OPINION:
Paul Toboni, the new Washington Nationals president of baseball operations, was introduced to the public in the District on the day the federal government shut down.
He might want to take that as a sign.
I doubt, though, that Toboni believes in signs. Apparently, he also apparently doesn’t believe the horror stories shared throughout baseball of his new employers — or has chosen not to care.
I believe Toboni believes in himself. It’s gotten him this far.
That belief helped the 35-year-old California native and former college player climb the ladder of one of the premier franchises in baseball — the Boston Red Sox — from intern to scout to scouting boss to vice president of player development to assistant general manager.
You can understand how his confidence and poise — along with his impressive resume — won over the Lerner family, the owners of the Nationals, who must have been giddy that they actually convinced someone like Toboni to work for them.
“He played a crucial role in turning that (Red Sox) franchise around,” Mark Lerner said in the Wednesday press conference. “All of us here are so excited to work with Paul and support the vision he has.”
Support the vision – this was something everyone danced around during the introduction of Toboni. Support for the baseball operation by the Lerners has been nearly nonexistent over the last few years.
The question of the Lerner’s support — they fielded a team this year with a $65 million active roster payroll — came up repeatedly before and after the press conference, as if everyone wondered why in the world Toboni would take this job.
“I’m stepping into this role with a clear vision, and that vision is to be the highest-performing organization in all of sports,” he said.
I’m sure Toboni believes this.
“I’m not trying to purposely be vague here, but I’ll say that I just feel very supported in the role,” Toboni said. “I can’t tell you when or how it’s going to happen, but I feel supported. And, once again, there’s a reason I’m in the seat that I’m in.”
One of the reasons is that Mike Rizzo was fired from that job on July 6.
Let us remember that the Lerners did not fire Rizzo because they were unhappy with his job. They might have been, on their way to a sixth straight losing season, and when Rizzo’s contract ran out at the end of the season, they might have fired him. But the owners fired Rizzo because he wouldn’t follow their orders and fire manager Dave Martinez. The family liked Rizzo. They were comfortable with him. He had been in the organization since 2006, when fellow owner Stan Kasten brought him in to be an assistant general manager.
As we have learned — something I’ve been saying for years now — Rizzo’s biggest job was not running a baseball operation. It was dealing with the Lerner family — managing up.
Rizzo managed to do so, and, for eight years, fielded a competitive team that went to the playoffs five times, won four National League East titles and one World Series.
So it’s been done. Why wouldn’t Toboni believe he is capable of doing so as well?
There are two important differences, though, between Rizzo’s time of success and now. One was the presence of the patriarch of the family, Ted Lerner was the man who built the family empire. It was a family operation, but ultimately, Ted Lerner was the vote that counted and, though often difficult and often frustrating, he was the vote that Rizzo had to win when it came time to make decisions. The elder Lerner died in 2023.
Now those decisions are run through the siblings and in-laws left behind, which has only served to blur visions even further. In perhaps a defiant show to their critics, joining Mark Lerner on stage at Wednesday’s press conference were his brothers-in-law, Ed Cohen and Robert Tannenbaum.
Rizzo’s success also came pre-COVID. There have been many sad stories about the financial damage COVID left behind, and no one is going to have to hold a bake sale for the Lerner family. But they have gone from the commercial real estate business to the empty building business, and it has taken a toll on a family already known for squeezing every cent out of every deal.
The Lerners have told people they are losing $100 million a year on the baseball team — a suspect number.
They have cried foul for years about being cut off from television revenue because of their contentious partnership with MASN, which ends this year. But the Nationals received more than $300 million in MASN revenue from 2017 to 2022. They may have been shortchanged over the years, but it also served as a convenient cover to avoid support.
Support — it was hard to get away from that question. Mark Lerner was asked about it. “We’re going to do it, sitting down with Paul, when it’s ready, when he says, ‘I need to do this, I need to do that,’ and we’ll take it from there,” he said. “This is not a decision that has to be made today. But we’re going to get there. We’re going to get back where we know we should be.”
It is worth reminding everyone what Mark Lerner told team announcer Dan Kolko in a “Nats Xtra” interview at the end of the 2023 season about support for Rizzo. “It’s his call how he wants to fill the holes in the lineup,” Mark Lerner said. “He comes to me when he is ready, whether it’s a player or a free agent or whatever. Whatever he desires he has the resources and he has always had the resources since the day we took over the team to build a winner.”
This was garbage. Rizzo was repeatedly turned away by the family when it came time to come up with money to build a competitive roster.
None of it may matter to Toboni, who may believe he can overcome all of this. He was asked about his priorities moving forward building the organization he wants, and spoke about advice he had once been given, “Move the big rocks first, then you can pick up the pebbles.”
The big rocks, though, can sometimes crush you.
• Catch Thom Loverro on “The Kevin Sheehan Show” podcast.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.