Former Red Sox, Angels Manager John McNamara Dies at Age 88

Former MLB manager John McNamara, who guided the 1986 Boston Red Sox to an American League pennant, died Wednesday at the age of 88. 

McNamara's wife, Ellen, and nephew, Joe, confirmed the news to Dan Shaughnessy of the Boston Globe.

McNamara managed the Oakland Athletics, San Diego Padres, Cincinnati Reds, California Angels, Red Sox and Cleveland during a 19-season career that spanned from 1969 to 1996.

He reached the postseason twice: Once with the 1979 Reds after winning the National League West, and again with the Red Sox in 1986.

That Sox team was one strike away from winning the World Series versus the New York Mets, but New York's three-run, two-out rally in the bottom of the 10th inning of Game 6 turned a 5-3 Sox lead into a 6-5 loss. The Mets would win the World Series in seven games after taking the finale, 8-5.

McNamara won the American League's Manager of the Year award for his efforts in guiding the Red Sox to the pennant after the team finished fifth in the AL East with an 81-81 record the year prior.

Upon hearing the news of McNamara's passing, Cleveland manager Terry Francona, whose father, Tito, played for McNamara, expressed his condolences and called the ex-skipper a "sweet, sweet man," per Tom Withers of the Associated Press.

McNamara's players have heaped praise upon their ex-skipper, perhaps none more notable than Baseball Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson, who noted his former A's manager's "character in the face of bigotry," per Mark Armour for the Society for American Baseball Research, who cited Jackson's remembrances in an autobiography:

"When we'd be on a road trip and we'd stop at a diner for hamburgers or something to eat, McNamara wouldn't compromise. It was simple for him: if they wouldn't serve me they weren't going to serve anybody. He'd just take the whole team out of the restaurant, we'd get into the bus and we'd keep driving."

Another player, former San Diego Padres third baseman Doug Rader, said that "any player with an ounce of decency in him will play his heart out for John."

Per Armour, McNamara lived a "quiet retirement" in Nashville with Ellen prior to his death.