Appreciating Cito Gaston

Cito has always been a classy guy and most players play hard for him.

And really when you know all managers are hired to be fired – that is the only SANE way to do it.

Things I admire about Cito:

Loyal to veterans – they’ve been there done it, he knows what they can do and not do, he is not scared by their peaks and valleys.

Loyal to guys like Buck and Overbay – AJ will have a 10 to 12 year career, he’ll have his chances – hopefully for him near his careers end someone will be on his side as Cito is now with Buck and the Big O.

This year with our young pitchers he NEVER panicked even came out at times to remind them he was going to let them “work their way through” the mess they were in. He also never let a young pitcher stay in past his sale by date.

Understands the season is a marathon and micro managing is just a cover for a manager who will never TRUST his players and who will always want to exclaim – “Ya but I went with the percentages.”

Cito is calm – seriously – almost scarily, unnervingly, otherworldly calm. A calm man in the midst of chaos. A rare trait.

Cito – I love ya! I think you are a GREAT manager – a great PERSON and the Jays have been blessed to have had your complete body of work with the team in all your roles. Bravo Sir – BRAVO!

Tom – well done you too – a great piece on Himself.

I didn’t agree with all of his positions or decisions but on the whole I thought he did a great job in his second go-around with the Jays. I appreciate everything he’s done for the team and it’s genuinely hard to think of a nicer or classier individual.

You’ve put into words many of the thoughts I’ve had about Cito.

While I’ve questioned certain aspects of how he manages the team from day-to-day, I’ve never questioned his class and his desire to win. Cito has left a tremendous legacy for the club and I hope that the new manager can build on the foundation that Cito has created.

I wish him the very best in the future.

Here here.

I wish Cito the best…until we see Brian Tallet in a 1 run ballgame tonight, than I’m going to go right back to cursing Cito’s name.

The best thing Cito does is keep his pitching staff healthy. He doesn’t usually overuse pitchers and they are also used enough to keep up their arm strength. There haven’t been many pitching injuries either in his first term or this one. Just think where we would be this year if we had lost one of our top four starters to injury.

Here’s a weird compliment to Cito…he’s hardly aged a day since 93. If anything, he looks a bit leaner/fitter nowadays.

It’s nice to see everyone letting bygones be bygones and coming out with nice things to say about Cito as he winds down his managerial career. And Tom I think you’ve really captured here what makes him tick as a manager.

All kinds of stuff being written about Cito at the moment, but here are a couple of columns.

Dave Perkins in the Star looks back at how Cito got the job by accident in a way. He loved his job as hitting coach, had to be convinced to take the managerial gig but only on an “interim” basis, then while no one thought he’d be the full-time candidate, it quietly became clear that he was the best for the job.

My favourite part of this story has always been Lou Pinella when interviewed for the job, telling Pat Gillick and company "you have the right guy there now" in Cito, which was a classy move on his part.

One interesting tidbit that was new to me in the column is Cito’s revelation that when he came back as hitting coach under Jim Fregosi and Buck Martinez, he realized that he didn’t really enjoy just being a coach anymore, but missed being manager:

"I still love to teach hitting. I still get my fingers in it a little every once in a while. When I came back to coach with (managers Jim) Fregosi and with Buck (Martinez), I really didn’t like coaching any more. I got used to (being a manager) and I wanted that again.

"What I learned is that as a coach you’re not sitting here worrying about what the hell is going on out there. You only worry about your hitters, or pitchers or bullpen or this and that. But as a manger you take care of everybody up and down the lineup. Everybody in this dugout, hitters and pitchers. And everybody else; the front office, the media, the players’ families, their wives and kids.

"The first time I realized that I was on the airplane, late one night, after I’d first started managing. I turned around and went, ‘Wow. I’m responsible for all these people on this plane.’ That’s the difference between coaching and managing.’’

The other column I liked is by Bob Elliott in the Sun. Already did a fanshot for it, but not sure how many people read those, so flagging it here again as it’s a nice read.

There’s all kinds of stuff about his early days in San Antonio and how he was signed that I didn’t know much of anything about. There’s also Cito’s picks for five best and worst moments of his career, along with his all time Jays team (of which a couple of picks kind of surprised me).

I’ve steadfastly stuck up for Cito whenever he came under attack by the know-it-alls on these baseball blogs. My standard retort has been: “I imagine the Blue Jays pay Cito $2-million a year because he doesn’t know anything about baseball.”

No question Cito is the quintessential man’s man. He has earned the respect of his peers for his accomplishments over the years. I wish him all the best.