SAN DIEGO -- The Padres’ hiring of Craig Stammen as their manager is unprecedented in franchise history in one sense. In another, it’s history repeating itself.
The latter history suggests Stammen could enjoy a long, successful tenure.
Stammen was introduced as the team’s 20th manager (not counting interim managers) on Monday in a press conference at Petco Park. He is the first skipper in club history to spend the bulk of his playing career in the bullpen. (He also joins Bruce Bochy as the only Padres non-interim managers who played for the team and Jerry Coleman as the only Padres managers with no previous coaching experience.)
Stammen’s ultimate goal? Make another kind of history as the first Padres manager to win a World Series title.
“The greatest challenge of this position,” Stammen said, “and the most fun part about baseball, is putting in the work and the effort to be that last team standing. And that's what gets me excited, gives me some goosebumps to see.”
Stammen, 41, spent his final six MLB seasons as a Padres reliever, making 333 appearances. His last year as a player was 2023, when he was on a Minor League contract and never appeared in a game while trying to make his way back from injury. A.J. Preller, the Padres’ president of baseball operations and general manager, provided a soft landing spot when Stammen retired as a player that year, immediately hiring him as a special assistant.
Which brings us to the encouraging bit of Padres history. There is precedent for a Padres’ front office staffer to begin a search on the interview panels, only to wind up with a key leadership job.
In 1995, Kevin Towers was the scouting director and was part of the screening process for GM candidates. Club president Larry Lucchino was impressed by Towers in the process and promoted him to GM.
After his surprise hiring, Towers built an immediate division winner and lasted 15 seasons in the job. The Padres made four postseason visits, including the World Series in 1998.
Similarly, Stammen was on the interview panels as the Padres initiated the process to replace Mike Shildt, who retired shortly after the Padres’ playoff loss to the Cubs in the NL Wild Card Series. Stammen soon stopped asking questions and began answering them as Preller began his recruitment.
“Would you want to be the manager?” Preller queried.
The response?
“Craig didn’t say, 'no,' but he didn’t say, 'yes,'” Preller said on Monday.
Stammen’s path to the manager job differed from Towers’ to GM in that Preller saw him as a candidate from the start, even if he hadn’t revealed his hand. Once Preller posed the question, Stammen took it to his wife, Audrey. They live in Ohio and have four small children. The time and travel demands of managing differ vastly from being a front office assistant.
Audrey was “all in” for the managerial challenge, Stammen said.
“It's about this organization and about making the fan base, the Friar faithful, proud of the product that we put on the field and the way that we treat people,” Stammen said, “and in the way that we take care of our families. So I'm excited to start that process, be a leader in that process, within the coaching staff and within the clubhouse. Hopefully, that leads to us taking this organization to a place that we haven't been yet.”
Just what put Stammen on Preller’s radar?
“First of all, he's super genuine,” Preller said. “He’s comfortable in his own skin. I think what you see is what you're going to get, in terms of big wins, tough losses. We have had a lot of success. We have had some failures. I think you get the same person [with Stammen], and we saw that as a player. We've seen that the last two years as a staff member.”
The special assistant role was hardly a courtesy title for Stammen. He threw himself into all aspects of the franchise -- working with Minor League players, spending time with the Major League coaching staff, participating in trade talks and learning about Draft preparation and player evaluation.
He begins his managerial tenure well aware there’s still plenty to learn. His coaching hires will reflect a collaborative mindset.
“The best part about this Padres organization,” Stammen said, “is the people that we have and how great they are at all their jobs. And I'm going to rely on all those people. This isn't a one-man Craig Stammen show. … Rely on a lot of people to have my back and create processes that lead us to the championship.”