Ned Yost Yay or Nay thread: Hardball Times rips Yost (part 3)

[TooLiveBrew]

http://www.bbspot.com/Images/News_Features/2004/08/darth_vader.jpg

 

You don't know the power of the dark side...

 

There is no escape - don't make me destroy you

[patrickgpe]

I can't see the point of retaining a manager and telling him he needs to start strong of he is gone. Isn't it better for the organization and Ned to start a new?

[Blazer25]

We get Ned back next year and ticket prices are going up 9%...joy.

 

Seriously did someone let Wendy back in the building?

 

I'm fairly certain I will not re-up my 20 game pack.

[TooLiveBrew]

BTW TooliveBrew...It certainly gives someone like me who likes Ned something to think about.

 

Glad to hear it, Buc. Disagreement doesn't have to necessitate subjectivity. http://static.yuku.com//domainskins/bypass/img/smileys/smile.gif

[brains and braun]

Dear DM

 

Please reconsider firing Nedly if Joe Torre is available.

 

Sincerely

That little voice in your head

[don1481]

I will second Brains and Braun's statement here: If Torre becomes available (or... is it "when" at this point?), Melvin and Attanasio should strongly consider pulling a Larry Harris and saying "well... we've decided to go a different course. Meet our new manager: Joe Torre."

 

I think Torre would do just fine in Milwaukee. Plus he wouldn't have the Evil Emperor breathing down his neck 24/7.

[bklynbrewcrew]

Joe Torre cant handle a bullpen any more than Nedly can. If Torre didnt have that 250 million payroll he would be exposed as the fraud that he is.

[TooLiveBrew]

Even though I'm an admitted Yankee fan, I have to agree with bkbc on that one. Or, as my gf (lifelong diehard Yankee fan) put it -

 

"He's just like him - bad in-game management, doesn't know how to handle a bullpen - he's good in the clubhouse, oooooh...we'd be getting Yost part 2!"

 

Plus, Torre's making $7 mil. this year. Yost in 2007? $825k. I don't think Torre's necessarily going to get $7+ mil. anywhere else, but he sure ain't comin' to Milwaukee for $2-3 mil., and as covered already, he's pretty much a lateral move, logistics-wise.

[endaround]

Torre is a very good in game manager in general, he just never has to do so because its the Yankees. That said, his salary will be much too much for the Brewers.

[bigredrobbo]

...and if we get Torre, with the rest of the big bag o' cash, we should pursue ARod and that Santana fella that Minnesota has.

[Principessa21]

Joe Torre cant handle a bullpen any more than Nedly can. If Torre didnt have that 250 million payroll he would be exposed as the fraud that he is.

I agree, though Torre's managorial skills have been questioned for the past couple years. He is a terrible in-game manager and I will go to church and light a candle so the Brewers don't get him.

 

[Principessa21]

Torre is a very good in game manager in general, he just never has to do so because its the Yankees. That said, his salary will be much too much for the Brewers.

Can you elaborate, because all I know about managerial Torre pre-Yankees is his losing record, which I know doesn't say a lot. So I was wondering what you have seen that would classify him as a good in-game manager?

 

Still, I believe that just because a team is talented, that doesn't change the role of a manager.

[endaround]

Torre manages differently in teh playoffs, brining in Rivera early, throwing out the defined "roles" for players, pinch hitting for his lefties against LOOGYs. during the season he does zilch, since the Yankees are built to win 85 games easily.

[Thurston Fluff]

Torre manages differently in teh playoffs, brining in Rivera early, throwing out the defined "roles" for players, pinch hitting for his lefties against LOOGYs. during the season he does zilch, since the Yankees are built to win 85 games easily

 

How does managing differantly in the playoffs make him a good manager in general? Quite frankly I think most managers manage differantly in the playoffs so there is nothing sacred about what Torre does in the payoffs.

 

Torre is a guy who given the right circumstances will do a good job. I think there are more managers who can be fine in certain circumstances but not all of them. Since there are very few who are good in any circumstance the trick is to find a manager that fits the team.

 

I think Torre is a great example of how things other than in game management can be as important, if not more so, than in game management. Torre is great at handling egos making players play hard and not let them get too down in bad times or too high in good ones. Those are just things that aren't as visable as when he pinch hit for someone or who he sent in as a reliever when.

[Fatter than Joey]

Torre would handle the media much better than Ned, -- although the same could have probably been said for Leona Helmsley

[Thurston Fluff]

Of all the things that matter for a manager I think how they handle the press is pretty low on the list. Is there anyone who was worse with the press worse than Bill Parcels and he wasn't to shabby of a coach.

[Fatter than Joey]

I wouldn't compare Parcels time in NY/Dallas to Ned's reign in Milwaukee.

 

Perhaps though I didn't state my comment well -- rather than "handling the media" -- I probably should have said "Ned doesn't handle his media opportunities well"

 

Yost handles his media opportunities worse than a lot of coaches: Blaming the fans, blaming the 24-10 start, saying "Aquino fields his position" better, saying "We have math on our side", and the list goes on.

 

He has made himself a fairly uncomfortable bed for April 2008.

 

Ned handles all aspects of his job poorly, regardless of their importance.

[sheethead]

I find it hard to swallow when thinking about Yost being back in 2008. The longer Melvin waits, the uglier the end is going to be.

[Bucky Rules]

The longer Melvin waits, the uglier the end is going to be.

I really don't see how that's going to be the case.

 

The main - if not only - gripe against Ned is some of his game time decisions. For the sake of argument, let's say he is a terrible game manager. If he's the worst game manager in baseball, he's only going to cost his team a handful of games and probably less. I think that even his worst critics on this board would have a hard time pushing the thought that he's the worst game manager in baseball. SO... I don't think there is much risk of Ned being the cause of the end being extraodinarily ugly.

 

The only way the end would get really ugly for Ned is if he completely loses the team - ala Jerry Royster and maybe Buck Rodgers. I don't see that happening. In general, people give way too much credence to a manager's game decisions influencing the outcome of the game.

[Ennder]

I think that even his worst critics on this board would have a hard time pushing the thought that he's the worst game manager in baseball

 

I don't know about that, I've never watched a manager as lost out there as Yost was in the 2nd half of this season.

 

He seems to be a good out of game manager though so that probably offsets a little bit of it at least.

[logan82]

I don't know about that, I've never watched a manager as lost out there as Yost was in the 2nd half of this season.

How much of that being lost has to do with having a bulpen full of guys that are not really very good? Outside of Cordero and Shouse in the 2nd half, who was reliable? Yost did not use Cordero quite as well as he should have, but when your SP are not getting out of the 6th you are trying to cover 3 innings every night with only 2 quality guys.

[Ennder]

I don't know about that, I've never watched a manager as lost out there as Yost was in the 2nd half of this season.

How much of that being lost has to do with having a bulpen full of guys that are not really very good? Outside of Cordero and Shouse in the 2nd half, who was reliable? Yost did not use Cordero quite as well as he should have, but when your SP are not getting out of the 6th you are trying to cover 3 innings every night with only 2 quality guys.

 

Linebrink pitched decently for the Brewers. Its not the results that bother me its the decisions.

 

Mench hit against a righty with the game on the line, Aquino was put in a few times with the game on the line late while cordero was avialable. Yost used the bunt very poorly down the stretch, he continued to refuse to IBB guys to force better matchups and it cost the team. He had problems properly using pinch hitting to force better matchups late in the game. Pretty much from the 6th inning on I have no faith at all in Yost pushing the right buttons.

[logan82]

Ennder wrote:

Linebrink pitched decently for the Brewers. Its not the results that bother me its the decisions.

 

Mench hit against a righty with the game on the line, Aquino was put in a few times with the game on the line late while cordero was avialable. Yost used the bunt very poorly down the stretch, he continued to refuse to IBB guys to force better matchups and it cost the team. He had problems properly using pinch hitting to force better matchups late in the game. Pretty much from the 6th inning on I have no faith at all in Yost pushing the right buttons.

I don't really like IBB because even though it forces a better matchup, any hitter has a much better chance to fail than to succeed. I am not going to get to upset over pinch hitting either because the difference between a .250 hitter and a .300 hitter is only about one hit a week. I just think the effects of in game decisions are way overestimated. I can understand why people don't like Yost because of his decisions though. To me the 6th inning is where you are still in a grey area with pinch hitting for position players. September is one thing, but before callups you are still dealing with a short bench.

[Jay Zahn]

I swear that most of the Yost critics never watch any other manager make moves.

 

First, the reason why moves don't matter as much as people think. Suppose you have a situation where you have a .250 hitter at the plate and you can replace him with a .300 hitter. Say that you don't make the move for whatever reason. Only 1 time in 20 will it make a difference. Because 25% of the time either player would get a hit, and 70% of the time neither will get a hit. Only 5% of the time will the .300 hitter succeed and the .250 hitter fail. But what happens is if the .250 player makes an out (which either player will do 70% of the time) the manager is going to be blamed every time. So the manager gets a 75% "blame percentage" when only 5% was under his control.

 

Besides, let's look at the two cases that the critics are always bringing up. In the "Mench game", maybe Yost wanted to stay with Mench because he already had driven in a couple of runs. Maybe because Mench hit well in Wrigley Field (check the stats.) Maybe because Jenkins hadn't done that much against Dempster. Maybe because the warmed-up guy in the lineup normally does better than the guy coming in cold off the bench, maybe especially in a tight situation like that one. Jenkins is not Fielder or Braun or one of the stars of this team anymore. He's a fading vet. Was a good player for years, but he is what he is in 2007.

 

I'm not going to go through the whole Aquino game again, but it never should have come to that except for the failures of Sheets, McClung, Turnbow, and Estrada as well as Aquino. Although closers on any team rarely pitch more than one inning, yeah Yost should have tried that particular time. It's still only one batter - as I said earlier the difference between Cordero and Aquino is only going to matter 5 to 10 percent of the time. The failures of the other pitchers played a lot bigger part in the game than anything Yost did.

 

Watch the playoff games. Look at the rosters. For the four remaining teams I see a deep bullpen, a deep bullpen, a deep bullpen, and a deep bullpen. Not the crap that Yost had to work with. Watch how Eric Wedge manages or Clint Hurdle manages, and see them in all of their "genius." You take your favorite manager of all time and the crap the Brewers had for the bullpen, and I'll take Ned Yost or Harvey Kuenn or Dale Sveum or Kremblas or whatever vanilla manager you want to throw at me with a deep bullpen, and I'll beat you every single time.

 

Do you know how many times the genius Eric Wedge used his closer more than one inning this year? Zero. Moreover, their closer isn't even very good. It doesn't matter, because they have two ace starters and their setup guys are studs. Yost had a bunch of C-level starters and his setup guy was Turnbow. Turnbow pitching in the LCS would truly be a sight to behold, no doubt.

[TooLiveBrew]

as I said earlier the difference between Cordero and Aquino is only going to matter 5 to 10 percent of the time.

 

I'm sorry, I can't get on-board with this one in particular.

 

And in general, look at it this way - if you were playing russian roulette with hypothetical 100-chambered guns, and you were offered the choice between a gun that had 25 bullets in it, or 30? Heck, how about the choice between one and two? This is what grates the 'Nay' crowd. Just because a choice is only slightly better does not negate the advantage it provides.