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Phillies Rumors: Marlins Trying to Pair Bowa With Mattingly?

By Tim Kelly

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Here’s an interesting take on the Philadelphia Phillies‘ bench coach.

Earlier this week, the Miami Marlins interviewed Phillies’ bench-coach Larry Bowa for their vacant managerial position for the second time, according to Jim Salisbury of CSNPhilly.com.

Bowa, who will be 70 before the calendar flips to 2016, seems like a strange candidate for the Marlins to interview. He’s had two stints as a big-league manager, but has held four different non-managing jobs (including returning to Philadelphia) since he was fired by the Phillies at the end of the 2004 season.

Beyond the fact that it’s been quite a while since Bowa has managed and he’s at a rather advanced age to start a job with a team like the Marlins, his brash style, though appreciated by some, didn’t resonate with a majority of players in 2004. Since then, professional athletes haven’t become any more thick-skinned.

According to Jon Heyman of CBS Sports, however, while Bowa is a candidate for manager, some think the team may be pulling him along with more of the intention of making him a high-profile bench coach.

"Sources tell CBS Sports the Marlins have long had keen interest in Mattingly, and he may well be their No. 1 choice for their managerial opening. The Marlins’ own managerial search seems to be moving slowly, and that quite likely is because they are waiting on Mattingly. Miami is known to have interviewed Manny Acta, Bo Porter and Larry Bowa to date, and all have the previous major-league experience they seek, but some wonder whether they could also be thinking of pairing Mattingly with Bowa, with Bowa playing the role of sage bench coach."

I tend to think of someone like Charlie Manuel more as sage — not that Manuel is going to be a bench coach any time soon — but I guess in a baseball sense Bowa is about as experienced as it gets, so Mattingly could learn something from absorbing Bowa’s baseball experience and having him to lean on during games.

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There are a lot of moving parts in this scenario, though. First of all, the Dodgers would have to either dismiss Mattingly as manager or not fire him but allow him to interview for this job. If he takes the job in Miami, then the Marlins would have to entice Bowa to leave the team that he played for during most of his career and has spent a majority of his baseball life with for the same position on a team that wasn’t very good a season ago.

The Marlins may provide Bowa with more stability than the Phillies. He has been asked back for the 2016 season by the Phillies, but none of the coaching staff has a contract past that point. Bowa likely would receive a pay-raise/multiple years of security from the Marlins and a chance to go to sunny Florida, both of which may or may not be of importance to him at this point in his life.

It’s also important to remember that Bowa has proven to be rather mobile over the past 10 years, moving with Joe Torre from New York to Los Angeles after the 2007 season. Mattingly did the same, meaning that if the two have a positive relationship, that could intrigue Bowa to take the Marlins’ job.

There still is a very real possibility that Mattingly remains the Dodgers manager in 2016. If that happens, it will be interesting to see if the Marlins are seriously interested in Bowa being their manager, or if they would attempt to pair him with another reported candidate like Manny Acta or Bo Porter.

Next: Ryne Sandberg Says he Never Wants to Manage Again

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