MLB.com has an article about former catchers who are now managers. According to the article, twelve of the thirty current managers in the majors have caught at least some games at the pro level.
The prevailing premise is that catchers work closer with the managers and get a better sense of the game. Of course, there is obligatory comments from a few of the former catchers/now-managers who say this is probably not true.
That got me thinking. I know that Connie Mack was a catcher before he reached his calling as the Master Tactitician. Al Lopez, too. So before I knew it I started making a mental list of historically great managers who might have been catchers in their playing days. I did a quick lookup and came up with a list of inactive managers in the top 75 in wins whose primary position was catcher.
| Manager | Games Caught | Record as Manager |
|---|---|---|
| Connie Mack | 609 | 3582-3814 |
| Al Lopez | 1925 | 840-650 |
| Wilbert Robinson | 1316 | 1375-1341 |
| Birdie Tebbetts | 1108 | 748-705 |
| Johnny Oates | 533 | 797-746 |
| Buck Rodgers | 895 | 784-774 |
| Steve O’Neill | 1532 | 1040-832 |
| Paul Richards | 486 | 923-901 |
| Lee Fohl | 5 | 713-792 |
This does not include Lou Boudreau (a University of Illinois alumni, BTW) who played 3 games at catcher. Lee Fohl managed Cleveland, St Louis and Boston in the teens and early twenties. He got as high as second place only once but still managed to win 713 games.
I don’t if this shows that mlb.com’s theory can be extended to the historical realm or not. It does seem that this is more of a recent phenomenon.