It’s not often we see a baseball move that is truly out of the ordinary, but the Marlins gave us one yesterday. While moving Dan Jennings from the GM role to that of manager is not without precedent, it is nonetheless quite unusual, and his lack of significant professional experience as a professional coach or player certainly sets it further apart.
We heard plenty of opinions on the subject yesterday, many of them focused on the jarring nature of the decision, others very nearly questioning the sanity and/or professionalism of owner Jeffrey Loria.
Needless to say, on balance, the reaction has been strongly negative. A variety of factors have been cited as setting Jennings up for failure, in spite of his good personal reputation around the game.
As I noted in the above-linked post, however, the hiring of Jennings is, if nothing else, rather interesting. The Marlins front office will, in a very real sense, be a part of the team (as distinguished from the organization) on a day-to-day basis, sharing in the ups and downs along with the players. Far from a suit in a private suite, the former GM (who’ll still have a heavy role in player personnel) will be in uniform, in the dugout, on the road, staring down the microphones of the press. Of course, he’ll also be a constant reminder that ballplayers — most of them, anyway — are constantly playing for their jobs.
Loria has struck gold with mid-season managerial changes before. For a team that hoped for much better than its 16-23 start to the season, might this be a worthwhile experiment? Let’s see what the MLBTR readers think:
As a fan of a different team in the NL East, I think the Marlins made a great move. Go Nats.
This is every bit as lucid as Jeff Loria’s thinking.
There’s a lot of underperforming players on that roster. If they as a group revert to the mean which is not out of the question, this will look like a genius move.
Seems to have “best baseball move since inventing dingers” missing.
A computer would be a better manager than a lot of current managers. It isn’t that hard to manage at the MLB level it is almost 100% predicated on your players.
You are right but the harder part of the job is keeping 25 guys with big egos happy enough to play at their expected level or better. Oh, and talking to the media
I wonder if having the option “destined to fail” at the bottom choice instead of the top choice would alter results. Besides, why is “who knows?” even an option. Nobody “knows”
The result order is randomly generated. As for “who knows?”, eh, just wanted to give an option for those who feel it is impossible to judge (count me among them).
Randomly generated! That is very good indeed. Also, there was no option for “good move” or something similar
Watched him in the dugout last night. The look on his face said it all, the game was going so fast he was amazed and always behind the play. The idea that a manager does just what we see on the screen is so shallow it doesn’t bear addressing.
Contrary to popular belief, baseball teams are groups and group dynamics do apply. The team requires knowledge of their immediate leadership just as employees in any business. Jennings may be a great leader but it’s unrealistic to expect him to actually manage field matters at a high level.
Loria is such a buffoon and were he not Bud’s buddy he would not have been allowed to destroy the Expos, hand it to MLB to fix and buy the fish in one motion. He’s a disgrace.
A big difference between decisions on the field and decisions off the field is time. You don’t generally have a day to “think it over,” (and often not even a minute to do so), in the dugout.
Already thought about ways to slow down the pace of play, the current play is to have fat guys run naked on to the field when DJ gives the signal for more time.
Working out if Vine or Instagram is going to be the official partner.
If those are home games, you’re gonna have to pump the attendance up to find enough fat guys to run out on the field! Wait… maybe a “Death To Disco” type promotion?!?!?
How do I tweet to the high school reporters so they can break the news the WazBazbo is the new Marlins President of Baseball Operations?
All my dreams have now been realized! Um… what’s the salary, by the way?
Funds are tight, we can offer the change Stanton leaves in the club house and free BudLight Lime a Ritas (Only while at the stadium).
Does the L in your username stand for Loria? You are Jeff Loria aren’t you.
Managers dont matter, its a good way to save money for miami.
I like your style! Ever thought about being a hitting coach? We want Dee to hit ’em out like Mike!
So you’re saying that I, with no professional experience as a manager or player, could have guided the Royals and the Giants to last year’s World Series just as well as their respective managers did?
It’s pretty widely agreed upon that Ned Yost is a terrible manager. Not really a good point you made there.
I still think it’s valid. At the least, he understands pacing of the game, etc. A difference of what, 2 or 3 wins turned into losses keeps the Royals out last year, I believe.
I’m sure that’s just something he will just have to get accustomed to like everyone else. But to your original point, yes, I actually do think you could probably go out and not be much worse than a lot of MLB managers, from a decision making standpoint. I seriously don’t think it’d be all that difficult if you know baseball pretty well.
Cool! Attention all MLB teams – feel free to hire me as your manager! I hereby publicly state that I’ll do the job for half of whatever your current man is earning!
me too, me too! I bid 45%
Right. If you are into advanced stats and win probability, you’d be an instant upgrade over most managers.
This has happened a lot in hockey so I’m not sure why it can’t work in baseball as well.
First poll in two years that I was with the majority.
and got an upvote to boot! Congratulations.
This experience will benefit Jennings far more than the Marlins this year. He will get an up-close look at the day-to-day dealings with players and their egos and will be in a much better position to let the manager handle the players when he is back as GM, here or elsewhere in the future.
For the Marlins, it has always been about money going through the turnstiles, and always will be with this owner, who is far more businessman than baseball man. As long as the revenue is coming in, he will spend $2 to bring in another $3, but never, never, never the other way around.
It tickles me that people pretend managing 25 guys wearing pajamas is so much different than managing hundreds of people as head of a multibillionaire dollar corporation.
History is full of guys who went from managing a farm to running an entire army with little to no training or experience in between, but going from a billion dollar baseball corporation to a baseball team? IMPOSSIBLE.
That is a ridiculously simple-minded view. And he has already lost a game BECAUSE of the fact he has no idea what he is doing. He left in the lefty Dunn to face Pollock, a righty, based on his “gut feeling”, and Pollock hit a 2-run homer to win the game for the DBacks.
You’re right, that’s literally never happened before in the history of baseball.
saying a guy is going to succeed because “anything is possible” is not a logical reason.
MLB manager is a public relations job. 99% of the baseball decisions are handled by pitching, bench, and defensive coaches, with the manager working as a tie breaker and maybe occasionally a veto. But that’s it. It is a public relations job. Making the players happy, making the media happy, that’s about it. This is a guy who has been an active manager for his entire adult life, there is no reason to believe he can’t manage people.