Analysis : The Little General Deserves a Star for Making This Decision

The facts suggest that Gene Mauch was the best manager the Angels have ever had.

He won 90 or more games three times with the Angels--the only 90-win seasons in the club’s history. He won two of the franchise’s three American League West championships. He got the team closer to the World Series--one pitch--than any of his nine predecessors.

And earlier this spring, when Mauch first left the club for health reasons, General Manager Mike Port wished for a quick return, stating flatly: “Gene Mauch is the best manager for this club.”

But, in reality, is he?

The 1988 Angels are a young team, with a starting rotation and a defensive alignment--minus catcher Bob Boone--averaging 26 years in age. Wally Joyner, Devon White, Mark McLemore, Dick Schofield, Jack Howell, Mike Witt, Kirk McCaskill, Willie Fraser and Chuck Finley were all born after Mauch managed his first big league game in 1960.

And, this club is a fast team. In the minor leagues in 1986, McLemore stole 67 bases, and White stole 42. Schofield stole 23 bases for the Angels the same year and in 1987, Chili Davis had 16 steals with the San Francisco Giants.

The combination of youth and speed would seem make these Angels better-suited to a manager younger than Mauch’s 62 years, to someone willing to flash the green light on the basepaths, to someone such as . . . Cookie Rojas.

Those Angels who played for Rojas in winter ball often use the same words when describing his style. Easygoing. Great guy. A player’s manager.

Rojas, 49, is closer to his players--in both age and personality--than Mauch. He’ll share a postgame beer with his players. He’ll golf 18 holes with them. Last winter, he even rented a boat for an off-day deep-sea fishing outing with a couple players.

Contrast that to Mauch, who could go weeks without talking with certain players. His style was leadership from afar, his philosophy to distance himself from his team. Mauch was the Little General, his players were the foot soldiers, and seldom should the two ever mingle.

“Gene was always off to himself,” one Angel pitcher said. “That’s just how Gene was. I’d never been around that type of manager before.

” . . . I think there were some things in Gene’s life that made him bitter, being so close to the pennant (in 1986) and not getting it. How the press got on him afterward. I think he was still upset about that all last season.”

Mauch admitted Saturday that the ability to lose graciously was something that failed to improve with age.

“As I’ve gotten a little older, I have developed an inability to cope with . . . losses,” Mauch said. “You’d think that when a guy’s been around . . . as long as I have, that tolerance would develop. It hasn’t been that way at all.”

An example: Last August, when the Angels began to sink in the AL West, Mauch responded to a particularly galling loss at home by flinging a bat through the screen of the television set in the players’ lounge. In earlier times, such a maneuver might have sparked an inspirational fire under a team. Not the Angels. Several young players viewed the incident as disruptive to team harmony.

Then there was the aftermath of crushing Game 5 of the 1986 AL playoffs. The Angels returned to Boston a tight and disheartened team, and Mauch did little to ease the tension. Players on that east-bound flight say those six hours were so quiet, you could hear a pennant drop.

The Angels lost Games 6 and 7 by scores of 10-4 and 8-1.

Last spring, the Angels attempted to regroup by ushering in the youth movement. Rookies White and McLemore were to join Gary Pettis and Schofield in the lineup, and the Angels were going to run wild.

It never happened.

McLemore and Pettis stole just 25 and 24 bases, respectively, although their combined batting average of .222 had much to do with that. White stole 32, Schofield 19. The Angels’ 169 stolen-base attempts last year were more than only five other American League clubs.

White and McLemore complained about not getting enough running time in 1987 and certain former Angels, most notably John Candelaria and Reggie Jackson, chided Mauch for keeping too tight a rein on his young sprinters.

Rojas, meanwhile, is a proponent of the stolen base. “I like speed,” he says. “If you have it, you should utilize it.”

So far this spring, Rojas has. He appears committed to keeping McLemore in the leadoff spot in the lineup and together, McLemore and White have already stolen eight bases--six since Rojas replaced Mauch.

During Rojas’ 14 games as interim manager, the Angels were 9-5, batting .314 as a team and averaging 6.6 runs a game. In their first three games under Rojas, the Angels won, 14-3, 11-3 and 8-7.

Such numbers have not been lost on Mauch.

“Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen a very healthy situation develop, a very healthy atmosphere on this team,” Mauch said. “I’m satisfied that that’s directly attributable to Cookie Rojas and the coaches on his staff.”

Nonetheless, it should be remembered that Mauch devised enough ways to win 90 games in 1982 with little pitching, in 1985 with little hitting and in 1986 with a disgruntled cast of aging veterans. He was a master at squeezing the maximum out of a minimum, and were it not for two pitches--to Dave Henderson in ’86 and to Cecil Cooper in ‘82--he’d have probably appeared in two World Series. He was the right man for those teams.

And Saturday, Mauch made the right move for this team. He needs to look after his health, which should now be his primary concern.

Let Cookie Rojas look after the health of the Angels.