Astros No Booby Prize For Bo
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By DERON SNYDER
The good news for Bo Porter: He landed one of only 30, highly coveted big-league managerial jobs.
The bad news for Bo Porter: He landed with the Houston Astros, arguably the majors’ worst managerial job.
Porter, the Washington Nationals’ third-base coach through the end this season, wasn’t in a position to be choosy. At least not if he wanted to manage as soon as possible. Patience might have netted him the Nationals’ job whenever Davey Johnson retires, perhaps in a year or three, but there were no guarantees.
Long considered a prime managerial candidate, Porter previously had interviewed to skipper the Florida Marlins and Pittsburgh Pirates. When the Astros offered him the job last week, selecting him from an initial list of 49 candidates, Porter concluded there’s no time like the present.
It’s easy to suggest that Porter should have waited for a better opportunity than Houston, which has the worst record in baseball and one of the weakest farm systems to boot. But the lure of managing at home was pretty powerful. His emotions didn’t start to waver until he told his wife the news.
