Tavares Is Latest Loss for Disney

The fans had walked away from Disney’s sports teams. On Friday, Tony Tavares followed them.

Tavares, who ran the Angels and Mighty Ducks, resigned as president of Disney’s Anaheim Sports subsidiary.

“Any kind of losing is my regret,” Tavares said. “Losing money and losing on the field makes a job like this unbearable.”

The teams lost games, lost money and lost fans, and Disney executives did not try to dissuade Tavares from his decision.

“Tony came to us and said he thought it was time to go. I didn’t disagree,” said Paul Pressler, who oversees Anaheim Sports as chief of Disney’s parks and resorts division.

Pressler said he would launch a national search for a successor, although candidates might balk at signing up to run two teams Disney would prefer to sell. Pressler said he will place a priority on experience in professional sports, a background Tavares lacked. In the interim, Pressler said three Anaheim Sports vice presidents will share administrative duties and said the general managers, Pierre Gauthier of the Ducks and Bill Stoneman of the Angels, will report directly to him.

Although Tavares said Pressler’s recent involvement with the Angels’ baseball operations was “not a major factor” in his departure, the autonomy of Stoneman and Gauthier might become restricted under Pressler. Pressler acknowledged his involvement in the decision to reject a Stoneman trade that would have sent outfielder Darin Erstad to the Chicago White Sox and in the $24-million signing of pitcher Aaron Sele, for the Angels their largest free-agent contract since they acquired Mo Vaughn in 1998.

“I certainly have spent a lot more time [with the teams],” Pressler said. “I’ve worked with Bill on some trades. It’s clear that we’ve given Bill the direction we want to have a competitive team in 2002.”

Tavares’ departure follows the collapse of negotiations to sell the Angels to Florida Marlin owner John Henry. With no buyer on the horizon for the Angels or Ducks, Pressler vowed that Disney was now playing to win.

And, in even more heartening news for long-suffering Angel fans, Tavares’ departure could persuade all-star closer Troy Percival to abandon his vow to leave the team after his contract expires this year.

“For Troy, this was important because he had philosophical differences with Tony that otherwise would have made it impossible for him to re-sign with the Angels,” agent Paul Cohen said. “Now that Tony has gone on to other things, it has opened the door for Troy to remain with the organization if terms are mutually acceptable.”

Not long ago, Tavares, 52, presided over a magic kingdom of his own. Disney chairman Michael Eisner personally tapped Tavares to lead the company’s entry into professional sports. The Mighty Ducks, founded in 1993, turned windfall profits, sold caps and T-shirts virtually at will, sold out the Arrowhead Pond almost every night and charged into the playoffs in four seasons behind coach Ron Wilson and superstars Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne.

Disney bought the Angels in 1996 and added them to Tavares’ portfolio. He directed a $117-million stadium renovation, with attendance jumping 43% to 2.5 million when Disney unveiled the new Edison Field in 1998. He also helped persuade Eisner to spend $80 million on Vaughn, a free-agent slugger.

But Vaughn injured his ankle in the first inning of his first game with the Angels, tumbling into a dugout, and the fortunes of both teams tumbled as well. The Angels have not appeared in the playoffs, attendance has fallen 25% in the past three seasons, and Tavares replaced five marketing chiefs in five years. In a report released last month by baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, the Angels claimed operating losses of $100 million from 1995-2000.

The Ducks have yet to win a playoff game since Tavares fired Wilson after the ’97 season, the popular Selanne was traded last year and a team that once sold out 51 consecutive games ranks last in the NHL attendance and loses millions each year.

Tavares first considered quitting his job in 1997, frustrated in part by concerns over the pace and financing of the stadium renovation. In 1999, when Disney negotiated to sell the teams to a group led by Orange County high-tech baron Henry T. Nicholas III, Tavares told friends he was looking forward to moving to the Lake Tahoe area, where he has a vacation home and where he would be free from the burden of running two teams that play a combined 244 games a year in overlapping seasons. He also was alternately weary and combative about the constant stream of public criticism that accompanied the failure to deliver a championship product.

“Losing just started to wear on me,” he said.

Tavares, who signed a three-year contract extension last year, said he first discussed his resignation with Pressler in October and said a settlement agreement was finalized Wednesday. He said he will indeed move to the Reno-Tahoe area and start a sports consulting business.

As the public face of the Angels and Ducks, and sometimes because of his comments, Tavares drew the wrath of fans frustrated at the ineptitude of the Disney teams. In explaining his absence from the news conference to announce Wilson’s dismissal, Tavares said, “I was not eating Snickers bars and soaking my feet in Ron’s blood.” Percival’s outrage was prompted by Tavares’ sharing details of supposedly confidential contract negotiations with a reporter.

Tavares invested the emotion of a fan into a corporate job. And what would he say to those fans who might celebrate his departure?

“If it’s a good day for them,” he said, “it’s a great day for me.”

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Times staff writers Mike DiGiovanna and Ross Newhan contributed to this report.

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Unfinished Business

Anaheim Angel and Mighty Duck President Tony Tavares resigned from his position Friday. Here’s a look at the Angels’ and Ducks’ win-loss records and winning percentages during Tavares’ tenure:

ANGELS

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Year Manager W L Pct 1996 Marcel Lachemann 70 91 .435 1997 Marcel Lachemann 84 78 .519 1998 Terry Collins 85 77 .525 1999 Terry Collins 70 92 .432 2000 Mike Scioscia 82 80 .506 2001 Mike Scioscia 75 87 .462

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MIGHTY DUCKS

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Year Coach W L T OT Pts Pct 1993-94 Ron Wilson 33 46 5 - 71 .423 1994-95 Ron Wilson 16 27 5 - 37 .385 1995-96 Ron Wilson 35 39 8 - 78 .476 1996-97 Ron Wilson 36 33 13 - 85 .518 1997-98 Pierre Page 26 43 13 - 65 .396 1998-99 Craig Hartsburg 35 34 13 - 83 .506 1999-00 Craig Hartsburg 34 33 12 3 83 .506 2000-01 Guy Charron 24 41 11 5 66 .402

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