For at least for two seasons, the Philadelphia Phillies will be able to refer to Rob Thomson as their manager, regardless of his moniker.
After leading the team to two consecutive NL Championship Series appearances, Thomson signed a one-year contract extension with the Phillies that would last until the 2025 campaign.
He served as an interim manager for the majority of 2022. Thomson will no longer have to start 2024 as a lame duck.
“It’s good to know that you’ve got that extra year,” Thomson said Monday at baseball’s winter meetings, “but if I didn’t get it, it probably wouldn’t have bothered me.”
Thomson, 60, has a 155-118 record since the veteran bench coach replaced Joe Girardi as Phillies manager on June 3, 2022. Thomson led the Phillies to the 2022 World Series, where they lost in six games to the Houston Astros. The Phillies returned to the NLCS this season but blew series leads of 2-0 and 3-2 with Games 6 and 7 at home against Arizona.
Kyle Schwarber, Trea Turner, Bryce Harper and Nick Castellanos went 5-for-53 (.094) with 11 walks, 22 strikeouts and 2 RBIs in Philadelphia’s four NLCS losses. Against six Arizona pitchers in Game 7, the four went 1-for-15 with five strikeouts and no RBIs.
Thomson led the Phillies to a 90-72 record in 2023 and their first 90-win season since 2011. In October, he became only the third manager in MLB history to win 18 of his first 25 postseason games, joining Hall of Famers Joe McCarthy and Casey Stengel.
Thomson has been with the club since the 2018 season when he was first hired as bench coach under former manager Gabe Kapler.
Thomson had said he planned to retire after the 2022 season until he was promoted to the manager’s job. Thomson said after this season he had no plans to quit and intended to manage as long as the Phillies wanted him.
“One reason I was thinking about retirement was that it was just getting stale for me,” Thomson said. “But ever since I’ve stepped into this role, there’s no staleness — at all. There’s a new problem every day, new things to do every day. I’m upbeat, and I’m just happy. I don’t think there’s any question about my love for this team, this group of people, players and coaches, this organization, the city, I love it all. So this was a no-brainer for me.
