Why manager and not head coach?

Question

Why are the coaches called managers in baseball? I understand that they manage the team, but so do head coaches in football and basketball. So why does MLB have to be different?

Answer 1

MLB is the oldest sport in America, and pre WWII, it was common for the manager to also be a player on the club. A player-manager. The term coach came later on (post WWII). Manager is the old school term. Akin to all English football "managers". Coach is an American post WWII term.

Answer 2

You partially already answered the question. In-game, they aren't as active, if at all, as Football coaches or basketball coaches. In the latter mentioned sports, they call plays, sets, make substitutions, are talking & interactive with players, they are on their feet going up & down sidelines in game and also scream/talk with officials. They do more than manage. Baseball managers,...they sit, spit, scratch, mumble to the bench coach. Not that they're not doing a job, baseball is such an individual sport, they only have to so much. Fill out a lineup card, call for a squeeze, change/talk to a pitcher. The actual coaches, pitching, hitting, 1st/3rd base, & bench coaches do the rest.

Answer 3

Good question. A Baseball manager runs a team during the game he does little teaching or coaching during the season. He has coaches for that purpose. A manager will determine the outcome through strategy rather than teaching skills during the game.

Answer 4

Because a baseball manager manages every aspect of the daily doings on the field.



He makes out the line up. Has pre game meetings with his players.

Determines when to pull a pitcher. Figures out his various strategies to create a win in today's game.



He doesn't coach. Baseball has people who do coach and they are called coaches.

Answer 5

Connie Mack managed and owned the Philadelphia Athletics and I would think that the manager or coach was probably in the business end as well and hence the name manager.

Answer 6

Ahem. Baseball is the senior sport here. Team managers are called managers because that is what they ARE. It is the younger, lesser sports that failed to pay heed and went with the term "coach" instead. They could yet make amends, but you know what self-righteous prigs they are with their delusions of infallibility....



And, as always, why care at all what the lesser sports do?

Answer 7

As tort pointed out, baseball was around as a professional sport prior to basketball and football.



The question is, why did basketball and football choose to be different? Baseball was here first.