Jays coach Mattingly joins Nashville expansion effort as advisor
Published
Toronto Blue Jays bench coach Don Mattingly will serve as an advisor to the Nashville Stars, a group headed by former All-Star and general manager Dave Stewart that seeks to become MLB's next expansion franchise, according to Bob Nightengale of USA Today.
Nightengale adds that Mattingly remains Blue Jays bench coach in addition to advising the Nashville expansion effort, named Music City Baseball.
“The approach that Dave Stewart and his team have in Nashville is exactly what the game of baseball needs. I am glad to see MLB taking an active approach on these important issues. We need more diversity in the game, and it starts from the top-down," Mattingly said in a statement to Nightengale.
The former New York Yankees All-Star joined the Blue Jays as bench coach on John Schneider's staff in late November.
The 61-year-old served as Los Angeles Dodgers manager from 2011 to 2015 and then guided the Miami Marlins from 2016 until last season. He and the team parted ways after a 69-93 campaign that saw them miss the playoffs for the second year in a row. In 2020, Mattingly won the National League's Manager of the Year Award as he helped the Marlins reach the playoffs for just the third time in franchise history.
In conjunction with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City and named after the Negro Leagues team that played in Nashville from the late 1930s to the early 1950s, the Stars group seeks to "secure Major League Baseball approval of an expansion franchise in Nashville." Their website describes themselves "an organization of Nashville business, sports, music and community leaders" who are "committed to bringing a Major League Baseball franchise to the city of Nashville as a central piece of a mixed-use, multi-themed family, sports, and entertainment district."
In 2018, MLB commissioner Rob Manfred named Nashville as a possible destination for MLB expansion and said this past summer he would "love" to expand to 32 teams.
MLB last expanded in 1998 when the Arizona Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay Devil Rays -- now named the Tampa Bay Rays -- were born.
Stewart also has history with the Blue Jays, having spent two seasons with the team including as a member of the 1993 World Series-winning squad.