Phillies Welcome Ryne Sandberg Back After Little Job Interview “Experiment”

Fate is always best when it is accepted without question, I always say.  For instance, I have wholly embraced my destiny to write and direct a disaster movie in which the earth’s water and land switch places.  Now I just need a fun-loving movie exec with more money than brains to make my dreams come true.

For a while, it seemed like Ryne Sandberg’s fate would take him to Chicago to be a part of the Cubs’ resurgence.  Then it seemed like maybe he would take the reins from Tony La Russa and spend his days managing the Cubs’ arch division rival, weaving a legacy of hate.  That would have worked, narratively.

But now it doesn’t seem like he’ll be doing that either, and he’s quickly run out of open manager slots to stick his nose into.  And that leaves Ryne Sandberg with us, the only organization to ever trade him and the only one to ever let him take on a coaching role on the Major League level, albeit an honorary, temporary (some would say “meaningless”) one.

So at the moment, it appears to be another summer in Lehigh Valley for Sandberg.  As I’m sure he is thinking, at the very least, he’s got the Collegiate Marching Band Festival to look forward to.

Yet… fate could be arranging for one final twist.

Should the Red Sox pull Pete Mackanin’s name out of their Hat That Decides the Way of the World, he would be jetted up to Boston and never heard from again.  His absence would leave the bench coach position open on the Phillies’ management roster, perhaps creating a situation where Ryne Sandberg’s handwriting would be all over Phillies lineup cards for at least a little while.

But what are we left with in the interim?  An understandably disgruntled former All-Star with the desire to prove he has the experience to coach on a Major League level, but with no one on the Major League level who believes him.  If minor league baseball is the home of anything, its bitterness from never getting that big chance.  So Sandberg will coach the shit out of the Ironpigs and then, one day, maybe fate will be a little kinder.