St. Louis Cardinals: David Bell a busy man since leaving the Cardinals

The St. Louis Cardinals at one time welcomed David Bell in the major league coaching staff before he departed for greener pastures. His name has finally bubbled to the top of discussions for several teams.

David Bell served as the St. Louis Cardinals‘ bench coach under Mike Matheny. This doesn’t bode well for his reputation but luckily Matheny didn’t tarnish the history or the future for Bell.

David Bell is the son of long-time baseball man, Buddy Bell. Buddy spent years as a player and then even more as a baseball manager. After managing, Buddy spent 14 years with the Chicago White Sox organization before moving to the Reds organization at the end of the 2017 season as their Vice President and Senior Advisor to the GM.

This is interesting as David’s name is one of a few that the Reds are considering for their managerial vacancy. Additionally, David Bell is being considered for the GM vacancy with the San Francisco Giants.

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As was said earlier, David served as the bench coach for the St. Louis Cardinals from 2015 to 2017. He had served as the assistant hitting coach for the Cardinals for the 2014 season before becoming the bench coach. His move to the Cardinals came after a one season stint with the Cubs as their third base coach.

Digging back into his early coaching career, David served as the AA and AAA manager for the Reds organization from the 2009 season to the 2012 season. Hence, his name at the top of the Reds’ list makes plenty of sense even in light of the potential nepotism.

To me, though, the real interesting piece is David being considered for the GM role with the Giants. David is highly-regarded in and around baseball, is known as a very smart baseball man, and makes a lot of sense with the Giants.

In fact, David was courted by the Giants and he left the Cardinals after the 2017 season to serve as the Giants’ VP and director of player development. In just one season in the role, David showed his adroit skills that would make him a natural fit for the GM role.

And, a simple call to Dad would/could constitute a potential team-to-team trade talk. Imagine how the California media would feast on that!

There’s still a chance that David will land as a manager but the GM wrinkle is an interesting new development.

The St. Louis Cardinals are good at developing players and with the number of former players who are now in managerial or front office positions, it seems they are good at developing leaders too.