Peter Drucker, Baseball, and the Lost Art of Management
The Dodgers, the Blue Jays, and the Art of Management
By Michael H. Kelly, Executive Director, The Drucker Institute & Danny Martin, Chief Scientist, The Drucker Institute
The Dodgers and Blue Jays couldn’t be more different, yet their success rests on the same timeless truth: effective management built on trust, development, and purpose.
For the first time in more than three decades, the Toronto Blue Jays are back in the World Series, facing the perennial powerhouse Los Angeles Dodgers. One franchise has been defined by sustained excellence.
The other is seeking to reclaim the culture that once made it a champion. Yet both have reached October’s stage through the same quiet discipline, above and beyond just talent: effective management built on trust, development, and human judegment.
“Baseball, after all, is the only American sport where the coach is called a manager.”
Baseball as a Window into America
Peter Drucker loved baseball. As an immigrant who arrived in America in 1937, he wanted to understand not just a country, but a civilization. Every year, he took his wife and children to a New York Yankees game.
He never fully grasped the rules, but he loved the rhythm—the pauses, the teamwork, the crowd’s spontaneous choreography. “To watch baseball,” he once told friends, “is to see an organization at work.”
“To watch baseball is to see an organization at work.”
For Drucker, baseball was a window into American life: a system built on competition, cooperation, and character. Years later, living in the same New Jersey town as Yankees legend Yogi Berra, Drucker and Berra met and found they shared a language—the language of leadership under uncertainty.
Berra, who had gone from player to manager, spoke about intuition, preparation, and knowing when to trust his players. Drucker spoke of decision-making, trust, and innovation. Both believed that effectiveness was not about power or numbers. It was about people—about doing the right things well.
“Yankees legend Yogi Berra spoke about leadership, innovation, and trust in ways that mirrored Drucker’s philosophy. “You can observe a lot just by watching,” Berra once said, a line Drucker might have claimed as his own.”
Image courtesy of Drucker Archives at the Drucker Institute. Peter F. Drucker
Although the Druckers didn’t own a television, Peter would rent one each October to watch the World Series. Baseball was the one event he refused to miss, a game he admired for its balance between individual performance and collective purpose.
Years later, Peter Bavasi of the then-Cleveland Indians reached out to Drucker for help with the team, which was adrift after years of losing seasons.
Bavasi had heard of Drucker’s reference to “widow-maker” jobs, positions that defeat even competent leaders because they lack clear purpose and structure. Running the Indians, he feared, had become one of them.
During their interactions, Drucker did not talk about lineups or batting averages. He spoke of management. He pressed for clarity of purpose, defined roles, and shared responsibility. He urged Bavasi to build a structure that allowed people to contribute and grow rather than react to every short-term loss.
Cleveland soon began to improve, finishing the 1986 season with a winning record and a surge in attendance. Drucker later sent Bavasi a note of congratulations, praising not only the wins but the renewal of purpose and structure.
The story captured what Drucker believed all along: management, even in baseball, is a human art built on trust, clarity, and shared goals.
Image courtesy of Drucker Archives at the Drucker Institute. A baseball signed by Bavasi’s father, Buzzie, who managed the Dodgers.
Carrying Drucker’s Legacy Forward
At the Drucker Institute at Claremont Graduate University, our work is to continue Peter’s legacy: to foster responsible leadership and effective management to strengthen organizations that support a functioning society.
A cornerstone of the Institute is its Data Innovation Team, which develops an annual ranking of America’s best-managed companies to provide leaders, investors, and academics with a holistic and insightful way to measure corporate effectiveness.
The team researches large-cap companies based on their alignment with core management principles advanced by Drucker, who taught management at CGU for more than 30 years.
Drucker defined effectiveness as “doing the right things well.”
“Among Drucker’s enduring principles, one stands above the rest: every person should see themselves as a manager.”
The ranking evaluates companies using Drucker’s principles across five dimensions: customer satisfaction, innovation, employee engagement and development, social responsibility, and financial strength.
After eight years of analysis, the pattern is unmistakable: people-first organizations consistently outperform.
“The ultimate resource in economic development is people. It is people, not capital or raw materials, that develop an economy.”
They succeed when employees are responsible not just for their own performance, but also for contributing to the results of the whole; organizations.
They succeed when individuals take ownership, the organization acknowledges their excellence and rewards it, and people find purpose in their work.
The companies that have earned a spot on the Management Top 250 list reflect these convictions. It shows that organizations where people act with accountability and purpose—where everyone feels trusted to manage their corner of the enterprise—consistently outperform the rest.
One could argue that the teams that win the championships, with a bit of luck and talent added in, achieve the same grand outcomes.
From the Boardroom to the Ballpark
That brings us to this year’s World Series.
For the Dodgers, Dave Roberts has become more than a field manager; he’s a leadership architect. He speaks about “connecting with each guy differently,” tailoring his approach to what each player needs to feel trusted and empowered. Under his stewardship, Los Angeles extended him into one of the richest managerial contracts in baseball. In Drucker’s terms, Roberts has built a culture that develops talent, creates agency, and sustains loyalty.
For the Blue Jays, manager John Schneider has charted a parallel course rooted in development and trust. A former catcher and longtime organizational coach, Schneider rose through Toronto’s minor-league system, teaching players to think like managers, to own their preparation and decisions. He’s fostered a clubhouse culture that blends accountability with freedom, encouraging stars and rookies alike to lead from where they stand.
Doing the Right Things Well, Together
So when you watch the World Series, look beyond the box score. Watch how the managers use their bullpens, how they develop young players, and how they hold steady under pressure.
You’re not just watching baseball—you’re watching management in action.
The World Series may crown a champion next week, but Drucker’s lesson endures year-round. Effective management is not about control alone.
It’s about unleashing human potential. Whether you’re leading a company, a classroom, or a clubhouse, the best objective measure of success is the same: doing the right things well, together.
Inspired by Drucker’s wisdom?
Peter Drucker changed how the world thinks about management.
The Drucker School of Management applies those ideas today through its graduate education, research, and community engagement. Learn more about how they carry forward his vision.
The Drucker Institute promotes effective management and responsible leadership as foundational elements that contribute to Drucker’s vision for a thriving, resilient, and functioning society.
