Jim Bowden (baseball)

James Goodwin Bowden IV (born 18 May 1981 in Boston, Massachusetts ) is a former MLB Senior Vice President and General Manager with over 15 years experience at that position for Major League Baseball Teams including the Cincinnati Reds, Montreal Expos and Washington Nationals Major League Baseball, and was named Executive of the Year by Baseball America in 1999. He is presently a Baseball Analyst for Fox Sports. His video's can be seen on FoxSports.com (then click on MLB, then click VIDEOS on the drop-down) and search "Jim Bowden". His FoxSports.Com segments include a creative and innovative proposed method to improve the parity of Major League Baseball through realignment, the title of the video is "Changes coming to MLB?"; a look at the 2010 Free Agent Class; and in depth look at the trade deadline; analysis of potential post-season rotations and weekly break-downs of each league. In 2009, he Co-Hosted on Fox Sports Radio with Steve Hartman, Dan Moriaty, Sean Farnham and Bruce Jacobs. His guests included: Jim Leyland, Lou Piniella, Matt Cain, Barry Zito, Chris Paul, Kobe Bryant, Trevor Ariza, Mick Jones, Kelly Hanson, Gary Bettman, Derrick Mason, Brian Cushing, Mark Gubicza, Jay Glazer, Eric Karros, Shawn Johnson, Dan Finnerty, Mike Riley and Jeff Tedford. <Fox Sports Radio Archives>. He has also co-hosted for XM/Sirius Radio with Casey Stern during the NLCS and interviewed Shane Victorino, Scott Boras and Pat Gillick. Jim is best known for his trades in acquiring players like Ken Griffey Jr., David Wells and Ryan Zimmerman. He was Baseball America Executive of the Year in 1999.

Early life and career

Bowden was raised in Weston, Massachusetts and Boothbay Harbor, Maine. He graduated from Rollins College, with a degree in Business and Communications. During his 15 years as a Sr. VP and GM, he was named Baseball America Executive of the Year in 1999 <Baseball America> and finished in first in his division 3 times as a GM (1994, 1995 and 1999) <Sporting News Baseball Guide>. He made over 168 Major League Trades in his career. His entry to professional baseball came as an assistant in the Pittsburgh Pirates media relations department in 1985. He was quickly promoted to Assistant Director of Player Development and Scouting in 1986 by General manager Syd Thrift who was impressed with Bowden and asked him to join the Pirates' baseball operations department. He followed Thrift to the New York Yankees, and eventually moved to the Cincinnati Reds with Lou Piniella and Bob Quinn as Director of Player Development and was promoted in October 16, 2002 to General Manager <Cincinnati Reds Media Guide>. During his career, he worked for owners George Steinbrenner, Marge Schott, Carl Barger, Mac Prine, John and Dan Galbreath, Carl Lindner and Ted Lerner. He worked with some very successful managers including: Lou Piniella, Jim Leyland, Jack McKeon, Davey Johnson, Bobby Valentine and Frank Robinson. He is also very close with Hall of Fame Manager, Tommy LaSorda.

General manager

His first role as a general manager was with the Cincinnati Reds at age 31 in 1992. When he took this position, he was the youngest general manager in the history of Major League Baseball. He also was the youngest GM in baseball history to lead his team to the NLCS in 1995. He continued with the Reds until July of 2003 <Reds Media Guides>. He was named Executive of the Year by Baseball America, the Touchdown Club and the Boston writers in 1999.

Bowden is perhaps best known for his acquisition of OF Ken Griffey, Jr. from Seattle in February of 2000. His Reds teams finished in first place in 1994, 1995 and 1999 <Baseball Digest>. He drafted players such as Ryan Zimmerman and Adam Dunn and acquired players such as David Wells, John Smiley, Pete Schourek, Jeff Shaw, Sean Casey, Paul Konerko, Mike Cameron, Ron Gant, Deion Sanders, Bret Boone, Aaron Boone, Denny Neagle, Barry Larkin, Kevin Mitchell, Danny Graves, Jeff Brantley, Tony Fernandez, Benito Santiago, Alfonso Soriano and Ken Griffey Jr.

Bowden worked for the ESPN in 2003 and 2004 as a Baseball Analyst for Cold Pizza, Baseball Tonight, SportsCenter and ESPNEWS. During his time at ESPN, Jim worked with several high profile talents including: Karl Ravech, Peter Gammons, Steve Phillips, Harold Reynolds, Jay Crawford, Buster Olney and Ken Rosenthal. He was hired by Major League Baseball to serve as GM of the Montreal Expos in November of 2004, who were soon to become the Washington Nationals.

Bowden was the first general manager of the Washington Nationals and the final GM of the Montreal Expos beginning in November 2004. The team never had a payroll in the top 12 in the NL during his tenure <USA TODAY> and did not finish above .500 over that span.

Bowden is known for his wheeling and dealing, completing over 168 trades during his tenure. He was also accessible to the media, and showed a willingness to sign players with proven track records (Larkin, Gant, Fernandez, Wells, Neagle, Brantley, Zimmerman Mitchell, Griffey etc) and affection for athletic outfielders like Ken Griffey Jr., Ron Gant, Reggie Sanders, Deion Sanders as well as offensive outfielders like Adam Dunn, Kevin Mitchell and Dmitri Young <Reds and Nationals media guides>. In his 15 years as an MLB general manager, his teams finished first three times. To put it in perspective of small market payrolls, the Reds never finished over .500 the following seven years without the leadership of Bowden despite doubling their payroll during that span. Bowden always had competitive Reds teams when he was running them despite never having a competitive budget. <Reds Media Guide, Baseball America, The Sporting News, Baseball Weekly, USA TODAY>. He has a chapter named after him Syd Thrift's book called, "The Bowden Brain" ; as well as prominently mentioned by David Wells in his book, respecting him for his honesty and straight forwardness.

He has met several Presidents of the United States including: George Bush Sr., George Bush Jr., Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. He and his family have been guests at the White House on several occasions.

Controversy

Bowden was with the Reds for 14 consecutive years and the Expos/Nationals for 5 consecutive years with loyal followings at both organizations. His drive to have fun and great sense of humor is appreciated by all of his family and friends who surround him wherever he goes. However, he also has his distractors and haters. As most people around him say, you either love or hate him, but always respect his brain power and love of life. However, he also has had controversy surround him, most of his life. For example:

• In 1993, he fired Reds manager and former star player Tony Pérez after just 44 games. Coming on the heels of racially charged comments by Reds owner [[Marge Schott].
• In 1998, he traded All-Star reliever and Cincinnati native Jeff Shaw to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Shaw claimed at the time that Bowden had agreed not to trade him as part of a contract that involved Shaw taking less money from the Reds than he could have gotten elsewhere. His agent Joe Bick however, would later admit that Bowden refused to include a no-trade in his contract and that team President John Allen was the one who forced the trade.
• In 2000, Reds coach Ron Oester reportedly was offered the job of manager by Bowden, but that when Oester didn't accept the financial terms, after several offers, John Allen ordered Bowden, per owner, Carl Lindner to offer the job to Bob Boone<confirmed by John Allen>.
• On 17 April 2006, Bowden was arrested for drunk driving in Miami, Florida and the charge was later dropped. <State of Florida>.
• As the GM of the Nationals, he made a deal with the Reds in mid-season 2006 involving Gary Majewski, who received a cortisone shot shortly before the trade. In May 2007 the Reds filed a grievance, but lost due to the fact they did not due their due diligence per MLB rules.
• Jim hand-picked and hired Mike Rizzo, Bob Boone, Kris Kline who along with Roy Clark are the leading the Nationals Baseball Operations Department.

He continues to be involved in extensive charitable work.

Family

Bowden is engaged to actress/model Joy Jolise and has five sons: James, Tyler, Chad, Trey and Chase.

References

• Bowden, Jim. "Scouting our way to the top", The San Francisco Examiner. 5 April 2006.
• "Nationals extend GM Bowden's contract through April", USA Today. 27 October 2005.
• "Jim Bowden's Segway", Washington Times. 19 February 2008.
• "Bowden makes deals--And enemies", Cincinnati Enquirer. 1 April 2001.