Braves manager Brian Snitker and Athletics skipper Bob Melvin were named Manager of the Year in their respective leagues, the Baseball Writers Association Of America announced Tuesday. As a reminder, votes were submitted prior to the beginning of postseason play.
Snitker received 17 first-place votes and edged out Milwaukee’s Craig Counsell 116 to 99 on the weighted ballot system. Colorado’s Bud Black, St. Louis’ Mike Shildt and Chicago’s Joe Maddon rounded out the NL ballot, in that order (full voting breakdown here). In the American League, Melvin topped Boston’s Alex Cora by a score of 121 to 79. Tampa’s Kevin Cash, Houston’s A.J. Hinch and New York’s Aaron Boone rounded out the ballot, in that order (full breakdown).
Snitker, 63, has spent more than two decades in the Braves organization, including three separate stints on the team’s big league coaching staff and 15 seasons as a skipper in the team’s minor league ranks. The Braves lifer was named interim manager upon the dismissal of Fredi Gonzalez in May 2016, and while that move wasn’t expected to become permanent at the time, Snitker has impressed a pair of different front office regimes while deftly managing an increasingly youthful roster that now looks poised for perennial contention in the National League East.
Much has been made of the Braves’ rebuild over the past several seasons, as Atlanta has dealt away stars like Craig Kimbrel, Andrelton Simmons and Justin Upton, among others, while stockpiling minor league talent with an eye towards a sustainable run of contending rosters. The front office no longer resembles the group that began the rebuild, following the stunning resignation of GM John Coppolella in the wake of infractions on the international free-agent market and the quieter departure of former president John Hart; the constant throughout that turmoil was that Snitker was the voice of leadership in the dugout.
Expectations for the Braves headed into the 2018 campaign weren’t exactly high, but the emergence of Ronald Acuna, a huge first half from Ozzie Albies, resurgent efforts from Nick Markakis and Anibal Sanchez, and the ultra-consistent Freddie Freeman — all under the tutelage of Snitker and a veteran coaching staff — helped to fuel a 90-72 club that surprisingly took home the NL East division crown.
As for Melvin, this is his third Manager of the Year Award, having previously taken home the honor with the 2012 A’s and the 2007 Diamondbacks. As was the case with the Braves, Oakland entered the season as a perceived long shot to make the postseason. Doubts about their ability to do so undoubtedly continued into the summer, as Oakland sat at 34-36 and faced an 11.5 game deficit in the American League West on June 15.
What followed was one of the most impressive streaks in recent history, as the A’s closed out the season with a ridiculous 63-29 pace, leaving the division-rival Mariners and Cash’s Rays in the dust as they marched to a 97-65 finish and an improbable American League Wild Card berth. That the Athletics were able to do so despite a catastrophic level of injury in the starting rotation made the feat all the more incredible. Through it all, Melvin kept his club in good spirits and managed a patchwork rotation comprised primarily of 2017-18 non-tenders and minor league signees. Melvin & Co. leaned on Trevor Cahill, Edwin Jackson, Brett Anderson and Mike Fiers in the rotation down the stretch, while emerging stars like Matt Chapman and Matt Olson anchored a lineup that became one of the league’s best.
Beyond Manager of the Year honors, Snitker and Melvin were each rewarded with new contracts following their strong seasons. Atlanta signed Snitker to a two-year extension with an option for the 2021 season, while Melvin’s contract is now guaranteed through 2021.
Wow. Win 108 games then a World Series and not the coach of the year.
People need to vote for what’s right not what they think is right. Shame on them.
Voting happens at end of regular season.
They had like a 300 million dollar payroll, I could have managed that team to the playoffs same with anyone else. He isn’t special.
Salty… Melvin deserves this 100/100 times over Cora, but your assessment of Cora is off.
Cora is everything we want(ed) Boone to be.
To the playoffs, maybe, but not to 108 wins!
Top of the 9th, game 4 of the World Series. One out and Cora pulls Leon for Devers. Never mind the fact that the game is tied and this means Swihart is now the catcher for a potentially long extra inning stretch. Also never mind the fact that you can take the far more logical gamble of keeping in Leon and pinching hitting for Kelly who’s next up. All I can remember thinking at the time is “I’ve seen Cora pull off crazy moves all season and they seem to work.”
You can dismiss this as a lucky move or whatever, but Cora made a ton of moves all season that did not seem to be the practical move and yet they constantly paid off.
Hey stripes. He is special to Chris who watched him in NESN.
What a joke, huh?
Disagree. You set a historic pace in your rookie season as a manager you should be MOTY. The AL West is awful and the AL East had 2 100 game and 1 90 game winners. It’s this bizarre concept/bias that writers employ that precludes big market managers from winning this award. Look at last years AL MOTY, he’s unemployed. Great job with that pick!! Clueless
well said
I said the same thing. It will look very silly in the record books when people look back if the A’s win 70 games next season and the Sox go on to win the division again.
In the end, the joke is on the voters. They are the ones who continue to look silly in HoF voting and award voting. If Melvin pulls it off again with a budget bunch as Joe Maddon did in Tampa all those years I’ll eat a slice of humble pie happily. But oddmakers in Vegas don’t believe it and neither do I. Sox are 13-2 to repeat and Oakland is 35-1 with the rest of the non playoff teams. Not to take away from Melvin’s 2018 but Vegas attributes a whole lot to luck.
it won’t look silly at all. what mighy happen next year has absolutely no affecyon what happened this year. Cora took a team expected to won, and win. Melvin took a team expected to lose, and damn near won 100 games. the award doesn’t go to the manager of the best team, it goes to who most positively defies expectations
That’s like saying that the manager of the year award is the underdog of the year award, which has not held true over the test of time. That’s just what’s happened over the last 10 years way too often. Joe Torre won it numerous times with a (inflation adjusted) much higher payroll relative to the average squad. Dave Roberts won it in 2016. Lou Pinella in 2008 had a big payroll. Zambrano, Ramirez, etc. Cora did what Dave Roberts did in 2016, but better.
Saying that a team that is a favorite to win can’t have the manager of the year is a tough thought process. As I’ve stated elsewhere should someone not be eligible for the MVP or Cy Young because of their impact on the payroll or their expectations (think Grienke with the Diamondbacks)? They can’t be the most valuable player because they are expected to perform and eat too much payroll? Its as silly as when people thought the MVP had to make the playoffs or the Cy Young winner needed to have x number of wins.
And next year absolutely has an impact on how the decision will looks years down the road. If Melvin is the next Joe Maddon to revolutionize the game, the A’s may not get 97 wins next season, but with a similarly talented squad, staying above the 82-85 mark isn’t a huge ask. If they drop down to 70 wins, it will look very silly. Because that shows it was more luck and players overperforming then the direct impact of the manager. Cora had a direct impact on the squad. Look at the difference in the clubhouse morale, David Price, etc. The Red Sox had fun this year for the first time in a long time. They showed it. That will certainly carry over into 2019. If all of a sudden the clubhouse is in disarray again, I’ll eat my words. But I doubt that’s going to happen.
This is all not to mention with no disrespect in the AL East and Boston vs. the AL West and Houston/Oakland/LA. The competition was a little tougher in the East this year.
and at the end of the regular season they had 108 wins
Then don’t win the World Series and only make it to the post season. Lol
huh?
I know you’re trolling or impaired in some way, but what you “think is right” is different than what others do. Your wonderful opinion was the minority in this case, so deal with it; they were all deserving candidates.
I always like to consider that if they switched places, would the A’s have performed worse under Cora or the Red Sox performed better with Melvin at the helm because one was voted “better” than the other? Doubtful, so in the big picture it doesn’t make much of a difference.
“I know you’re trolling or impaired” is the best insult I’ve read on here
Your actual point is fair as well. Different teams need different managers. There’s no saying that if they swapped places the A’s wouldn’t have been awful. But there’s also almost no chance the Sox win 108. That’s the point I think people are trying to make. You can’t really cross compare managers in that way because sometimes it’s just not the right guy for the job. Think why the Yanks let Girardi go. Why the Sox let Farrell go. Everyone is just missing the point that no one had bigger expectations to manage then Cora. Very few managers live up to those expectations whereas every year there’s a team that outperforms their abilities and makes the manager look good. It’s about what you value. An argument could be made for either. But I think it will look pretty bad if Melvin goes the way of Cash last season.
Vote is taken at the end of the regular season. And with all the talent on the Red Sox roster all Cora could really do was not screw things up.
I could have led that Sox team to 95 wins. Melvin took 5 guys from the stands for his starting staff and still won 97. I could not have done that. Well-deserved.
Kind of the opposite of what Dave Roberts did.
…like his predecessor screwed things up, right?
Next season Sox fans will have Cora’s head too!
Yanks let Girardi go for the same reason the Sox let Farrell go. He wasn’t the right manager for the job.
Sox fans won’t have Cora’s head just like we didn’t have Farrell’s after he won. Farrell was a player favorite when he signed. He looked like the stress of the job just had him not having much fun anymore. When he left, multiple players, some of whom advocated for him to come on as the manager, said that he wasn’t the right fit for the 2018 squad.
What I think is kind of cool about managers in general is that its not just about the best guy. Its about the right guy. There’s no saying if Joe Torre would have been one of the best in history if he had managed the Red Sox instead of the Yankees, for example. Maybe he would and maybe it would have been sooner that the Sox broke the curse? But likely not. People think oh, we got a great manager, this is awesome! But in reality, its about whether or not he can sell the players on his vision. Melvin and Cora both succeeded in getting their team to share their vision and buy into strategies that were not exactly traditional. Both in very different ways.
I could manage that Red Sox roster to 100 wins.
Why should coach of the year go to the team with the best record? They did vote for what’s right, how hard is that to see?
Cora isn’t even the 2nd best manager this year. Melvin and Cash were amazing with what they to work with…
Wait, they should vote for what is right, not what they think is right? Who should tell them that exactly? The award for Comment of the Year is certainly a lock in my mind.
Boston had the second highest payroll and also played the Orioles 19 times and won 16 of those games. Melvin and Snitker did more with less. Atlanta had the fourth smallest payroll and Oakland had the smallest payroll in baseball. Pretty impressive that they both made the playoffs.
Melvin did more with the roster that he had. Also consider that Melvin’s team was without an ace for the last part of the season.
Its about the team overachieving with what was expected,always has been and always will be,the Ring should be enough unless your a snob?
People did vote for whats right not what they think is right. You are the one doing the opposite
The thought process here is unfortunately much like the MVP. What’s the criteria?
Trout has won a lot on a losing team, so that criteria is out the window. That was the thought process for awhile was that you had to be on a playoff team. Then when Pedroia won the MVP (big Sox fan, but was a joke) it became about the most important player to the team. Finally it seems like we’ve universally begun to agree this should be the best player in baseball.
Similar problems happen with manager of the year. Melvin did a hell of a job. No discredit to him. But Cora had a very difficult season. Managing David Price alone showed what a night and day difference a guy can make. But also to his credit, he had no bullpen outside of closer, had huge expectations to manage given the J.D. Martinez signing. Had to get his team together a little late because of how late J.D. signed. These people thinking Cora had it easy just are out of tune with the Boston market and everything that has gone on since 2012 or so.
His relationship with at tough front office who fired a guy who won the division last year is also amazing. My Boston bias aside, what Cora did this season was nothing short of astounding and incredible. I’d have said the same thing if it had been Aaron Boone who I think also did a solid job, but you can see the difference between the quality of the two. Cora is just on another level. Just as most of the guys who played with him always said he would be.
A race with no wrong answers. Congrats to both men.
Well, the Chicago writer that voted Joe Maddon 1st place clearly had a wrong answer. Maddon is a fine manager, but in no way was he the top NL manager this season.
When you vote that poorly, you should lose your right to vote for future managers
If only this were true in all elections
This is the real truth right here. This has to be one of the best seasons in terms of managerial quality I can remember. So many new concepts going around with shifts, and bullpen games, and timing and pace of play rule changes and challenges and more and more advanced numbers to analyze. These guys aren’t just the eyeball managers of the past. These guys are like chess legends and the field is their board.
Any manager mentioned is very deserving.
Except Joe Maddon…he shouldn’t even have been on the ballot
I was a little surprised as well, but he pioneered being successful using so many strategies that are so widely used today. Its a respect thing. I watched Joe a lot first hand in Tampa and the guy is a genious and a magician. What happened to the Cubs this year deserves widespread blame. But I don’t think given his resume you can put it on Maddon, just like I don’t think the Indians early exit had anything to do with Francona.
“Oakland entered the season as a perceived long shot to make the postseason.”
In that the A’s were expected to *maybe* play .500 ball, “technically true”.
Cora is a great manager, but he was given a super-roster. Melvin’s A’s lineup, had a patchwork pitching staff, and poor beginning
It will be interesting to see if he and Billy can put together some tricks to bring Oakland back to the playoffs next season. The moneyball game definitely has its rewarding seasons when the product on the field matches the math on the table. But when it doesn’t it can be disastrous. 2013 Red Sox to 2014 Red Sox come to mind. There was a lot of heart in 2013 after they shed payroll, were supposed to come in dead last and defied all expectations. After they won, 2014 showed what was really on the roster and that some guys just had unsustainable years.
In my opinion the great managers like Joe Maddon when he was in Tampa for example, can bring that out of those guys year in and year out and find another guy when that one doesn’t work out. Given that he won manager of the year this year, I expect Melvin to put together some similar magic next year. If Oakland winds up back around 70-92 again, this one will look pretty bad in the record books.
Awful. Baseball writers clearly don’t know anything!
How is this awful? Did you know Boston had the ability to go where they went? Now how about Oakland, cause I know Oakland surprised me.
Anyone who is talking Cora as manager of the year can they truly say they would have picked the A’s to win more games than Red sox at the beginning of the season That is right nobody would not even 1 A’s fan would say that. Most A’s fan were just hoping to have a .500 record at the end of the season. If Melvin didn’t win Cash was the second best by taking a below .500 team to almost a playoff spot. Don’t feel sorry for Cora he got a trophy and ring which any manager would rather have than an award.
Nobody expected the Red Sox to win 108 games, either. The Red Sox outperformed their projections to a similar degree as the A’s did.
I expected the Red Sox to win 100-105 games. I expected the A’s to win 80-85 games. Red Sox outperformed that by 3-8 games while the A’s were 12-17 games over their projection. Plus As had 3 rotation starters have major surgery. This race wasn’t even close.
Are you saying if Cora lost Price, Sale, Porcello, and Eovaldi they would still have won 108 games? That is why Melvin won he lost his entire starting staff and still won 97 games.
Surprised Boone was even on the ballot
There is no “ballot”. The BBWAA panel just votes for who they think should’ve won, and the people who get votes ARE the “ballot”.
Ok and so when someone says I’m surprised he was on the ballot you can take that as I’m surprised he got a vote
let all the Snitker haters sound off! I think he deserved the award and is the right manager for this team at this time.
Very well-deserving. Also a great success story coming from a small town in central IL. Not exactly a goldmine for scouts to find talent but he was able to work his way to this point over a long career. Congrats to Snitker
But he did come from the baseball rendition of Hoosiers.
Yes he did. Just a much less-known story. Great book about that team that anyone from a small town would enjoy…”One Shot at Forever”
We were born in the same town of Decatur, IL.
He did an unbelievable job and deserved the award.
Strange..where ARE all the Snit haters? They’re usually Braves fans, ironically. But then, I imagine most fans turn on the manager of their team pretty quickly.
I’m not a hater of Snit. But I am impressed with his improvements over the last two years. Happy to see him get extended.
Im a braves fan and I love Snitker.I think the fairweather fans that hate our Managers and/or Gms are really just Falcons fans taking it out on our team. Snitker deserved it for sure.
He honestly shocked me as a manager. I’m from Ga and a Braves fan and he was a very questionable as a third base coach, but it only took me about 20 games for him to win me over. They clearly knew he brought a lot more to the team than an arm waving guys into outs at the plate haha.
Much deserved for Bob Melvin!
Anybody could have been competitive with the redsox roster. Not just anybody could have led the Athletics to a winning record, let alone 97 wins and a WC spot.
Eh, not so sure about that. For good measure, I can’t stand the Red Sox, but their bullpen was mostly terrible for much of the season (exception of Kimbrel) and their rotation seemed patchwork at times when Sale was on the DL. All in all, he really got the most out of his players and he got W’s more often than I thought he should frankly. I do believe that Cora alone added 10 wins to the team, which was the difference to pull the division down and inevitably to a WS win. Had they been behind the Yanks for the WC, all of this would be different.
Congrats to the winners. However, it’s abundantly clear that IBWAA needs hand over these votes to the fans. After botching the AL ROY award and now not even having Cora on the ballot (along with Boone) just epitomizes how we the fans view things so differently. I’m not even a Red Sox fan (I hate them), but Cora was absolutely top of the list in this case.
After reading Passan’s article in Yahoo today, packed full with contradictions, about his ROY vote (read it and it you don’t see what I’m referring too, I’ll come back and highlight about 2-3 statements) all of this illustrates baseball writers shouldn’t be the individuals making these determinations. The factors the fans use trough different optics seem more honest in comparison.
they are the bbwaa awards, so yeah, they kinda vote for em….
Hi! Yankee fan here who also hates the Red Sox, and think Andujar deserved to win AL ROY over Ohtani.
You could not be more wrong about Cora over Melvin
A’s used castoffs Brett Anderson, Edwin Jackson, and Trevor Cahill. 14 different starting pitchers were used, they had losing record out of gate. Frankly, it’s miracle, Melvin had them finish above .500, let alone won 97.
Red Sox had a team record highest payroll ever and…… One of two people could win MVP. Much better SP.
Only Cahill deserves to come back for next year.
You’re obviously in the minority. Nothing was screwed up or botched. Just because you don’t agree with something doesn’t mean there’s a problem. Maybe the problem is with the way you’re looking at it, not everybody else.
“it’s abundantly clear that IBWAA (actually it’s BBWAA) needs hand over these votes to the fans.” Have you seen all star voting? It’s a popularity contest and nothing more.
Have you ever read some of the yearly “fans vote for the HoF” articles? They are a joke.
Handing these votes over to the fans would be a terrible idea. You think they vote thoughtlessy?
The Red Sox were something like 10 wins above expectations. The A’s were at least 15.
Fans are the last people that should vote for this? My god that’d be horrible, ever look at the all-star voting?
You want fans to vote for these awards? The same fans who consistently vote players near the Mendoza line to the All-Star game every year?
Congrats to both. Both deserving. Was rooting for AC with Sox 15 game improvement over last year but can’t argue with the job Melvin did.
I can’t stand the A’s, but even I know Melvin was the most deserving in the AL. Glad to see they got it right.
For all you idiot Red Sox fans clamoring for Cora and whining about how he was hosed, remember that they boasted one of the highest payrolls and one of the deepest rosters in all of baseball. To they end, most professional managers could have led that team to at least 95 wins.
Not to mention about 10 guys on this site, just ask them
The red sox would have won 100 games without a manager.
“who wants to start today?”
“lets just ro sham bo for it”
As a Giants fan I watched Bud Black manage for years. Great manager. He’ll win the award some day I hope.
Melvin both deserved it, because it’s only about the regular season and he’s great for that, but also should be fired for being bad when it matters, like the postseason. Boone ran rings around him in the WC game.
I don’t think he should be fired but starting Hendricks in the WC game wasn’t the brightest of ideas. If he was going for a bullpen game, he should have just started it off with Trivino.
With the way teams are trending toward micro managing this award does not carry the weight nor should it of prior years where the manager asserted greater authority without the analytics crap from upper management.
The other side of that coin is that now managers have more decisions to make and with far more information to consider than before… In the past, you ran nine guys out and if they won, they won. Sometimes you put a pinch hitter in for your starter in the 7th. Now, every single at bat of the game is thought about and analyzed, sometimes to death. It’s NOT like a manager’s job got any easier.
Let your best players play.
That’s what they’re trying to do… play the best player for EVERY situation. There are precious few Trouts in the world who do most things well.
I think Andujar was deserving over Ohtani.
I think Ohtani winning has a LOT to do with MLB and it’s love affair with the Japanese baseball leagues. Not to take anything away from Ohtanis performance. It’s just good business for MLB. Same way it went for Ichiro.
You DO know this is a thread for MOY, right?
Do you remember 2001?? The only AL player anywhere near Ichiro was C.C. and his e.r.a. was over 4.30 when e.r.a. really mattered.
Mets, Yankees AND Red Sox?
C’mon man!
Yup ….
In order 1965, 1966, 1967.
Yes you can be a fan of many teams.
Different management situations require different skill sets. Would Melvin or Cash be able to deal with the Red Sox? Would Cora be able to deal with the “opener”? Who knows. All six of the nominations had a legitimate case. It was a test without a wrong answer.
But you have to be happy for Melvin; 3 different organizations, 3 different GMs, 3 MOY awards. That speaks pretty well for the guy. And for Snitker, who rode a lot of buses for a lot of years.
IF I had a vote, it would have been for Cash, if for no other reason the Rays played hard, even while their clubhouse looked like a turnstile, with all their comings and goings. And probably for Snit; nobody thought the Braves would be ready this year. Let’s not forget they not only won the NL East, they won it pretty handily.
I think what all the managers did was pretty amazing. But Melvin deserved that for sure.
Can’t help but think that CC would have walked away with the NL MOY had the vote happened after the postseason. Hell, the person (Chicago writer) that voted for Maddon should be fired by their boss as they obviously have no clue how to look at things from an honest perspective. Melvin is the hands down choice for the other.
The Red Sox just had the 9th winningest season in baseball history and they shut it down in the final week. It doesn’t matter what the payroll was a good portion of it went to Hanley Ramirez and Pablo Sandoval. This was basically the same team that John Farrrell fumbled with for years. The A’s had a nice second half. How can anyone but Cora be manager of the year. 9th best season in baseball history.
I’d say because while both managers exceeded expectations to some degree (NOBODY could have guessed the Sox win 108), the Sox were very much expected to be in the playoffs while the As weren’t expected by many to even be a .500 team this year. Factor in the insane amount of injuries they dealt with and 97 wins out of that roster in this season was a feat that deserved to be recognized. Melvin exceeded expectations by a GREAT deal more than did Cora.
P.S. – I’m a Red Sox fan.
Where did JD Martinez hit in Farrels lineup?
Did JDM add 15 wins all by himself?
LOL…With the team that the red sox had they could have won 100 games with my daughters hamster as the manager.
Congrats to both men, well deserved for both.
Laugh out loud. Red Sox had a great year but Cora wasn’t even top 5 manager in majors. Not hard to do well with highest payroll (ask Dave Roberts). Hate saying it, but only reason they won was because they faced Dave Roberts and the dodgers lol. Not to mention, the most all stars on one team in the MLB.
People always forget too, but Red Sox had the easiest schedule in all of baseball. Especially first half of season.
Being a Yankees fan, I’m not taking anything away from the season you guys had, but restating like others did. No way Alex Cora should have won award.
Idk about easiest schedule,
Any team in the AL central could say they had the easiest, or the NL east.
Red sox had to face Yankees and rays quite a bit. Even if the Orioles and blue jays offset that. Oh well
You realize the Yankees had the exact same schedule, basically, as the Red Sox, right?
Playing Baltimore 15 times in April and May would get anyone out to a rediculous record. Road trips? West coast trips? Yea they play all the same teams but when and where is important as well. But what do I know? This SOS (strength of schedule) that’s always figured out and posted is useless.
But for you to tell me they have the same schedule is absurd and ignorant. Obviously you don’t have much knowledge on professional baseball or any analytical stats.
Per ESPN:
Boston Strength of Schedule: .498 (22nd)
New York: .496 (24th)
Per Baseball-Reference:
Boston- 24th
New York- 25th
It’s almost unanimous: Boston and New York have an almost identical strength of schedule. And it’s almost unanimous that Boston is actually AHEAD of New York in that department.
This lovely chart from Fangraphs actually has Boston 6th, New York 25th. (fangraphs.com/blogs/strength-of-schedule-and-the-p…)
I’m not sure why you felt the need to go low, especially when the very “stats” you claim I don’t know clearly don’t support your premise.
Anyone who spells”ridiculous” with an “ E” shouldn’t be calling anyone else ignorant.
Even for this site, that’s one of the most backhand compliments towards any team I’ve seen.
Cora got a World Series ring. I doubt he’s losing any sleep over this. neither should Red Sox fans. shut up already!
yeah as a giants fan, that is what i said each of the 3 times that bochy got a ring but somehow didn’t get a MOY, but it was still a head scratcher sometimes.
If you want to be a multiple-time MOY, you should never have your first job be with a strong, high-payroll team. Melvin is a very good manager but he also did it right: Take over a low-payroll team, improve it, get MOY, get fired when weak team falls apart, take over second low-payroll team that had a bad manager, improve it, get MOY a second time, watch team fall apart, wait for better players to come up, win MOY a third time.
On the other hand, I think Cora is pretty happy just managing the world champions.
Snitker is deserving but my vote (if I had one) would have gone to CC, he did a lot with much less. Admittedly some of it is because I liked him as a player.
Melvin is certainly deserving. BoSox fans can take some solace in the fact that both NY writers voted Cora.
As a Sox fan it would have been great to see Cora win but also think this is well justified. MLB needs to do something to close the gap between major and minor markets
I really hate how this award generally only goes to managers of teams that were surprise contenders after being projected to be mediocre at best. Managers who lead their teams to truly dominating seasons *cough* Cora *cough* really deserve better consideration even if they were expected to contend anyway. Not just any manager can lead a team to 108 wins!
Cora didnt win because a toddler could have lead the team to 100 wins. The red sox did dominate the playoffs. But if anyone on the red sox should win MOY it should be Dave Roberts. Dude is really good at helping
At the beginning of the season any non-Red Sox fan would call any Red Sox fan who suggested that was a 100-win team delusional. Now a toddler could have done it…
I don’t know how anyone on Earth thought this Sox team wasn’t damn close to a 100 game winner. They won what 93 in 2017 and they added JDM to replace Hanley Ramirez. E-rod was another year older and Price had given them very little the season before. It’s pretty clear that they were going to be a 95 win team at their floor assuming good health for everyone.
Bruce Levine voting Maddon doesn’t even surprise me. The cheese fell off that dude’s cracker many, many years ago.
Easy formula – take whatever small-mid market team that was projected to finish .500, then performs above that, and there’s your MOTY.
There has to be the illusion of a Manager contributing enough to be that difference maker, regardless of whether they actually were or not.
Hahhahahaha
If they had a “choke MOY award” your boy Roberts would won back-to-back. Easy formula…
I’m pretty sure the planet will survive without these mind numbing, glad handing, and back slapping award shows for athletes, actors, reporters, beauty pageant strollers,,etc, etc, etc..
Especially the ones espousing sophomoric political and societal views. Who cares which x number of some bodies prefer A over B? I assume I answered my own query: Too many humans still actually care. for the elitist over the unwashed worker. Party on…
Who invited Alex Jones?
Mrs. Sacamano?
Ok, I’m just going to ask this: What would Cora have had to do to win Manager of the year.
Ok then I’m just going to say it:
Not have a billion dollar payroll (hyperbole) and not have, arguably, the greatest Red Sox team of all time.
Then why bother making him a candidate. If he had won 110 games would it change anything? 120? 125?
If we’re going to talk about money then by the same logic should player on a $200M team be graded the same way a player on a $60M team should when determining MVP? How about ROY?
At what point is a team well built versus well managed? Replace Melvin and Cora, does either team do the same?
I’m looking at all the comments about how anyone could have managed the Red Sox to 108 wins. Can you honestly say you wouldn’t have thought me delusional if I told you at the beginning of the year that the 2018 Red Sox would easily beat 100 wins and coast into the playoffs? How about at the beginning of the season which would you have thought more likely, Oakland wining 97 or the Red Sox winning 108.
Every manager in the league is a “candidate”.
I don’t think some of you understanding how the voting works. The panel isn’t just given a sheet of paper with a list of players they can vote for. There is no “ballot”.
The BBWAA panel can vote for ANYONE they want They just write down who they think should’ve come in first, second, etc.. Heck, they could’ve voted for Bryan Price if they wanted.
A guy like Cora won’t win MOY but he’ll take home his WS ring. I agree he should’ve been given a little more consideration but it’s pretty clear cash and Melvin did more with less. If you manage a 250MM roster you just have to accept the fact that the award isn’t coming your way. Particularly when you have two guys with payrolls that are almost a quarter of that having their team perform at that level. I Don’t feel too bad for Cora here.
I know how the voting works, let me rephrase. If there’s such a strong feeling within the 30 BBWAA members who voted that a manager of an expensive team shouldn’t win manager of the year then why call it manager of the year? Might as well call it the underdog award.
I don’t feel bad for him either and I’m willing to bet that Cora didn’t sit by the phone last night wondering when he was going to get a call with more kudos.
Frankly, I just want everyone who’s saying Cora shouldn’t have won come up with a better answer than “he had an expensive team.” Because the other side of that argument is there’s been plenty of managers with expensive teams that couldn’t deal with the diva mentalities of the players.
If we are talking about money making it easy the Dodgers and Dave Roberts would have a ton of rings right now. With the same mentality in mind, a guy with too high a salary shouldn’t be eligible for the MVP because he’s hurting his team taking up too much of his team’s payroll. Its a ridiculous reason and excuse to attribute it to payroll. If Melvin won because he did more with less, that’s cool. He won 97 games with definitely a less talented roster.
Annnndddd this is where it gets fun because this is where you have to start talking about manager WAR. You have theories that a manager could never be worth more than 1-2 WAR, even the best. I think that’s a huge crock of you know what. I’d argue Melvin was probably worth significantly more given that if any wrong strings were pulled they’d have lost numerous games. We know the Red Sox bullpen. We know Cora saved our butts more times then we could count with the lack of consistency in that disastrous pen. The Sox won 108 games and people thought they might lose in the playoffs over it. The difference between him and an average manager is the difference between a 98 win season and a wild card race and a 108 win season and a dominant post-season performance. Anyone who undersells Cora just didn’t watch the playoffs.
*** not an argument Cora should have won, but a request to stop selling him short. I think all of the managers had an argument to win and did a fantastic job.
I think people understand how it works but in the article it clearly stats
“Snitker received 17 first-place votes and edged out Milwaukee’s Craig Counsell 116 to 99 on the weighted ballot system. Colorado’s Bud Black, St. Louis’ Mike Shildt and Chicago’s Joe Maddon rounded out the NL ballot, in that order”
so that might be the confusion
anyone but bobby valentine.
Cora would have to have taken team like the A’s and with that low Budget to 97 wins
Melvin just exceeded any expectations. The future is bright for the young A’s.
I’m just glad Counsell didn’t win, I hated him even when he played, what a little rat.
He’ll be devastated to hear that.
Nice comment. Did you grow up under power lines?
The highest paid roster on opening day was the Giants, the Red Sox were next. The Nationals and the Mets were also in the top 5. So a high payroll is no guarantee of success. The A’s by the way were the lowest paid. Bob Melvin did a great job with what he had. No doubt. But Cora managed a team which had expectations of maybe winning 90 to 95 games and led them to the 9th most wins in the history of the game. The Sox did not have Murderer’s Row. They had a core of home grown players with a dh that no one else wanted to pay, one high paid free agent pitcher and several others they traded for. $40 million of the $200 million payroll was wasted on Sandoval and Ramirez. Cora did a masterful job with good talent. Not 9th best in the history of baseball talent.
The guy who scheduled 19 games against the Orioles should be a candidate for MoY.
Easy decision for the NL. Shouldn’t have been near as close
Joe Maddon lol lol lol lmfao
Seems to be one or two voters every year/category that do that.
ROY was similar: Someone didn’t have Ohtani on their ballot (the same person …or someone making a not-a-rookie statement?) and both Anduhar and Soto were only named on 29/30 ballots.
I understand, but don’t agree with, the Ohtani “miss”, but how are the other two NOT in everyone’s Top 3?
What you just said triggers me so hard because you are right. I am so sick and tired of the BBWA using awards and Hall of Fame voting as a platform to make a statement. I don’t think they think about the big picture that it makes them come across as incompetent. There’s no such thing as a wrong opinion in an award lacking conditions and criteria, and I get that argument but there’s a point to which they have a duty and a responsibility to the game of baseball to make the best decision they can and even a lot of the voters feel that not everyone uses that platform correctly or takes that responsibility seriously and instead furthers their own objectives. This isn’t politics and wasn’t meant to be. It’s baseball.
Not too much surprise here.
close with counsel and snitker. The mlb writers generally give the award to a team not quite expected to make the post season, ala oakland. If the writers gave it to cash, it would have been reaffirming the one inning starter. Hard to say how well that works in the long run in terms of injuries or lowered contracts, since teams can get relievers cheaper than staters.
Boston, chicago and new york did well last year, so they figured that would carry over anyway.
He’s spent over FOUR DECADES in the organization!
The Writers do a terrible job voting. Brewers were good last year and got even better this year while Atlanta sucked and the got 90 wins. I get it but counsell did better and deserves it
Cora was brilliant. Did anyone see how he carefully he prepped every player to be ready for finals in the last 10 games of the season? He took risks on players performing by sheer instincts and would roll through pitchers until he saw one that could get the batter out … that takes courage and willpower to do that