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ST. PETERSBURG, Fla., April 18 -- Invariably, a coach or a manager whose team is performing poorly gets a pink slip from management after a really bad loss. Such was the case Wednesday for Larry Rothschild, who was fired as manager of the Tampa Bay Devils Rays less than 24 hours after a game in which they looked lifeless and overmatched in 10-0 pasting by the Boston Red Sox.
Rotchschild had guided the Devil Rays to steady improvement since their inception in 1998, but this season they got off to a poor 4-10 start.
The Devil Rays called a 2 p.m. Eastern time news conference to name a new manager. Coaches Terry Collins and Hal McRae both have previous major league managerial experience.
Rothschild is the only manager the Devil Rays have ever had. Under his guidance, the Devil Rays compiled a 205-294 record but increased their winning percentage each year since their first season in '98, just the fifth expansion team out of 14 to accomplish that feat.
In his first season, Rothschild, who had never managed in the big leagues before, put together a team that had the best finish of any expansion club in history in pitching (4.35 ERA, fourth best in the American League) and defense (.985, second in the AL).