Tony La Russa and the Chicago White Sox: How the manager fared in two managing stints with the franchise

Tony La Russa is one of the most accomplished managers in major-league history.

He’s second all time in victories. He won the World Series as the manager of the 1989 Oakland Athletics and the 2006 and 2011 St. Louis Cardinals.

La Russa was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2014.

His major-league managerial career began with the Chicago White Sox. La Russa went 522-510 with the Sox from 1979-86.

He returned to the Sox in 2021, but the second season of his second stint ended early at the direction of his doctors.

Asked if he had a sense if La Russa, 77, still wants to manage, Sox general manager Rick Hahn said on Sept. 24, “Right now the focus is on his health.”

Here’s a timeline of La Russa with the Sox.

The beginning

The Sox hired La Russa on Aug. 2, 1979, after Don Kessinger resigned.

“Don suggested that maybe it would be in the best interest of the ballclub to make some changes,” owner Bill Veeck said in an Aug. 3 Chicago Tribune article by Richard Dozer.

Dozer later wrote:

“Talking about his new assignment, La Russa said, ‘We’ll try to build a champion. That’s my No. 1 goal. I know the people won’t wait forever. There are a lot of clubs to pass (on the team’s chances this year), but we’ll try to give the fans something they can take home with them — an interesting game.’”

La Russa was 34 when he was promoted from managing the Triple-A Iowa Oaks.

The Sox won in his managerial debut, defeating the Blue Jays 8-5 in Toronto the next night. In the Aug. 4 Tribune, Dozer wrote:

"In replacing low-keyed Don Kessinger with keyed-up Tony La Russa, the White Sox may be bringing a new Earl Weaver into the American League.

“La Russa is tough, dedicated to winning at any cost, and probably won’t keep Chicago fans waiting long to see an emotional outburst that would make Leo Durocher look like a Sunday school teacher.”

Later in the article, Chet Lemon said of La Russa: “He’s a hard-nosed hustler.”

Said La Russa: “I’m a hungry manager. I have this fire that burns inside me, and it tells me I want to win any way I can.”

The Sox went 27-27 under La Russa in his first season.

Winning ugly

It all came together in 1983, when the Sox went 99-63 and won the American League West by 20 games.

La Russa reflected on the season in an Oct. 5 Tribune article by Mike Kiley, saying: “There is no single game or player who turned around our season. It’s pieces, pieces that fit together to show how we won, why we won. Fit the pieces and you’ll see why.”

Kiley wrote later in the article:

"On May 26, the Sox had a 16-24 record and were in sixth place, seven games behind first-place Texas. That was their worst position all season.

"The Sox had committed 35 errors in those 40 games. Floyd Bannister was 2-6. Richard Dotson was 3-5. LaMarr Hoyt was 3-6. Carlton Fisk was batting .174 with 2 home runs and 9 runs batted in. Greg Luzinski was hitting .204 with 7 homers and 23 RBIs.

" ‘I thought if someone was catching a break, then it might as well be us,’ La Russa said of being able to stay so close to the top even though the team had struggled.”

As history shows, the Sox did get going in the right direction.

“We never stubbed our toe in the stretch,” La Russa said in the story. “We didn’t stumble. It was amazing.

“The rest of the year is a highlights film. We didn’t let up. The rest of the division gave us an opening by not winning when we lost and now we had the division under control. We kept on going.”

The Sox returned to the postseason for the first time since the 1959 World Series. They lost in the ALCS to the Baltimore Orioles in four games.

The season ended with a 3-0 loss in 10 innings in Game 4 at Comiskey Park.

Jerome Holtzman wrote in the Oct. 9 Tribune:

"The Sox, who had won the AL West by a record 20 games and had averaged five runs a game during the 162-game season, stranded 11 runners Saturday. They scored only three runs in the four-game playoff and batted .211. Their longest hit was a double.

“ ‘I always said good pitching will stop good hitting,’ said Sox manager Tony La Russa. ‘And they had good pitching.’ ”

Manager of the Year

La Russa received 17 of 28 first-place votes to win AL Manager of the Year in 1983.

“I won’t try to be modest and say I didn’t make a contribution,” La Russa said, according to a Nov. 3 Holtzman article. “Yes, I believe I did. But look at the people who helped. We have a wonderful front office and we had a clubhouse full of players who had great years.”

It was the first of four Manager of the Year honors for La Russa. He also earned AL Manager of the Year twice with the A’s (1988, 1992) and NL Manager of the Year in 2002 with the Cardinals.

The 1983 Sox cleaned up in postseason honors. Pitcher LaMarr Hoyt was named the AL Cy Young Award winner. Ron Kittle won the AL Rookie of the Year. Future Hall of Famers Carlton Fisk and Harold Baines finished third and 10th, respectively, in AL MVP voting.

The end

The Sox placed fifth in the AL West in 1984 at 74-88 and third in 1985 at 85-77.

They started 1986 slowly. Speculation grew about whether the Sox were going to make a managerial change, as Ed Sherman wrote in a May 6 Tribune article:

“La Russa could be a manager without a job before the week is out. And his status wasn’t helped Monday night when the White Sox dropped their fourth in a row to the Yankees 4-1. They are 7-16, the worst record in the American League. Even worse, they are 3-12 at home.

“With Billy Martin in town as a Yankee broadcaster, there is strong speculation that he might be La Russa’s replacement. The name of ex-San Diego manager Dick Williams also has come up.

“La Russa’s job was on the line in 1982 and 1983. But if the club doesn’t make a dramatic improvement quick, La Russa will have lived his ninth life with the team.

“ ‘The status is one that’s not good,’ said Sox operations chief Ken Harrelson. ‘If the status of the club isn’t good, that means the status of some people isn’t good.’ ”

Harrelson was in his first, and only, year as the baseball operations chief after being moved from the broadcast booth.

La Russa and pitching coach Dave Duncan were fired June 20. The Sox were 26-38 at the time.

“The club has not responded,” Harrelson said in a June 21 Sherman article. “A decision had to be made, and I made it. Obviously, the performance on the field is not indicative of the talent involved. Our guys tried hard, but the chemistry was not there, and the wins were not there. We have decent talent; we should be better.”

Sherman wrote: “Harrelson and La Russa had their differences almost from the beginning. The situation reached the point where something had to give, and it did Thursday when Harrelson met with (Jerry) Reinsdorf and (Eddie) Einhorn, who concurred with his decision.”

Less than a month later, La Russa became the A’s manager.

The reunion

La Russa hadn’t managed since guiding the Cardinals to the 2011 World Series title.

The Sox — who made the playoffs in 2020, their first postseason appearance since 2008 — surprised the baseball world, making the reunion official Oct. 29, 2020.

“I’m fired up, I’m ready to go,” La Russa said during a conference call.

“I think all managers would understand this, everybody would understand this … how rare it is to get an opportunity to manage a team that’s this talented and this close to winning,”

Less than a month later, reports emerged La Russa was charged with two Class 1 misdemeanor counts of driving while under the influence after a February arrest.

He pleaded guilty to a charge of reckless driving at a change of plea hearing that December in Arizona.

“I brought this on myself,” La Russa said during a conference call. “I feel a deep remorse and regret over what I did.

“I think about fans in Oakland and St. Louis, many of them became friends, and now starting again in Chicago, it’s not the way I wanted to start my relationship the second time around.”

The 2021 season saw the Sox fight through various injuries to capture their first division title since 2008.

“To come back, it’s like Fantasy Island,” La Russa said after the Sept. 23 clincher in Cleveland. “You would have never thought that I could get this opportunity. Especially with the club being this good. And here we are, the division champs.”

Earlier in the season, La Russa moved into second all time on the managerial wins list.

“It’s real emotional for me that it started here and it’s ended up here,” La Russa said after breaking a tie with John McGraw on June 6. “It’s hard for me imagine that.”

The franchise qualified for the playoffs in consecutive seasons for the first time, but the Sox were eliminated in the ALDS by the Houston Astros.

“We accomplished the first goal, but we are disappointed to get one win and not two more, so bittersweet,” La Russa said after the season-ending Game 4 loss. “We’re hurting for them, but it’s an amazing group.”

Anticipation grew for more success in 2022. It never materialized. The Sox battled various injuries for the second straight season but this time remained around .500 throughout the year.

Moves like intentionally walking Trea Turner with a 1-2 count in a June 9 game against the Los Angeles Dodgers gained national attention.

Fans voiced their displeasure with the inconsistent play, including chants of “Fire Tony” during an extra-innings loss to the Texas Rangers on June 11.

“I appreciate they want us to win, and when we don’t win they’re unhappy,” La Russa said after the game. “I’m pleased that they are, you know? We have the team ... to win, and we’re losing games. Nobody in that clubhouse, including the manager and coaches, are happy. I like it when (the fans) care enough to be upset.”

Less than an hour before an Aug. 30 game against the Kansas City Royals, the Sox announced that La Russa would not manage that night at the direction of his doctors. The next day the Sox said La Russa was out indefinitely and would undergo further testing with doctors in Arizona.

“Health ain’t nothing to mess with,” La Russa said before a Sept. 11 ceremony in Oakland honoring former pitcher Dave Stewart. “I got checked in Chicago and the reason I flew to Arizona is because that’s been the place since the ‘90s I’ve had physicals. They addressed it, they fixed it, now it’s just a question of regaining strength. Don’t mess with health.”

He told Janie McCauley of the Associated Press he had a pacemaker inserted for his heart.

On Sept. 24, the Sox announced La Russa would not return for the 2022 season at the direction of his doctors.

Said general manager Rick Hahn: “As for the inevitable question, ‘Well, what does that mean for next season?’ We are going to finish up this season first and then address everything when it’s appropriate to turn the page at the end of this year.”