(Audacy) Between his playing career as a minor league catcher and a quarter-century of scouting and coaching experience culminating in a short-lived managerial stint from 2020-'22, Joe Maddon has spent most of his adult life as a Los Angeles Angel. But after being scapegoated as the flat tire on a car that was veering into traffic long before he got there, Maddon has washed his hands of the Angels, disavowing any allegiance he once had to the organization that, for better or worse, shaped his career.
“It’s like, once that happened, I dissolved my affiliation with them,” Maddon recently told the Tampa Bay Times, still clearly bitter over how his tumultuous Angels tenure ended with his firing in early June. “There’s no emotion anymore. There’s no anything. It’s like to me they don’t even exist, organizationally.”
While Maddon won’t go as far as to root against his former players, many of whom he’s still close to, there’s no love lost between Maddon and the organization that dismissed him amid a 12-game losing streak.
“There’s a lot of things that need to be improved there," Maddon told the Tampa Bay Times. "These guys can’t do it alone, obviously. It’s the non-sexy stuff that has to get better. It’s not just bright, shiny objects — they have that. That was my goal, to get the Angels back to where we had been in the past. That was it. Nothing but pure intentions. I was an Angel. They had every ounce of me. And now that’s done.”
The Angels have only gotten worse since Maddon’s firing, as they were 25-41 under interim manager Phil Nevin entering play Tuesday, with rumors that star two-way player Shohei Ohtani may be plotting an escape after having his prime years squandered by a rudderless franchise that, as alluded to by owner Arte Moreno, could soon be on the market. Maddon believes that dysfunction begins and ends in the front office, lamenting meddling executives who made it hard for him to run his team.
“The manager has so many voices in the back of his head, by the time the game begins, it’s not his game like it had been," Maddon said, critical not just of the Angels but of how all front offices arrive at their decisions. “It’s absolutely the front office’s game. It’s at the point where some GMs should really just put a uniform on and go down to the dugout.
“It isn’t just an issue in Anaheim,” Maddon said. “You can’t just shut it down because you go through a losing streak.”
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