Going into the 2024 season are we going to see a true Lamarr Rodgers RailCats team? You maybe saying well what do you mean a true Rodgers’ team as it’ll be his 3rd year managing the Gary SouthShore RailCats.

Well, we should at least all agree that Coach Rodgers’ first year was a very late start to the game, as he was hired in March towards the end of the month. His roster was not truly his as he had the structure of Greg Taggert’s roster (RailCats Manager legend). Taggert left the team to go to The San Francisco Giants organiztion.

We saw in the 1st year the pitching staff was the highlight of the RailCats up to the All-Star Break. Which seems to par to how Taggert had his roster’s constructed, good pitching and small ball offense. But, really The American Association has moved away from that kind of play. Well least be honest baseball moved away from small ball and all about the big bat. This all before the pitch clock rule.

With that all being said Lamarr had to finding his footing quick and he seemed to be the new type of manager. Big Bats, Offense over Defense, Starters going 4 or 5 innings, and playing the number games. Which is fine if he had the players for it. Which he didn’t, which lead to another lossing season and missed the playoffs. after the All-Star break we saw a bit more of what Rodgers was looking for. So year 2 should be a lot better right?

Year 2 was a lot like year 1 but more of a Lamar Rodgers roster. Year 2 was a bit of a ride. Starting the season, the RailCats had high expectations. But we saw a lot of what we saw in 2022. Except the pitching staff wasn’t as dominate and the offense really struggled to score. The offense didn’t run through Daniel Lingua like in 22, Sam Abbott wasn’t hitting for power and was later released. Woodworth wasn’t himself being plagued with injuries. Marriaga and Castillo didn’t put up the numbers they did in the previous year.

About mid-June, Ben Miller, who was a relief pitcher, was released. He wanted to be released because he didn’t enjoy the locker room. When I first heard this, I wasn’t really concerned. I guess I should have because when Micheal Woodworth was traded to Kane County for A Player To Be Named Later, the flood gates opened that the locker room was a bit toxic. Which most of us may not like to hear but it seemed Woodworth was at the center of it.Why did the locker room fall apart or why was there a split. To my belief it seemed like that changing of guard caused this to happen. So when I started to hear “fire Lamarr” and Woodworth was done dirty. I started to think and do a little digging and talking to some that are close to the locker room.

I think year 2 for Manager Rodgers was a failure but not on his part of being a manager but having a different mindset among the previous players that have been staples of the RailCats for a couple of years. I’m not saying that any of these players are bad player or people, they just don’t like the way things are ran, like they didn’t want to work hard off the field. What I’ve seen from Lamarr is he want’s his team to act like professionals and have a great work ethic. I don’t blame him for that as he’s not wrong. We saw that with Victor Nova. I was told he had a terrible worth ethic even though he was on a heater.

I’m not saying this year is all on players. A couple of mangement issues I had were when the team had a double header and they were off the next day. He would pitch the scheduled starter on the 1st game but would throw a bullpen game in game 2. To me your not screwing up the rotation schedule because of the the day off. My other complaint was the lack of using the bench. It seemed like close games at the end of the game he would just leave a starter who maybe struggling and nothing would happen or leave a slower runner on instead of having a faster run on base. I also heard the complaints of leaving in pitchers to long, but last year the complaint was he pulled pitchers to early. So you can take that for what it is.

In Summary I think last season was a failure but not all on Rodgers. Now I’m not going to tell you how to fan, but from experience I know that having a toxic locker room is the worst thing possibly for talented players, and Lamarr Rodgers put a pretty good roster together, as everyone that covered the league saw that. You may be saying, Well, why not change up the locker room and get more players?Well, it’s an independent baseball league. You can’t just release a player and expect to get close to that same talent mid-way through the year.

So year 3 is going to the most important for Lamarr Rodgers, as it’s his 3rd year and a new owner has stepped in. So if this team isn’t a playoff team in 2024 the seat might get a little warm for Manager Rodger.

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