John McLaren was scouting an Arizona Fall League game near his home in Peoria on Tuesday when someone approached him with a logical assumption.
“I supposed you’ll be heading to Chicago with Lou?” he was asked.
McLaren heard that over and over during the day, and that’s when he realized without a doubt that he needed to go another direction with his career.
Lou Piniella, hired this week to manage the Chicago Cubs, had offered McLaren the bench coaching job there, which would have maintained a relationship between the two that blossomed during Piniella’s years managing the Cincinnati Reds, Seattle Mariners and Tampa Bay Devil Rays. They seemed inseparable.
No more.
The Mariners announced Thursday that McLaren, 55, would return as bench coach, filling a job on manager Mike Hargrove’s staff that became vacant when the team fired Ron Hassey in September.
Conveniently, and ironically, McLaren was scouting a game Tuesday at Peoria Stadium – the Mariners’ spring training home – when his cell phone rang. It was Lee Pelekoudas, the Mariners’ assistant general manager, asking if McLaren was still available and if he was interested in the club’s opening.
McLaren literally walked across the parking lot, to the Mariners’ offices, and met with general manager Bill Bavasi and manager Mike Hargrove. He met with Hargrove again on Wednesday and got the job Thursday.
“It came out of the blue, to be honest,” McLaren said. “The hardest ting I’ve ever done in my life was to call Lou Piniella. It was real emotional and it was tough to leave him. But Lou gave me his blessings and I felt relieved.”
McLaren said the Mariners are the right situation for him. The job returns him to the franchise where he coached on Piniella’s staff from 1993-2002, and it allows him to break the perception that his place in baseball is beside Piniella.
“I’m the happiest guy in the world,” McLaren said. “I had a special thing in Seattle.”
McLaren will aide Hargrove with in-game strategic decisions, but also serve as a conduit between the players and the managers. He sees that as his greatest strength.
“I enjoy going into the clubhouse and get the pulse of the clubhouse,” he said. “My strength is dealing with players, getting to know the players, doing what I can to get the players ready to go out and play the game.”
McLaren spent last season as a scout for the Devil Rays and enjoyed the job, but he yearned for the intensity of the dugout.
“Late August I really started getting restless,” he said. “That’s the time of the season when you grind. Even in Tampa Bay, we were battling contenders and we held our own. I missed the competitiveness, trying to find a little something that might help Lou. Now it will be something that I’ll help Mike.
“I wish we were starting the season tomorrow. My battery is charged.”
Minor league MVPs: First baseman Bryan LaHair was named the Mariners’ minor league player of the year and right-handed reliever Mark Lowe the pitcher of the year in awards announced by the organization on Thursday.
LaHair hit .309 with 16 home runs and 74 RBI at Class AA San Antonio and Class AAA Tacoma. Lowe, who began the season at Class A Inland Empire, went 1-2 with six saves and a 1.96 earned run average at the Inland Empire and San Antonio. The Mariners called him up July 7 and he became an instant fixture in the bullpen before an elbow injury ended his season on Aug. 20.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
