where segregation barred him from joining teammates at
restaurants and their hotels. But he was persuaded by the Astros' management to
persevere. He made his major league debut in 1966, playing in one game with the
Astros in September. A sturdy 6 feet tall and 200 pounds or so, Watson was
known as
the Bull. He was a right-handed line-drive hitter, but he hit 184 career home
runs
despite playing at the pitcher-friendly Astrodome through most of the 1970s. He
was
an All-Star in 1973 and 1975. In May 1975, Watson scored what was billed as the
millionth run in major league history, a heavily sponsored promotion by Major
League
Baseball. He received a million Tootsie Rolls, which he donated to the Boy
Scouts and
Girl Scouts, and a million pennies, which he gave to charity, but kept a Seiko
watch.
The tally leading up to the supposed millionth run has not been formally
verified,
however. Watson was the first player to hit for the cycle -- a single, double,
triple
and home run in a single game -- in both the National and American Leagues,
doing it
with Houston in 1977 and the Boston Red Sox in 1979. The Astros traded him to
Boston
during the 1979 season. He joined the Yankees as a free agent in 1980 and hit
.307
with 13 home runs. The next year he hit a three-run homer off the Dodgers'
Jerry
Reuss in the first inning of Game 1 of the World Series, but Los Angeles went
on to
defeat the Yankees in six games. The Yankees dealt Watson to the Braves in
April
1982. He retired after the 1984 season with 1,826 hits, 989 runs batted in and
a
career batting average of .295. Watson was a coach for the Oakland A's for four
years, then joined the Astros' front office. He was the major leagues' vice
president
in charge of discipline, rules and on-field operations from 2002 to 2010 and
worked
with USA Baseball in selecting the United States team for the 2000 Sydney
Olympics.
The team won the gold medal. He received a lifetime achievement award from the
Baseball Assistance Team, known as Bat, in 2017 for his years as a member of
the
board and grant committee of the organization, which aids former baseball
figures in
need. Watson had been living in Houston. His survivors include his wife, Carol
Watson; his daughter, Kelley; and his son, Keith. Watson told Major League
Baseball's
website in 2014 that the game needed to step up the hiring of members of
minority
groups as general managers and field managers. 'We still have a long way to
go,' he
said. 'The commissioner's office has hired a lot of women and a lot of
minorities in
the front office up there in central baseball, but it hasn't trickled down to
the
field.
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