There were no bitter feelings.
No regrets.
There was even empathy.
Rob Thomson, fired Tuesday morning by the Philadelphia Phillies, had his own Zoom call to say goodbye. He insisted that he not only understood why he was dismissed so quickly, but had no harsh feelings toward Dave Dombrowski, president of baseball operations, for trying to hire Thomson's replacement when Thomson was still employed.
Dombrowski, in a press conference earlier in the day, revealed that he offered the Phillies’ managerial job to Alex Cora on Sunday — less than 24 hours after Cora was fired by the Boston Red Sox — while Thomson was still managing the Phillies in Atlanta.
"I think Dave was just doing his due diligence," Thomson said, "and he had made up his mind and he was going to move forward. This guy’s a Hall of Fame executive. So I think people need to trust him. He’s going to do the right thing for the organization.
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"David and I have a close relationship, but that doesn’t stand in the way for him doing the right thing for the organization. And I respect that."
Rob Thomson has been fired by the Philadelphia Phillies.
Dombrowski, who remains close with Cora from their days together in Boston when they won the 2018 World Series, said it was Cora who telephoned him Saturday night, strictly out of friendship, after being fired. They talked again Sunday morning, and Dombrowski later offered Cora the Phillies’ job, with Cora still in the second year of a three-year, $21.75 million contract with the Red Sox.
"We talked about potentially taking the job," Dombrowski said. "I thought I had told him I’d really come to the conclusion at that point, if he took it, I was going to make a change. And I thought that he might take it, but as time went on over the next day into Monday morning, it was apparent from his perspective that he wanted to take time with his family …
"It wasn’t because he’s paid through the next year, but he just felt that he wanted, at this point, to be a father, first and foremost."
Cora, 50, is expected to again be offered the managerial job after the season, with Don Mattingly taking over as interim manager for the rest of the season. But Dombrowski said that nothing has been decided.
"Alex Cora is one of the finest managers in the game of baseball," Dombrowski said. "I’ve been fortunate enough to work with Hall of Famers like Tony La Russa and Jim Leyland in my career. I think if Alex Cora decides to keep managing, he has a chance to be in that same category.
"That’s how good he is."
Meanwhile, Thomson will go home, he said, and try to decide what he’ll do with himself.
"I got no idea," he said. "I really have never spent a summer in 42 years at home, so I really don't know. Thank God my wife put a pool in a couple years ago, so maybe I'll go for a swim or something."
Thomson, 62, is expected to stay with the Phillies organization as a special assistant. There have been no official offers, but Phillies owner John Middleton told him Tuesday morning that an adviser’s position is waiting whenever he’s ready.
"I wasn’t officially offered anything," Thomson said, "but I am open to staying in this organization. I’ve said throughout my four years as manager here I don’t want to go anywhere else. I love this organization. I’ve been treated with class and dignity the last eight years since I came here, not only the organization, but the city of Philadelphia as well.
"I would seriously entertain staying with the organization. Maybe right now isn’t the right time, and we give it a little bit of (a) break here, but yeah, I’m all in."
Thomson, who replaced Joe Girardi in 2022 and led the Phillies to the World Series, also believes these Phillies will turn it around after their dreadful 9-19 start, praising Mattingly’s managerial skills after stints with the Dodgers and Marlins. He also supported the decision not to fire any coaches, calling his former staff the best in the business.
"This team is going to turn this around," Thomson says, "and they’re going to get hot. I have a bunch of different reasons why. There’s a lot of talent in there. And if you look at the back of the baseball cards with these guys, usually they reach those numbers by the end of the year. So, I think that they are going to turn it around.
"We haven’t really played synchronized baseball yet, but I think that will change. There’s a really hot run in there someplace."
And although he won’t be on the bench in uniform, Thomson says he’ll still be around.
"This is the most fun that I’ve had in baseball the last four years. … I’ve loved every minute here in Philadelphia. I feel like a citizen here, I really do. It’s been the best."
Thomson, who says he wanted to have a farewell Zoom call simply for accountability, answered questions for about 20 minutes, representing the Phillies with class and dignity to the end.
He hadn’t made up his mind quite yet what he planned to do for the evening, but said there were some NHL playoff games he wanted to catch, and, yes, that Phillies game against the Giants, too.
