Towards the end of his 11-year tenure in Cleveland, Terry Francona suffered from a variety of medical ailments. He played only 14 games in the 2020 season before a gastrointestinal issue landed him in the Cleveland Clinic for weeks. When he left the team in mid-season to undergo hip surgery again the following year, he was wearing a boot on his foot due to off-season staph-related toe surgery and a head cold. He also did not have to play two games. A few weeks before his final game with the Guardians in 2023, the motorized scooter he used to travel around was stolen for the second time. The replacement scooter didn’t go so well: Francona steered it to avoid pedestrians, hit a pothole and flipped over the handlebars. (“It’s amazing how much of your life you can see in that moment,” he said. told AP,
Francona reflected on his future at a season-ending press conference last October, saying, “I don’t expect to manage again,” where he announced he was stepping down as manager of the Cleveland Browns. Are. “Because if I were going to manage, I’d love to do it here.” Thursday night, Jeff Passan of ESPN Got some surprising news: Francona, 65, will manage again in Ohio, but not with the Guardians. The Cincinnati Reds announced Friday that he is replacing David Bell, who was fired in the final days of the team’s poor season.
In March, Zach Buchanan reported here Francona became a University of Arizona men’s basketball player who was obsessed with retirement. “I’m a fan, man,” he told Buchanan at the Wildcats practice in Tucson. “It’s different, and that’s okay. Fuck, I love watching them play. Maybe it was the KJ Lewis-Caleb Love backcourt that got Francona healthy, or maybe he was onto something His reasoning for eating 17 popsicles at once One night in: “They’re healthy, so if one is good, 17 must be really good.”
Guardians fans probably don’t mind this betrayal much in the state, especially now that new manager Stephen Vogt has guided his young team and questionable rotation to the AL Central title. In Francona, the Reds got one of MLB’s winningest, most experienced managers, who made the most of low salaries and emerging talent. Whether or not it’s really wise for someone with a history of heart problems to follow Alexis Diaz’s regular diet is between Tito and her cardiologist.