Why Do Some Want to Fire Melvin?

[RightFieldCoder]

Right now Cam is 5th in MLB CF in OPS, only .001 behind Victorino for 4th. And he plays plus defense. We had nobody to man CF in our system ready for the majors. I think that's a great signing by DM.

[bklynbrewcrew]

I havent read the entire thread but I will comment on Melvin anyway. I have been critical of Doug plenty of times over the last few years but I still think he is an excellent GM and I dont want him fired.

 

My criticisms of him are his stubbornness in regards to Yost (he should have been fired a long time before he was) and his pitching staffs. Melvin has never put together a real good staff. From his times in Texas when John Burkett was his number one starter to his time in Milwaukee where Gallardo is the only stud starter he has developed. Melvin has always had great offenses and he is great in picking up undervalued guys like McGehee and Podsednik off the scrap heap but he has yet to show that he can put together a top flight pitching staff. Still he has helped us go from laughingstock to contender and I just think the odds of us getting someone better are not good. If we were gonna let him go we had our guy in Jack Z. Now I dont see any better candidates and Doug is definitely well above average so we need to keep him.

[Invader3K]

Well said bklyn, I agree.

 

Also, for those saying Macha has been a bad hire...he's basically been managing the Brewers for three and a half months of regular season baseball. I think it's a little premature to be calling for him to be replaced as of yet. So far I actually like most of his in game moves...sure there are things that can be criticized, but I think you can nit pick any skipper game to game. I think he's definitely been an upgrade from Ned in terms of how he handles the bullpen, the fact he usually shows a quicker hook with starting pitchers who struggle, and the fact he hasn't stuck with the same struggling guys like Ned would have.

[JJHardy7]

The fact that you say Melvin didn't bring in any prospects doesn't make it true. He did. He got Jorge De La Rosa, Zach Jackson, Jose Capellan, and Carlos Villaneuva. Capuano had all of 33 innings in Arizona before becoming a Brewers.

Has it really been a few years since he's traded for a prospect? I'm asking the question because I don't recall one in the recent years, but obviously could be wrong. I guess maybe that's a change in philosophy?

You're correct that it was not on the level of CC. But that team's major weakness was a catastrophic bullpen, and Melvin went out and got the best RP on the market that July to try and address the issue. That's basically my point- the last two seasons the team has performed poorly in the 2nd half, but in each season Melvin made acquisitions to help the team. If they slump after the deadline, it's not because he sat there twiddling his thumbs in July.

I guess I just don't see it as a major trade either way. He didn't sit on his hands and you're right he's usually not going to do that. I do think we maybe gave up too much in the deal (again, that's if the prospects we gave up were ranked correctly in our system). Inman is still real young, but obviously he's struggled in AAA so it may end up being more or less a wash. I think some of the 'slumps' the Brewers have could be blamed on the team put together by Melvin. It seems that they 'slump' as bad as any other team, but that's just an opinion and maybe not true. I know a lot is made here about how strikeouts aren't a huge deal and not to get into that, but that's not an opinion I can really support when this teams seems to be over matched at times. A guy like Lopez (not discussing the trade) puts the ball in play as well as anyone on this team...and I personally do value that.

[joepepsi]

Melvin has never put together a real good staff.

Last year's staff had the 3rd lowest ERA in the league. The 2005 team had the 5th lowest. Until Bush took one off the elbow and Parra imploded this year's staff led the majors in % of quality starts and was top 5 in lowest ERA, iirc.

 

Melvin has brought in several highly touted young pitchers-De la Rosa, Capellan, ZachJack(a 1st rounder), Capuano, Bush ( 2nd rounder). Even took a flyer on former high pick Matt Ford.

 

It seems those who would fire Doug enjoy the simplicity of hindsight through anecdotes of failure, while dismissing organizational success as the product of others' labors.

[DonMoney4Mgr]

TheCrew07[/b]]I hope this makes sense, most of the time I know exactly what I'm trying to say, but then when you all read what I wrote my posts tend to get taken a different direction than I intended because I don't express myself very well.

Both posts I read in this thread make a ton of sense. They articulated quite accurately the way I view Melvin, just explained better than I could explain it. Maybe DM will read it and do a Tom Coughlin and change philosophies after doing something the same way for years and have it pay huge dividends. But I doubt it.

[MJLiverock]

Melvin has never put together a real good staff.

Last year's staff had the 3rd lowest ERA in the league. The 2005 team had the 5th lowest. Until Bush took one off the elbow and Parra imploded this year's staff led the majors in % of quality starts and was top 5 in lowest ERA, iirc.

 

Melvin has brought in several highly touted young pitchers-De la Rosa, Capellan, ZachJack(a 1st rounder), Capuano, Bush ( 2nd rounder). Even took a flyer on former high pick Matt Ford.

 

It seems those who would fire Doug enjoy the simplicity of hindsight through anecdotes of failure, while dismissing organizational success as the product of others' labors.

Last year took an incredible run in the second half by CC and a great 1st half by Sheets.

 

De La Rosa was one piece in a big trade and had been traded for the second time in a short period, Cappellan was had for a retread reliever so I am not sure how highly touted these guys were anymore and frankly none were very good as a Brewer so I can't give credit for acquiring bad players no matter what the GM thought of them.

 

It sort of like when people say Ted Thompson drafted X number of future starters so he must be good at the draft, if that measuring stick were meaningful then Matt Millen was a good GM because he drafted a lot of starters too, they just happened to go 0-16.

 

The Overbay for Gross/Bush/ZJack worked fairly well. Bush is a decent 3/4 ML pitcher, ZJack is another prospect who was sinking in his former organization and was expendable by the Blue Jays and not surprisingly didn't pan out.

 

Capuano was coming off TJ surgery and had lost some shine and turned out to be a pretty decent pitcher for a couple years until TJ hit again.

 

I still wouldn't call getting any of these guys as getting a potential future ace and I doubt anyone thought of them that way at the time either.

 

Melvin likes to pick around scrap heaps and get value by grabbing guys cheap who have upside but usually very limited upside that is how a pitching staff of 4/5 type talent is built and what the team has including the bullpen. That is also why they are among the worst in the league and many thought that is where they would end up despite a decent start to the season which many thought unsustainable.

 

The results from this staff really aren't surprising, the number one knock on the Brewers in the preseason was the pitching staff.

 

The organizational success is basically turning a terrible franchise into a .500 type ball club who was able to back into the playoffs last year by riding 325 innings of elite pitching from Sheets and Sabathia to take advantage of a total collapse by the Mets. I am glad they made the Sabathia trade, the playoffs were great but I dont' want to wait another 26 years even if the team is always on the cusp but just outside.

 

The Brewers are probably a .500 club still who may finish in the 2-4 in a division race for the next couple years and not be horrible but to take it to the level of competing for championships they have to impove the pitchinig situation.

[Fatter than Joey]

It seems those who would fire Doug enjoy the simplicity of hindsight through anecdotes of failure, while dismissing organizational success as the product of others' labors.

 

This is both inaccurate and unnecessary.

[TooLiveBrew]

I don't agree at all FtJ... I, too, get that impression from many posts in this thread.

[Fatter than Joey]

I don't agree at all FtJ... I, too, get that impression from many posts in this thread.

 

Fair enough then, part of hindsight is history -- and I don't expect DM will change being what he is.

[Thurston Fluff]

Last year took an incredible run in the second half by CC and a great 1st half by Sheets.

 

If Melvin got those types of players I don't see why it shouldn't count simply because they had good years. It wasn't like Suppan was came out of nowhere and put up Cy Young type numbers. It was two of the top pitchers in the league doing what top pitchers in the league do.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

It's pretty hard to fire a GM that took us from a 56 win team in 2002 to a 90 win team in 2008. Sure, all of his moves haven't worked out, but a most of them have and he's got the 2009 team in contention once again for the NL Central division. What more can we ask from a small market GM? Should we replace him with Jim Bowden? Doug Melvin can be our GM until the end of time (if he could live that long) if it were up to me.

[bklynbrewcrew]

It's pretty hard to fire a GM that took us from a 56 win team in 2002 to a 90 win team in 2008. Sure, all of his moves haven't worked out, but a most of them have and he's got the 2009 team in contention once again for the NL Central division. What more can we ask from a small market GM? Should we replace him with Jim Bowden? Doug Melvin can be our GM until the end of time (if he could live that long) if it were up to me.

This is exactly how I feel. After Sal Bando and Dean Taylor I cant say anything too bad about Doug Melvin. He clearly has his faults like all GMs but there really arent too many better.

[TooLiveBrew]

Totally agreed. Once you start really attempting to follow GMs' moves (as I've tried over recent seasons), you see that not only is Melvin clearly in the upper half of GMs in the league, but as far as small-market GMs go, he's about the cream of the crop.

 

I should clarify by 'small market GMs' I not only mean GMs of smaller-market teams, but ones adept at the types of moves conducive to smaller-market success (the claim of McGehee last Sept. is a perfect example).

[gobrew23]

100% agree with the last three posts. I would be very upset if Melvin was fired.

[MJLiverock]

As I said earlier, I am not for firing him yet, he has helped turn a franchise that was horrible into a respectable, .500 type team. I want to see the franchise taken higher and picking thru the detritus of other team's scaps is not what will take it there. I don't want to get caught just hanging around .500 and being satisfied with that.

 

Melvin's M.O. is always about value and I get the impression sometimes from posts here that people think there is some sort of satisfaction in wins/$ spent vs. just wins. Sure grabbing a guy from the scrap heap, turning him into a 4th starter is great "value" the problem is that only helps if it is filling in the final pieces of a well rounded team, or when you are building a team that was awful and just trying to make them competitive. Grabbing guys from scrap heaps and trying to make them your #2 or important everyday hitters just leads to mediocrity. Its the old if you're not getting better, you are getting worse. Doug built the team from the depths but is the right guy to take it to the top vs. getting it to a .500 type team.

 

As backupcatcher pointed out in my own earlier post, the Brewer rode aces to the playoffs because that is what aces do for teams. The Brewers went into this year without that luxury so anything more than a game or two above .500 in my eyes was too optimistic. Next year they are likely in the same boat, Gallardo will have a full year under his belt and can maybe one of those guys, but the staff will still be full of questions after that top spot in the rotation all the way to the back of the pen.

[TooLiveBrew]

And fortunately, once again Melvin will have a lot of ammo at his disposal with which to acquire pitching -- Hardy, Hart, Salome, Escobar, Lawrie (to just name some of the bigger names). I have full faith that Melvin is aware the SPing needs to be addressed. I really think we will see an acquisition this season still.

[joepepsi]

It's pretty hard to fire a GM that took us from a 56 win team in 2002 to a 90 win team in 2008. Sure, all of his moves haven't worked out, but a most of them have and he's got the 2009 team in contention once again for the NL Central division. What more can we ask from a small market GM? Should we replace him with Jim Bowden? Doug Melvin can be our GM until the end of time (if he could live that long) if it were up to me.

I completely agree. Every GM makes moves that don't work out. You have to judge the GM on whether the decision was valid at the time, not just on whether it worked out OK. As a lifelong Oriole fan, I've had the misfortune of suffering through many boneheaded moves in the last decade. Trading John Maine for Kris Benson was stupid from the outset and doomed to fail. Trading for Sammy Sosa was dumb. Thinking Corey Patterson would suddenly develop plate discipline was indicative of a GM who simply didn't know how to evaluate talent or its potential.

 

Signing an arbitration eligible ss, coming off 3 straight years of marked improvement, to a 4 year/$24 million contract at age 26, was a reasonable decision at the time. Signing a veteran pitcher who had started 32+ games every year for the previous 8 seasons while delivering league average ERA was a reasonable move, given the team was desperately short of starting pitching. Signing a young Ben Sheets after his amazing 2004 season to a 4 year deal was a smart move. Acquiring CC for three minor league players was a smart move. Signing Cameron and Hoffman were smart moves. Picking up Carlos Lee for Scott freaking Podsednik was brilliant. Flipping Lee for Cordero was a good move, even if Cordero left 1-1/2 years later.

 

Some of these moves didn't work out as planned. But I think it's hard to argue they were doomed to fail at the time each decision was made. Melvin has made reasonable, often excellent baseball decisions, given the circumstances at the time.

 

A GM's job is to build a long term winning organization, juggling the needs of winning now with the needs to maintain quality long term, while working within the limits of the organization. Melvin has done this job well. Is there someone out there who could have done it better? Maybe, but who that person would be ain't nothing but speculation.

[Fatter than Joey]

It's pretty hard to fire a GM that took us from a 56 win team in 2002 to a 90 win team in 2008.

 

I'd agree if that GM was able to sustain that 90 win mark -- or get reasonably close to it. Six years is a pretty long time to reach the 90 win mark, if you can sustain it for a few seasons, that is awesome, if you hit it once, and then end up with < 80 wins the following season, it really is nothing special.

 

he's got the 2009 team in contention once again for the NL Central division.

 

"contention" is a really loaded word -- There are 9 teams better than us right now in the NL, 6 worse -- we would be 10+ games behind, in the West or East -- I certainly understand there are a lot more games to be played, and we could end up winning the Central -- and if that happened I'd certainly rethink my position, however the reality remains, that the majority of NL teams are having a better season than we are right now.

 

What more can we ask from a small market GM?

 

Sustained success.

 

Furthermore, DM has enjoyed a new stadium, and new ownership, which has changed the Brewers standing in the "small market" arena -- If the Seligs were still running the show in County Stadium, I'd be a lot more patient with DM.

[brewblue1]

FtJ,

 

thank you for so eloquently stating (much more so than I) the exact reasons why I'm not convinced that DM is the right man for the job anymore.

 

Meanwhile, as we argue about this, the Brewers have, once again, slipped to .500 and 4th in the NL Central and 7th in the WC.

 

I hope this team can make a comeback here in the 2nd half, as,technically, they are still in "contention", but it doesn't look promising, especially the way they have played the last month.

[joepepsi]

I'd agree if that GM was able to sustain that 90 win mark -- or get reasonably close to it. Six years is a pretty long time to reach the 90 win mark, if you can sustain it for a few seasons, that is awesome, if you hit it once, and then end up with < 80 wins the following season, it really is nothing special.

Twins from 2009-2005:

48-49

88-75

79-83

96-66

83-79

 

Cardinals 2009-225:

53-46

86-76

78-84

83-78

100-62

 

White Sox:

50-47

89-74

72-90

90-72

99-63

 

Indians

39-58

81-81

96-66

78-84

93-69

 

Athletics

40-55

75-86

76-86

93-69

88-74

 

Brewers

48-48

90-72

83-79

75-87

81-81

[kramnoj]

Furthermore, DM has enjoyed a new stadium, and new ownership, which has changed the Brewers standing in the "small market" arena

 

Seems to me that Melvin has taken advantage of the new stadium. He's built a team that people come out to watch, and stay home to watch. Compared to other teams, Melvin has excelled in that area.

 

I'm sure it's true that somewhere out there people exist who could do better than Melvin. I just think it would be difficult to find that person, and I'd rather enjoy the success that Melvin has brought this franchise rather than go through the learning curve of a new GM who could easily do worse. People like Jim Duquette exist who will trade away Kazmir for nothing. Melvin won't make that mistake.

[DonMoney4Mgr]

What bothers me the most about Melvin is the net result of all the players and prospects he traded over the past several years. Not one is helping our major league team right now. You can argue all you want about... "well at the time Bill Hall this, and Carlos Lee that". But in the end no major league help and no stud prospects. (Dave Bush isn't helping right now.)

[logan82]

I have no problem with Melvin. My issue is with Macha's ineptitude. It makes me yearn for the days of Garner or Yost. I see 0% chance of Macha being extended for a 3rd season

 

Well, I would have to say that one of 2 things happen. Macha is either fired this offseason or extended. Managers don't typically manage till the end of their contract with a lame duck status.

[TooLiveBrew]

But in the end no major league help and no stud prospects. (Dave Bush isn't helping right now.)

 

Counting Dave Bush's injury against Melvin is absurd. Seems like you remembered at the last minute, 'Oh yeah, I guess he has traded for guys that are still helping us.'