Background and career
Anthony La Russa Jr. (; born October 4, 1944) is an American former professional baseball infielder and manager. His Major League Baseball (MLB) career spanned from 1963 to 2022, in several roles. He is the former manager of the St. Louis Cardinals, Oakland Athletics, and Chicago White Sox. In 35 seasons as a manager, La Russa guided his teams to three World Series titles, six league championships, and 13 division titles. His managerial total of 2,884 MLB wins is second only to Connie Mack's. As a player, La Russa made his major league debut in 1963 and spent parts of five major league seasons with the Kansas City / Oakland Athletics, Atlanta Braves, and Chicago Cubs. After a shoulder injury during the 1964–65 off-season, in 1969 he completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in Industrial Management at the University of South Florida before spending much of his career in the minor leagues and retiring in 1977. After attending courses for several years during baseball off seasons, in 1978, he completed a JD at Florida State University. La Russa was admitted to the bar in Florida in 1980, but chose to pursue management and coaching positions in baseball instead of practicing law. Named manager of the White Sox in the middle of the 1979 season, La Russa guided the team to an American League West division title four seasons later. In the middle of the 1986 season, he was fired by the White Sox and hired less than three weeks later by the Athletics. La Russa led the A's to three consecutive American League championships from 1988 to 1990 and the 1989 World Series title. He left Oakland after the 1995 season to manage the Cardinals, whom he led to three National League championships and the 2006 and 2011 World Series titles. La Russa retired after winning the 2011 title and 34 seasons as a major league manager. Three months later, he accepted a position helping fellow former manager Joe Torre, the executive vice president for MLB operations. In 2014, he became the chief baseball officer for the Arizona Diamondbacks. In November 2019, he joined the Los Angeles Angels as a senior advisor of baseball operations. In the 2021 offseason, he was named the manager of the White Sox; he retired in 2022 due to health concerns. In 2013, La Russa was unanimously elected to the Hall of Fame by the 16-member Veterans Committee. The induction ceremony was held at Cooperstown, New York, on July 27, 2014. On August 16, 2014, he was inducted into the St. Louis Cardinals Hall of Fame.
Born in Tampa, Florida, on October 4, 1944, to Anthony and Olivia (Cuervo) La Russa, Anthony Jr.'s paternal grandparents had emigrated from Italy (Sicily) and his mother's family from Spain. He was raised in nearby Ybor City, Florida, where his parents had met while they were working in the local cigar factory. The La Russa family moved to West Tampa, Florida, where Tony played American Legion baseball and PONY League baseball alongside teammate Lou Piniella. After graduating from Jefferson High School in Tampa, La Russa was signed by the Kansas City Athletics in June 1962 as a middle infielder, with a clause that the Athletics pay for his college education at the University of South Florida.
La Russa made his major league debut with the Kansas City A's on May 10, 1963, after having played 76 games with A's affiliates Binghamton Triplets and Daytona Beach Islanders in 1962. He spent the entire 1963 season in the majors, as was required by his signing as a "bonus baby". He had suffered an off-season shoulder injury while playing softball with friends, and this limited him to only 34 games in 1963, in which he hit .250. The injured shoulder bothered him through the remainder of his playing career. Over the next six seasons, La Russa spent most of his time in the minor leagues. He made it back up to the A's, which had since moved to Oakland, in 1968 and 1969. He spent the entire 1970 season with the A's, and then late in 1971 the A's traded him to the Atlanta Braves. His final big league playing stop was with the Chicago Cubs, where he appeared as a pinch runner in one game, on April 6, 1973, scoring the walk-off winning run. He also spent time in the organizations of the Pittsburgh Pirates, Chicago White Sox, and St. Louis Cardinals. In total, he played 132 major-league games, 40 in the starting lineup. He went 35-for-176, for a batting average of .199. His 23 walks pushed his on-base percentage to .292. He had 7 RBI and scored 15 runs. He made 63 appearances at second base, 18 at shortstop, and two at third base, fielding .960 in 249 total chances and participating in 34 double plays. It was as a player with the A's that La Russa first met catcher Dave Duncan, who would join his coaching staff in Chicago in 1983. The two worked together on every La Russa-managed team thereafter, and he often credits Duncan as playing a key role in his success.
Having started coursework following his A's signing in 1962, La Russa completed a degree in Industrial Management at the University of South Florida in 1969; followed by a JD at Florida State University College of Law in 1978. and was admitted to the Florida Bar on July 30, 1980. He is associated with a Sarasota law firm although he is not eligible to practice at this time. La Russa has been quoted as saying, "I decided I'd rather ride the buses in the minor leagues than practice law for a living." Shortly before graduating from FSU College of Law, La Russa spoke with one of his professors about his post-graduation plans, indicating to his professor that he had an opportunity to coach in the minor leagues and asking his professor what he should do. La Russa's professor responded, "Grow up, you're an adult now, you're going to be a lawyer." Other major league managers in baseball history who have graduated from law school or passed a state bar exam, include: James Henry O'Rourke (Buffalo Bisons, 1881–84, Washington Senators, 1893), John Montgomery Ward (New York Giants, Brooklyn and Providence, late 1800s), Hughie Jennings (Detroit, 1907–20, New York Giants, 1924), Miller Huggins (St. Louis Cardinals and New York Yankees, 1913–29), Muddy Ruel (St. Louis Browns, 1947), Jack Hendricks (St. Louis Cardinals, 1918, Cincinnati, 1924–29), and Branch Rickey (St. Louis Browns, 1913–15, St. Louis Cardinals, 1919–25).
La Russa credits Loren Babe and Paul Richards of the White Sox organization for helping him to become a manager. The White Sox gave La Russa his first managerial opportunity in 1978 by naming him skipper of their Double-A affiliate, the Knoxville Sox of the Southern League. La Russa spent a half-season at Knoxville before being promoted to the White Sox coaching staff when owner Bill Veeck changed managers from Bob Lemon to Larry Doby. Doby was fired at the end of the season; Don Kessinger, former star shortstop of the crosstown Cubs, was named the White Sox' player-manager for 1979, and La Russa was named manager of the Triple-A Iowa Oaks of the American Association, choosing to manage in the minors after the White Sox had offered him his same major league coaching role. The White Sox fired Kessinger with a 46–60 record two-thirds of the way through the 1979 season and replaced him with La Russa. The White Sox played .500 baseball (27–27) for the rest of the 1979 campaign. LaRussa, at 34, was the youngest manager in the major leagues. La Russa was named American League Manager of the Year in 1983, when his club won the AL West but fell to the Baltimore Orioles in the American League Championship Series. The White Sox fired La Russa after the club got off to a 26–38 start in 1986. In 1986, general manager Roland Hemond, who had hired La Russa as White Sox manager, was replaced by the White Sox' broadcaster Ken Harrelson as general manager. Harrelson then fired both La Russa and coach Dave Duncan during the season. Ironically, Harrelson and La Russa were teammates at Binghamton in 1962. In later years, White Sox Owner Jerry Reinsdorf expressed regret for allowing La Russa to be fired. La Russa finished his first White Sox career with a 522–510 regular season record and a 1–3 postseason record, but added another 156–134 record in 2021–2022. Decades later, Hemond said of La Russa: "Tony La Russa is one of the most brilliant managers that I ever encountered in my baseball career. He saw things other people didn't see. There were some managers who thought he was out of line with what he was trying to do, but later on they had to respect him because it was working. There's no question he changed the way the game is played." La Russa is also commonly credited for the advent of the modern specialized bullpen.
La Russa had a break of less than three weeks before his old club, the Athletics, called him to take over as manager. La Russa and Duncan both joined the A's, inheriting a team that was 31–52 and in 7th place. They went 45–34 the rest of the season to finish in 3rd place in 1986. La Russa managed the Oakland A's to three consecutive American League Pennants and World Series appearances from 1988 to 1990. The A's lost the 1988 World Series to manager Tommy Lasorda and the Los Angeles Dodgers. The following year, the A's swept the earthquake-delayed Bay Area 1989 World Series against the San Francisco Giants. In their third consecutive appearance, the favored A's faced manager Lou Piniella, LaRussa's childhood teammate and friend, and his Cincinnati Reds in the 1990 World Series. The A's were swept in the series. In both 1988 and 1990 the A's had swept the Boston Red Sox 4–0 in the ALCS, after winning 100 and 99 games respectively. The 1988 World Series was made famous by the Kirk Gibson game-winning home run off of A's closer Dennis Eckersley. La Russa earned two American League Manager of the Year awards with the A's, in 1988 and 1992, giving him three AL awards, the latter after again winning the Western Division. After the 1995 season, in which the A's finished 67–77, the Haas family, with whom La Russa had a close personal relationship, sold the team after the death of patriarch Walter A. Haas, Jr. In the off-season, La Russa left Oakland to take over for the fired Joe Torre as manager of the St. Louis Cardinals. La Russa had a 798–673 regular season record and a 19–13 postseason record with Oakland.
