NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – The Toronto Blue Jays and John Gibbons have put off extension talks while the business of the off-season plays out, but the manager says he’s content entering 2017 as a lame duck if that’s how things play out.
Speaking with reporters at the winter meetings via conference call, Gibbons said he and general manager Ross Atkins "haven’t talked (about it) much lately," but also added "it’s not something at the moment I’ve really been pushing."
Typically, a manager in his contractual situation is rewarded with some type of extension but the Blue Jays, to be fair, have been preoccupied with some very significant roster decisions.
Since there’s no urgency to the matter – next year is Gibbons’ last under contract after his previous deal was reworked last winter to eliminate a rolling option that prevented him from having a lame-duck season – it’s become a matter to revisit down the road.
"We discussed it briefly right at the end of the season and I talked to Ross a couple of times," said Gibbons. "I couldn’t tell you yet how things are going to play out before the start of next season, but it’s not something I’ve been obsessed with. We restructured my deal at the last winter meetings, we took away the Jan. 1 option, and I was fine with that, I was behind that, it got me a small little bump in salary and if nothing changes, I can live with going into the season with it being my last year under contract, I’ve got no problem with that.
"But there are (bigger) priorities at the moment anyway because it’s a such a big year with two of our top players, (Jose) Bautista and Eddie (Edwin Encarnacion), being free agents, (Brett) Cecil, some of those guys. So a lot of things are going on, it wasn’t a big priority, necessarily."
Gibbons’ future has been a frequent subject of conjecture since Mark Shapiro took over as president and former GM Alex Anthopoulos left last fall. Most front offices want to install their own manager, understandably so, but over the course of a run to a wild card and the American League Championship Series, Gibbons drew strong praise from the new regime.
"There’s a level of consistency with him in approach that is unflappable and I think that translates into toughness," Shapiro said in an interview before Game 5 of the ALCS. "He’s the same guy and in a role like this, when people tend to go with the wind and get so impacted by the emotion that flies all around us, that stability, that strength and that toughness from a leader is a real asset."
Atkins mentioned after the season that he and Gibbons had briefly discussed the possibility of an extension, signalling how the relationship had grown.
"We didn’t know what to expect out of each other coming into the season, I was new to them and hadn’t worked for them before," said Gibbons. "As the season went on, things worked really well, the team for the most part was successful. We didn’t get to that final series like we wanted to, but we got close and some things ended up playing out pretty well. They were able to work with me, I enjoyed working with them. But who knows how long these things last, who knows how long guys hold down these jobs anyways. We’ll see, in due time all those things work themselves out."
