Oh my god. That is classic!
The impact of managers is way overrated. Baseball has tons of situational plays. Anyone can call them. Arguing calls in just TV time. Setting up a lineup is just plugging names into traditional spots. It does not require great knowledge. Every little league manager uses the same system.
Guillen may get the Lifetime Achievement Award for Creative Profanity, but the Cubs’ Lee Elia still had the greatest single public performance in recent history.
I don’t even watch baseball, but I like Tony LaRussa. He founded the no-kill shelter where we got the Neville kitties. They rescue animals that are on their last day at kill shelters around California. We have two wonderful cats, thanks to Tony LaRussa.
Favorite as in “want coaching my team,” not “would like personally.”
All-time (in my life): Earl Weaver
#2 Davey Johnson
Current: Jim Leyland
#2 Terry Francona
Lou Pinella is near the bottom of the list.
Yes, and the impact of theater directors is way overrated. Why, I went to a play the other night, and the director didn’t do a thing during the whole performance!
Bill James says if you put in a totally absurd lineup according to baseball lore, the difference would be about 5 percent. That would require trying to screw it up.
A theater director could be better compared to a general manager. When you go to a ball game do you notice him?
The actions of a theater director before a play is not at all comparable to what a baseball manager does.
Casey Stengel used to say the whole key to managing was keeping the 5 guys on the team who were indifferent to you away from the 5 guys who hated your guts.
His system worked great when he had Mantle, Berra and Whitey Ford on the team, not so well when he had Marvelous Marv Throneberry.
Probably not, but my point was that I don’t think it’s fair to judge a manager only by the decisions he makes during a game itself.
All Time: Billy Martin - He was the manager when I first learned baseball and became a Yankee fan.
Others I’ve liked: Tommy Lasorda, Buck Showalter, Jim Leyland, Earl Weaver, Lou Piniella
Billy could not manage himself. He seemed to win but wore out his welcome quickly. I hated the disrespect he showed umps.
I’ve watched closely the efforts of Jim Frey, Don Zimmer, Jim Lefebvre, Jim Riggleman, Don Baylor and Dusty Baker and I say with absolutely confidence that Lou Pinella is at the top of the list. I generally am of the opinion that Managers do very little to help the team win, but I’ve personally witnessed Managers doing a lot to help them lose. In that vein, Pinella might be flawed but he, more than any other manager I’ve watched closely on the north or south sides, does the best job of staying out of the teams way. It’s a quality that Francona, Torre and Leyland share.
Earl.
http://www.casttv.com/video/k93kn1/baseball-oriole-earl-weaver-blooper-giving-it-to-the-umpire-video
I never thought managers acting like idiots ,is baseball showing its best. They are embarrassments .
Jack McKeon.
Having met Tommy in the offseason when he had the chance to be difficult to those “beneath” him, this illustrates the difference between “good person” and “other abilities”.
The folks at Baseball Prospectus would probably argue that it’s even less than that. In their article on managerial decisions and batting order, they conclude that:
The same article also argues that the theory of protection is overrated, and says that the most biggest problem with conventional batting lineups is that, by hitting the best players (folks like Bonds, Pujols, etc.) third or fourth, they deprive these awesome hitters of 36-54 plate appearances per year, and thus deprive their teams of runs. And even then, the difference wouldn’t be that great. They estimate that, by hitting Bonds leadoff instead of third during his peak seasons, the Giants would have added about 10 runs to their season total, the equivalent of about 1 win.
And on the general topic, i really don’t like or dislike managers very much, for the most part, although i do have a couple of exceptions. A have a soft spot for Tony LaRussa, simply because one of the first baseball books i read after coming to the US was George Will’s Men at Work, and i sort of felt like i got to know the main characters in that book. That’s probably more a reflection of Will’s excellent writing than anything else. And Ozzie Guillen is a complete fucking asshole; he, Hawk Harrelson, and A.J. Pierzynski are the unholy triumvirate that fill me with loathing for the White Sox.
As someone who came to America from a sports culture where team managers/coaches play a rather different role than those in baseball, some of my attitude to baseball managers is rooted in particlalr ideas about what people in such positions should and should not do.
For example, if i ran baseball, i would forbid managers from arguing with umpires. Period. None of this fucking childish yelling and screaming, no arguing calls, nothing. Sit in the fucking dugout and shut our mouth. All the crap about how good managers will stick up for their players with the umps? Fuck that shit. If they want to have some sort of appeal or challenge system, a la football’s red challenge flag, then by all means do it. But any yelling or getting in the umpire’s face or kicking dirt or whatever should be punished with a large fine and a multiple game suspension. Make some of these assholes sit on the sideline for a few games, and then we’ll see how useful they really are.
I don’t understand this sentence. What is “this”?