Mark Feinsand

David Dombrowski confirmed that he called Alex Cora and offered him the job before he'd even fired Rob Thompson.

There is still a prevailing thought that Mattingly is a placeholder this year and that if Alex Cora wants the job for 2027 and beyond, it will probably go to him.

That said, if Mattingly has a run like Rob Thompson had three years ago and gets to the World Series, well, then it's going to be harder for them to justify not bringing Mattingly.

back but you know madley came into this year thinking that his managerial days were behind him and you know he had done the uh bench coach thing in toronto i think they called me offensive coordinator up there uh and he came back to be a bench coach in philly um this year but i don't think donnie came here with the idea of i'm gonna be the guy to save the day when you know when rob thompson gets the axe yeah um you know him and rob will go way back to their days of the yankees

And I think this was more of a circumstance than anything else.

So if I had to, you know, handicap the managerial race for the Phillies for 2027, I'd still say Alice core is probably the favorite, but I think Mattingly is certainly on the board and in that number two position.

I don't know how you couldn't be surprised.

They've been historically bad the last couple of years.

Two years ago, it was actually historically bad with the most losses in history.

The American League this year, you said there aren't very many good teams.

There are very few good teams.

We're sitting here on May 20th.

Memorial Day is next week.

And we're sitting here with an American League where there are four teams with a winning record, and one of them is the Chicago White Sox.

So what do you make of it?

I don't know.

Do I think the White Sox have it in them to make a run and win a division?

I mean, my gut says no, but...

Why not?

That AL Central is not a very good division.