He was fiery. He was passionate. He was, in every sense of the phrase, a baseball lifer. And through more than 50 years in the professional game—through ten different organizations and a resume that spanned nearly every job title imaginable—Lee Elia always carried one unshakable truth: he was a Phillie at heart.
Elia, who managed both the Chicago Cubs and the Philadelphia Phillies in a decades-long career as a player, coach, instructor, scout, and mentor, passed away Wednesday at age 87, the Phillies announced Thursday.
“Lee Elia was a valued contributor to the Phillies for much of his half century in professional baseball,” the club said in a statement. “The third base coach for the 1980 World Series championship team, he also spent time in the organization as a minor league player, manager, scout and director of instruction.”
That 1980 championship team had Elia in the third base coaching box—sending runners, moving pieces, helping manager Dallas Green guide a club filled with names like Schmidt, Rose, Bowa, and Carlton to the game’s highest peak.
Born July 16, 1937, Elia was a Philadelphia native through and through—a graduate of Olney High School who signed with the Phillies in September 1958 after attending the University of Delaware. Though he never made it to the majors in a Phillies uniform, the franchise became the connective tissue of his career.
As a player, Elia spent two seasons in the majors—80 games with the Chicago White Sox in 1966, and 15 more with the Cubs in 1968 after they purchased his contract. In 95 total games, he hit .203 with three homers and 25 RBIs. His playing MLB career was brief, but his coaching career was anything but.
Elia managed the Cubs from 1982–83, then returned to Philadelphia in 1985 as a bench coach. He served under John Felske before eventually replacing him midway through the 1987 season. He managed the Phillies through 1988, posting a 111–142–1 mark in parts of two seasons.
He remained a staple in the organization well into the 1990s, managing the Clearwater Phillies in 1990 and 1991. In his first year, the team stumbled to a 50–87 mark. A year later, he engineered a stunning turnaround—the club surged to an 81–49 record. By 1992, he was at the helm of the Phillies’ Triple-A affiliate in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, guiding them to an 84–58 season before retiring from managing.
Over the years, Elia wore many hats—not just with the Phillies, but with the Yankees, Mariners, Blue Jays, Rays, and Orioles. Between 1980 and 2008, if there was a role in professional baseball, Elia likely filled it: bench coach, instructor, director, evaluator. He remained a trusted figure in front offices and dugouts across the game.
But even with ten organizational affiliations to his name, Elia never lost sight of where it started. He never stopped being a Phillie.
In 2000, he was inducted into the Pennsylvania Sports Hall of Fame—an honor befitting a man whose roots and legacy remain deeply embedded in the Philadelphia baseball community.
Lee Elia’s final managerial record in the majors: 238–300–1. His impact? Impossible to quantify by numbers alone.
