A former major league baseball player and longtime Mets manager is taking a swing at running for mayor of Stamford. Bobby Valentine announced he will challenge incumbent Democratic Mayor David Martin and Democratic state Rep. Caroline Simmons as an independent.
The Stamford native said he has seen what challenges the city faces in the wake of the pandemic.
“By November, everyone will still be in the process of getting back on their feet, and I want to be the guy that leads it back to normalcy,” said Valentine.
Valentine was a standout on the Rippowam High School baseball field in the 1960s before taking his talents to the major leagues as a player. From 1996 to 2002 he managed the Mets. In 2011, he spent 11 months in Government Center as Stamford’s emergency management director. He left that position to become manager of the Boston Red Sox for a season.
“Fast-forward 10 years from that experience, I am now at a point in my life where I can give my experience, my time, my wherewithal to the city that’s been so good to me,” said Valentine, who owns a downtown sports bar and a baseball academy in the city’s Springdale area.
Most recently, Valentine worked as Sacred Heart University’s athletic director. He said it’s time to step away from that role to help highlight his hometown’s diversity. He believes that will help its economy recover from the past year.
“I don’t think our city has done a good enough job [at] making it part of our special identity, and that will attract the businesses that need to come to replace the ones that left during the pandemic and before,” said Valentine.
