Seattle Mariners fire Don Wakamatsu and coaches

[Invader3K]

According to a local radio station twitter.

 

They add that coaches Rick Adair, Ty van Burkleo, and Steve Hecht were

also let go.

 

Not totally surprising given the poor play of the team this year after expectations were so high.

[dadofandrew]

Jack Z literally just said a couple days ago the manager would stay.

 

JZ should have resigned last year, when they won 10 more games than they should have. He's said and done a lot of dumb things this season, and needless to say, the bloom is off the rose. Seriously, how could I notice SEA's offense would be historically bad, but the front office not notice it?

[pretendastronaut]

I think it was well documented that the front office knew their offense was their weak spot, and they focused on trying to make a strong defense to make the pitching better to compensate.

[MJLiverock]

Illustrating that some of the models that weight defense equally with offense like WAR are really not very realistic. i.e. guys who are studs offensively being reduced to replacment level as if their superb offense is totally offset by bad defense, implying defense so bad that the guy must be giving up a run every third game in order to completely offset their offensive production.

[berniebrewer4life]

Jack Z literally just said a couple days ago the manager would stay.

 

JZ should have resigned last year, when they won 10 more games than they should have. He's said and done a lot of dumb things this season, and needless to say, the bloom is off the rose. Seriously, how could I notice SEA's offense would be historically bad, but the front office not notice it?

anytime Chone Figgins is your main offensive pickup, you know you are in trouble. Hopefully Jack continues to draft well, cuz he doesn't look so hot at the signing part of the job.

[Baldkin]

Illustrating that some of the models that weight defense equally with offense like WAR are really not very realistic. i.e. guys who are studs offensively being reduced to replacment level as if their superb offense is totally offset by bad defense, implying defense so bad that the guy must be giving up a run every third game in order to completely offset their offensive production.

Name me some of those, please. WAR may not be perfect, but, by no means is it showing that Seattle, as a team, should be having a good year.

The fact is Seattle has Ichiro and... well... Ichiro this season.

[NievesNoNO]

All hail to the mighty Jack Z!! Maybe "his guys" just weren't in place yet. In all fairness, I think it will help the organization with Griffey being an alum and not a player going into next season. Ahh, how perceptions can change quickly.

[trwi7]

Pretty much everyone on that team regressed from last year for some reason.

 

Gutierrez, Lopez, Figgins (who I know was with the Angels the year before), even Ichiro. Their offense was going to bad even with those guys having the same years as they had last year but they could've made up for some of it with pitching and defense but the defense regressed as well.

 

That Kotchman trade was incredibly dumb though.

[Principessa21]

I think he's a good writer, so here's Joe Posnanski's opinion.

[RobertR]

Yeah, Wakamatsu is certainly not entirely to blame for the disaster that the Mariners' season is. Plenty of blame to go around. Short term decisions that backfired. Almost everybody playing worse than last year. And some massive question marks of just about everyone not named Ichiro, Felix Hernandez, Gutierrez, and Cliff Lee.

 

That said, beyond the play on the field, the clubhouse was clearly a disaster as well. And it seemed to have been made worse by Wakamatsu. The Mariners didn't just fail to win, they've been embarassing off the field as well. You might get another chance if you're only embarassing in one area, but if you're bad in both you probably deserve the heave ho.

 

Say what you will about Melvin, but he's never had a season while GM of the Brewers that's been a disaster in all those areas.

 

Robert

[PKBadger]

Maybe Jack Z gets desperate....desperate enough to overpay for a big bat like Prince Fielder in the offseason.

[monty57]

That said, beyond the play on the field, the clubhouse was clearly a disaster as well.

 

Couldn't see that coming when they traded for Milton Bradley. He brings the term "Clubhouse Cancer" to an all new level.

[Hofbraunhaus]

I think it's funny that he was fired on the day they had Japanese Heritage Night at Safeco. It reminds me of when Jorge de la Rosa and Carlos Lee were traded right before Cerveceros Day at Miller Park.

[Invader3K]

That said, beyond the play on the field, the clubhouse was clearly a disaster as well.

 

Couldn't see that coming when they traded for Milton Bradley. He brings the term "Clubhouse Cancer" to an all new level.

Was Bradley really that big of an issue this season? I remember reading that he admitted that he had issues and reached out to the front office for help. I think his effect on the team is being overblown by some.

[MJLiverock]

Illustrating that some of the models that weight defense equally with offense like WAR are really not very realistic. i.e. guys who are studs offensively being reduced to replacment level as if their superb offense is totally offset by bad defense, implying defense so bad that the guy must be giving up a run every third game in order to completely offset their offensive production.

Name me some of those, please. WAR may not be perfect, but, by no means is it showing that Seattle, as a team, should be having a good year.

The fact is Seattle has Ichiro and... well... Ichiro this season.

It makes no sense to equally weight offense and defense since the numer of chances for a player to help/hurt his team offensively is much greater than the number of chances to help hurt his team defensively.

 

For instance, a guy like Andre Ethier, his batting is worth 17.3 and his fielding is worth -16.3 yielding a WAR of basically 1 his so called defensive liablity is nearly cancelling out his offense completely. He has 396 PA this year and a wRC+ of 136, meaning he is 36% better than league average for offense. Even if one assumes the defensive metrics are correct he would have to be 36% worse than average on defense.

 

But he only has 153 put outs, now assuming his defense is terrible and he really should have 239 put outs since he is 36% worse than average at converting plays into outs so his total put outs must be understated by what a elite or in this case average fielder would convert. His defensive impact on a the game is still only about half what his offensive impact on the game is just based on pure number of chances to do something either good or bad. I know that you can't truly calculate defense that way but it just shows how overstated a player's defensive impact on a game is in comparison to his offense, especially if the player is a very good hitter.

 

Let alone some of the pure ridiculous numbers that implied by the defensive metrics for allowing runs to score in comparison to runs created to offset offensive production. Guys would have to be booting balls, not getting to balls that they should in every single game, to allow the number of runs ot offset their offense if they are very good hitters, given the disparity in chances.

 

I'm not saying defense isn't important but to equally weight it with offense is overstating its value in relation to the difference between being average or below at it vs. elite at it and the difference in being average to below average in offense vs. being elite at it. This also doesn't take into account how subjective the defensive ratings are anyway given positioning, speed of balls, spin, pitch thrown, and just guessing on what a guy should get to or not. Not to mention the impact of being a corner outfielder who gets only a few plays a week that truly are up for debate on making or not making the play as a great defender.

 

 

A guy like Adam Everett in 2006 was a 2.4 WAR player because his defense was 25.2 while his offense was -26.3. His wRC+ was 65 an absolutely atrocious offensive performer well below any kind of average performance. Yet we are to believe his defense was so stellar and above average that he completely offsets that kind of miserable offense?

 

[sveumrules]

I agree with you completely MJ. I really like WAR and what it tries to accomplish, but valuing offense and defense equally is a huge flaw in the calculation. As you pointed out, the opportunities just are not equal, nor should they be weighted as such.

 

Whenever I check a players WAR i always adjust a little based on how much is derived from their offensive/defensive value. My favorite example is Braun/Nyjer Morgan last year. Hilarious.

[Baldkin]

Nyjer Morgan plays CF and Braun plays LF, so there is a pretty steep positional adjustment factored into WAR for the two positions. LF is the 2nd easiest position to play, Morgan already has a +1.0 WAR head start over Braun just because he plays CF.

 

I prefer WAR to many other things, because it does have that positional adjustment and also includes defense in it's factors, and using linear weights to derive it's values, it's actually fairly straight forward. Each play has an average run value, whether it is on offense or defense, and if you add up all those plays or non-plays you get the total run value, which is then transformed into WAR.

 

It's not that defense is half the picture because they arbitrarily decided it would be, it's because that's how the run values of the plays made or not made come out to be.

 

UZR explained, very well over at Yahoo

[Principessa21]

Here's an interesting article about Wakamatsu, Griffey, and the clubhouse atmosphere. I'd like to add this to another reason why I don't like Griffey.

[Sage]

Here's an interesting article about Wakamatsu, Griffey, and the clubhouse atmosphere. I'd like to add this to another reason why I don't like Griffey.

After reading that article, as best I can tell, Griffey is the reason that Wakamatsu is the fall-man here. Due to Griffey, Wak lost the clubhouse, and there was nothing he could do about it. When he tried to take control of the team, the team refused to be controlled (see: Figgins after being pulled from a game). From what I can tell, only Cliff Lee, along with Wak's staff, were on his side. Lee called a players-only meeting trying to get them let go of resentment over Griffey's retirement, but it didn't work. His coaching staff feels (as do I), that Wak is shouldering the blame for the under-performing team that Jack Z put together.

A lot of people are tempted to agree with this firing because Wak "didn't take control of his club," yet, it seems to me, that no one could have controlled this clubhouse. King Felix yelling at Wak during a mound visit, Figgins fighting with him in the dugout, and Griffey... It seems that because of Griffey, the clubhouse lost all respect for Wakamatsu... Yet, I've only lost respect for Griffey after reading that article.

"The sources, who had spoken with Griffey by phone, say he was furious that Wakamatsu had not treated him with the respect due a veteran of his stature nor properly communicated the extent to which he'd be benched." This particular quote made me lose quite a bit of respect for Griffey. Did he really expect to be in the everyday lineup when hitting .184/.250/.204? He need not look any further than that line to realize why he'd been benched. I don't care if he is Ken Griffey, Jr. When he's hitting that badly, he's costing the team wins and deserves to be benched.

So, uh, in short (too late, I guess), I disagree that Wakamatsu deserved to be fired. However, it's probably best for all involved that he was fired. This lets him get away from a clubhouse that had lost all respect for him (due to no fault of his own), and to perhaps get a chance with another team. It lets the Mariners calm the hell down about the whole situation, and lets them get a manager that Griffey tells them it's okay to respect.