New Manager Not Thinking in Short Terms

During Chub Feeney’s ill-fated tenure as the Padres’ president and resident schmoozer, he once came upon a Padre coach and congenially said: “Hello, Rick.”

This would have been a perfectly cordial gesture on Chub’s part but for the fact that the Padres had no coach named Rick.

Had Greg Riddoch been a bit more irreverent, he might have nodded his head in acknowledgement and said: “Hello, Flub.”

Obviously, Riddoch’s stock with the Padres’ hierarchy has risen since that April evening of 1988.

The boss, Tom Werner, knows exactly what to call Greg Riddoch.

Starting Wednesday, Manager will do.

This was Werner’s first major decision since his group took over the ownership June 15 . . . and came a little earlier than the lads had hoped they would be forced to make a major decision.

“The ownership group hoped to have a short honeymoon period,” Werner said, “but we didn’t.”

Jack McKeon, the figurative wearer of two hats, wanted to get rid of the only cap he actually wore. He wanted out of uniform. He wanted to concentrate on his chores as vice president of baseball operations.

Werner made the decision to grant this wish.

The next decision was tougher.

Who would be the new manager?

Greg Riddoch would be the guy. It would be easy to suggest that this was a choice of convenience, a guy who happened to be on hand. It would be easy to assume that Greg Riddoch will be a caretaker until bigger names are available for recycling after the season.

Don’t tell it to Riddoch.

“ I am the manager,” Riddoch said Wednesday. “I’m not an interim manager. I’m going to make it as hard for these people to get rid of me as I can.”

This is a message he has to convey to the players. Players tend to walk all over caretakers, and this guy is saying he won’t be walked on.

It sometimes can be difficult to assess how a man who has never managed in the major leagues will react to his first assignment. It is probably a bit more difficult when he is coming from the coaching staff of the team he is taking over.

This is because coaches are often the good cops to the manager’s bad cop. Players needle coaches more than they dare needle managers.

Thus, a coach has to change roles.

When Riddoch first addressed the players Wednesday morning, a couple asked about this issue. They said things such as they couldn’t say this to him any more and couldn’t do that with him (or to him) any more.

“I told them it’s the same,” he said. “I care about all the guys. They’re like your own children . . . they make mistakes, and you spank them.”

That’s the difference between being the manager or a coach. Riddoch will succeed or fail according to how he crosses that line. I suspect he will cross that line in relation to whether a player or players cross him.

Riddoch has never been a center-stage type of guy. He has always worked with baseball’s children in the summer and society’s children in the off-season, when he once taught psychology and more recently worked as a substitute teacher. He now has the most high-profile chore of his life.

What he may find is that baseball’s children will make psychology a full-time job.

It was easy to get the impression he will not get tough on this team just for the sake of toughness. He is a different person than Jack McKeon, and he will see how this team and these players react to him.

However, one of the very earliest indicators was that he is not afraid to do tough things.

The first thing he did was fire Amos Otis, the hitting instructor who was a colleague on the coaching staff for 2 1/2 years. He wanted it done, and he did it. No pussyfooting around. Over and out.

“I have nothing against Amos Otis,” he said. “I just wanted to run with the ball with people with similar ideas.”

Amos Otis, thus, represents Lesson No. 1 for the Padre players to learn. This fellow Riddoch will not coast along on cruise control. He may not be an interim manager, but he does not have an eternity in which to prove himself. What he has, to be sure, is the power to do what he thinks needs to be done.

And another thing.

Toughness.

Is this team tough?

“I don’t think so,” the new manager said. “I don’t think they’re tough at all.”

He left the impression that this will change. He had no magic formula for creating toughness. Instead, he said he will react to what he finds.

In other words, test him . . . if you are so inclined.

Indeed, Greg (Don’t Call Me Rick) Riddoch had better be prepared to be every bit as tough as he would like these players to be.

WHO IS GREG RIDDOCH?

Born: July 17, 1945, in Greeley, Colo.

Residence: Greeley, Colo.

Professional: Named manager of the Padres in his fourth season on the coaching staff, Riddoch (RID-dock) had spent most of the past three seasons as first base coach but in the past month had been assisting Jack McKeon in the dugout. From 1982-86, he worked for the Cincinnati Reds in a variety of roles, including scouting supervisor, assistant director of player development and scouting and director of minor league clubs. He joined the Padre front office on Jan. 1, 1986, as associate director of minor leagues and scouting and was named director on Feb. 26 when Steve Boros was named the team’s manager. Riddoch joined the coaching staff on Oct. 28, 1986. His previous field experience includes nine years (1973-81) of managing minor league teams in the Reds organization. His stops included Seattle, Billings and Eugene, and he won two league championships and two division titles in that time.

Personal: He and wife Linda have two sons, Rory, 20, and Raleigh, 16. Riddoch was raised in California, attending Garden Grove High School, then earned a baseball/basketball scholarship from Northern Colorado University in Greeley. Following his freshman season as a two-sport player, he played baseball exclusively and eventually signed a contract with Cincinnati after graduating. Has a bachelor’s degree in business administration at Northern Colorado and a master’s in education administration at Colorado State. Riddoch has taught psychology and coached baseball, football and basketball at the high school level. In the off-season, he is a substitute teacher. He spent last off-season working on a pair of instructional videos with Padre outfielder Tony Gwynn.

--Source: Padres’ 1990 Media Guide