Greg Riddoch Gets Buried in the Part

SAN DIEGO —  Tom Werner has Bill Cosby and Roseanthem Barr, big stars in the world of network comedy, but the man has proven to be versatile.

He now has a soap opera as well.

Call it “All My Padres.”

With little more than two weeks to play in the 1992 season, we’d get a plot synopsis which reads a little bit like this:

Owners would like to see the manager rehired. The general manager doesn’t seem to want to rehire the manager. The general manager makes things tougher on the manager by trading away a star pitcher. The players don’t break bread with the manager ... and not because he doesn’t make enough money to eat where they do. The owners cannot afford to either keep the players they have or hire new ones, unless someone such as Barry Bonds comes with a $1-million coupon they can double at the corner store .

Yikes.

It has to be enough to make Werner and his ownership group wish they had formed a Rotisserie League rather than bought into the National League.

This might not be much fun, but at least it’s ridiculously expensive.

Most of the focus at this time of year is on the managerial situation. Joe McIlvaine, the general manager, is the guy who will call the shot . . . and probably fire the shot. Greg Riddoch is the manager.

It would not be an understatement to say that Riddoch has spent the last two seasons on the spot. Before his first opening day as manager, in the spring of 1991, it already was being rumored that Jim Riggleman, manager of the Padres’ Las Vegas affiliate, was being groomed to replace him. Riddoch was 45 at the time, hardly a candidate for a recliner and slippers.

Riddoch, you see, was hired by ownership before that same group hired McIlvaine. In essence, McIlvaine was like a guy who moved into a new house but didn’t like all the furniture. Riddoch had to know he wasn’t safe if his new boss dared trade away Roberto Alomar and Joe Carter. The manager is like a potted plant and those guys were like living room sets.

Throughout the 1991 season, Riddoch’s job status remained shaky. However, he couldn’t be fired. He took the Padres from 75-87 in 1990 to 84-78, an improvement which could not be attributed to an influx of new stars or a more favorable alignment of the planets. He had to have done something right.

As the Padres approached the 1992 season, they looked troubled. They had holes in key places McIlvaine was responsible for filling. The only NL West team they seemed assured of beating was Houston. They did not return from Yuma with very high hopes, except maybe that McIlvaine had acquired a kid from Milwaukee who seemed to have potential.

Here it is September, and this team is nine games over .500. The kid from Milwaukee, Gary Sheffield, has done quite nicely. His acquisition represents the most enlightened transaction of McIlvaine’s two-year term as general manager.

However, Riddoch has had problems elsewhere, particularly with the pitching staff. No one would have imagined that the staff’s top five pitchers, in terms of earned run average, would be Rich Rodriguez, Mike Maddux, Jose Melendez, Jim Deshaies and Jeremy Hernandez. Ed Whitson has been out all year, Greg Harris has made nine appearances and Andy Benes is below .500.

Win with that bunch? Who are you trying to kid?

Riddoch did have Craig Lefferts, who was tied with Bruce Hurst with 13 victories on Aug. 31. McIlvaine traded him away.

Huh?

That’s right. The same man who said he would evaluate Riddoch’s managerial skills under the pressure of a stretch run traded away a pitcher Riddoch needed to maximize his chances for success. The Padres weren’t in the middle of the race at the time, but they were close. They are totally out of it now.

That being the case, McIlvaine gets an F for general managerial skills under the pressure of a stretch run.

It has been said that a rift exists between McIlvaine and Riddoch, but I don’t think it’s anything that overt. They are both independent men with egos who distance themselves from all but their closest confidants. Neither qualifies as a close confidant to the other. It can’t really be a personality clash, because neither has that much personality to clash.

It does seem likely that McIlvaine will dispense with Riddoch at some point in the next few weeks. He probably will say something about a change being best for the organization.

I hope he doesn’t use disgruntled players as an excuse, because I don’t know of any players who liked Dick Williams. He took the Padres to their only World Series, but the players would have voted to impeach him a few days into his first spring training.

Greg Riddoch, to be sure, is no Dick Williams, but he’s no Jerry Coleman, Frank Howard, Steve Boros or Larry Bowa either. He’s better than all of them.

In truth, managing this club in 1993 will not be a joy for anybody. Cost constraints are going to cause a number of key players to depart, and those same cost constraints will keep quality players from being imported as replacements.

Maybe Tom Werner should manage this team himself.