Paul Molitor Relieved of Coaching Duties

[clancyphile]

Molitor (or any other player) didn't owe the Brewers (or any other team) anything at that point.

 

His salary had already been artificially supressed for multiple seasons by the owners colluding to not sign each other's free agents from 1985-87.

 

That.

 

For me, I never blamed Molitor for not signing after `92. I blamed Bando. It was his job to keep a star like that - to find a way. And Molitor's last six years would have been worth every penny.

 

For me, it would have been like seeing Walter Payton play three years with two other NFL teams...

[reillymcshane]

Molitor (or any other player) didn't owe the Brewers (or any other team) anything at that point.

 

His salary had already been artificially supressed for multiple seasons by the owners colluding to not sign each other's free agents from 1985-87.

 

That.

 

For me, I never blamed Molitor for not signing after `92. I blamed Bando. It was his job to keep a star like that - to find a way. And Molitor's last six years would have been worth every penny.

 

For me, it would have been like seeing Walter Payton play three years with two other NFL teams...

Bando offered Molitor a one-year deal for $2.3M. It was $1M in salary, and $1.3M in deferred payments. Plus the team wanted a $2M club option. The team, if I recall, ultimately offered him arbitration, which would have resulted in a deal nearer to $4M for one year. But the Crew knew he'd turn it down. Molitor would sign with Toronto for three-years and $12.9M.

 

Kind of hard to to blame Molitor for that. The team - Bando in particular - were pretty much set on getting rid of him.

 

Here's a nice rundown of this affair: https://shepherdexpress.com/sports/brew-crew-confidential/messy-divorce-brewers-paul-molitor/

 

I will say that I was crushed when Molitor left. I was 15 when he came up with the Crew, and I got to love the team watching him and Yount and all of the Harvey's Wallbangers crew. But Molitor was my favorite, and when he left, it stung. But I was old enough see the numbers and know why it happened. But it still stung.

 

This was one event in a long string of poor moves made by Brewer management - primarily Sal Bando. I still can't believe that guy stayed GM for eight years. The team was mismanaged badly during this time and it took a long time for it to recover.

[clancyphile]

Bando offered Molitor a one-year deal for $2.3M. It was $1M in salary, and $1.3M in deferred payments. Plus the team wanted a $2M club option. The team, if I recall, ultimately offered him arbitration, which would have resulted in a deal nearer to $4M for one year. But the Crew knew he'd turn it down. Molitor would sign with Toronto for three-years and $12.9M.

 

Kind of hard to to blame Molitor for that. The team - Bando in particular - were pretty much set on getting rid of him.

 

Here's a nice rundown of this affair: https://shepherdexpress.com/sports/brew-crew-confidential/messy-divorce-brewers-paul-molitor/

 

I will say that I was crushed when Molitor left. I was 15 when he came up with the Crew, and I got to love the team watching him and Yount and all of the Harvey's Wallbangers crew. But Molitor was my favorite, and when he left, it stung. But I was old enough see the numbers and know why it happened. But it still stung.

 

This was one event in a long string of poor moves made by Brewer management - primarily Sal Bando. I still can't believe that guy stayed GM for eight years. The team was mismanaged badly during this time and it took a long time for it to recover.

 

Indeed, it was. It took Dean Taylor to start the very long turnaround process. Bob Melvin then got the team to the point where they could boom-or-bust contend, but I think the game was passing him by to a degree.

 

Stearns, I think is starting the process of making the Brewers a solid team. Certainly he has shown an eye for talent.

[obobo55new]

Interesting read in the Shepherd. Pretty much what I remembered. I still don't believe it was a poor decision not knowing that Molly would go on to have great seasons afterwards. Bando was a poor GM and made bad trades and horrific drafts. How much of that was on him and how much he was hamstrung by ownership we will never really know. That era of baseball was just nearly impossible for small market teams.

 

I was a huge fan in all of those years. Living in Milwaukee, I went to probably 30+ games each year from '87-'92. I would buy the cheapest seat and pay the $4 parking fee and drink with my buds in the parking lot. I was one of the reasons that the payroll was tiny. Think this was true of much of the fan base. There were very few season ticket holders and no premium seating really in County Stadium. Often you would have more people sitting upstairs than in the lower grandstand when the price difference was like $3. Nowadays people pay far more.

[gregmag]

This whole thread is cathartic for me. Molitor was and remains my favorite player ever. I started following the Brewers seriously in 1978 -- probably the best timing of anything in my life -- and so I grew up with Molitor. His departure hit me like a gut punch, even as an adult.

 

My one pushback against the "Molitor was a 36 year-old DH" argument is that he had characteristics of players who age well: high BA, speed, line drive power, smarts. He was also at the peak of his powers, unlike Braun today. No one could have predicted exactly how good Molitor would be over his last years, but it would have been a smart bet that he would at least be worth his contract, and re-signing him would have been a smart baseball move.

[obobo55new]

Agree with what you said. You also need to consider the other part of that article. The total payroll for the '92 team was 30 million and the owners were "supposedly" hemhorraging 10 million to keep that up. That isn't sustainable and Bando was tasked with cutting it to 22 million. Tough to do that in a single year without making sacrifices, and letting go a 36yr old DH kind of helps in that area.

 

I too was a big fan of Molitor but even at the time I understood the reasoning. I'm not saying that Bando was right but it was a difficult spot and time for the franchise.

[Jose Cardenal1]

Bando was a terrible GM but I put more of the blame on ownership and MLB. Small market teams in general and the Brewers in particular were really hamstrung by economics. It took revenue sharing and a new stadium to give the Brewers a chance to compete. Without those Milwaukee would not have a team right now.

 

For those too young to remember 1992 was really a watershed year. Brewers had a very good team powered by great pitching and team speed but no power (weird huh) yet the economics were so bad we could not make a trade to pick up anyone for the stretch run because it was not in the budget. This would have caused a lot more of an uproar but for two things, the Brewers stayed in the hunt and Yount was chasing 3,000 hits which he got in September. Toronto clinched the division the last weekend of the season (and would go on to win the world series). In the offseason Molitor, Dan Plesac and Chris Bosio left in Free Agency and Gantner retired.

 

I was a huge baseball fan growing up but 1992 and the offseason gave me a bad taste in my mouth. At roughly the same time that the Brewers were being eliminated from the playoff chase Brett Favre was making his first start as a Packer QB (9/27/92). In the ensuing offseason the Packers signed the biggest free agent in football history with Reggie White.

 

This 6 mos. or so time frame is when the Packers significantly surpassed the Brewers as the dominant sports team in the state in terms of interest and coverage. The Badgers going to the Rose Bowl after the 1993 season also pushed the Brewers farther down the food chain. The rest of the 90's was just an ugly mess for the Brewers, epitomized by those god awful 90's era uniforms.

[obobo55new]

Like most things in the real world, there are more things going on that determine outcomes than simply saying that a single person screwed up. Think it was easy for Selig to step away from day-to-day management of his team? Think his job convincing the rest of the owners to share revenues and reshape the economucs of the game was simple? Then throw in the strike and its aftermath and a sudden increase in steroids.

 

I have no doubt that Attanasio deserves a ton of credit, but some younger fans seem to denigrate Bud and need to know more of the history.

[jjfanec]

I didn't feel that Molitor did anything special in 2017 with that team, it just played way over its collective head. I don't have a big issue with this. He probably didn't deserve to get relieved of duty but I can't say he did anything that made him untouchable either.

 

What does a manager really do if he cant get credit for getting a pretty poor team to win games?

[RockCoCougars]

I'm not absolving Bando of all blame in Molitor's departure, but Harry Dalton was a factor as well in giving Higuera and Stubbs relatively expensive deals in the previous of seasons. Neither of them contributed squat after the ink dried on the contacts. Another thing to keep in mind was that Yount had declined substantially after the big deal that he (rightly) received after his 1989 MVP season, and Molitor was roughly the same age and carried substantial injury history/risk.

 

That said I will blame Bando for putting many eggs in the Kevin Reimer basket that off season, as he was actually portrayed as a big acquisition. That trade and his play were absolutely brutal.

[Ennder]

I didn't feel that Molitor did anything special in 2017 with that team, it just played way over its collective head. I don't have a big issue with this. He probably didn't deserve to get relieved of duty but I can't say he did anything that made him untouchable either.

 

What does a manager really do if he cant get credit for getting a pretty poor team to win games?

 

They have studied this and the manager really doesn't have a very big direct impact on the teams win/loss record. How he manages the players themselves and their access to the media is bigger than anything they do with the lineups and bullpens. The 2005 White Sox won a world series because everyone on the team had their career year at the same time, it wasn't because of something Guillen did.

 

If Molitor was somehow managing the team to a record way above their talent he would have done it all 4 seasons he managed, not just the one. That type of skill would be very consistent, not leading to wildly varying results like it has.

[harrydalton]

As a Milwaukee baseball fan since 1957, I agree with Turborickey.

 

My theory about Molitor's departure was that Selig sacrificed him to make a financial viability point.

 

Molitor has Minnesota roots that he's been loyal to, not Wisconsin.

 

I see no particular reason to bring him to Milwaukee. At most, I'd let him apply, but I'd evaluate him no differently than an

outsider for any particular job opening.

 

Counsell should be kept.

[topper09er]

 

They have studied this and the manager really doesn't have a very big direct impact on the teams win/loss record. How he manages the players themselves and their access to the media is bigger than anything they do with the lineups and bullpens. The 2005 White Sox won a world series because everyone on the team had their career year at the same time, it wasn't because of something Guillen did.

 

If Molitor was somehow managing the team to a record way above their talent he would have done it all 4 seasons he managed, not just the one. That type of skill would be very consistent, not leading to wildly varying results like it has.

 

How could you study this? What is the control? There is no way to compare the outcomes of what the manager did vs what he did not do. Its like analyzing the 3rd base coach. Maybe we know the times he gave the wrong send and the runner was out, but there is no way to know if he gave the correct hold call. Great example this year on April 10. Bottom 10, 2 outs Brewers up 1 lefty at bat with Jennings and Hader in the bullpen. CC leaves in Hoover who gives up the tying run, how can you analyze whether that was the right move or not?

[pacopete4]

I agree with topper09er. And it is a big reason why people will still call Counsell a dummy even though he led a team of misfits to the NL leading record and home field throughout.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

No one can tell me managers don't matter when the whole world knew it was a bad idea to play Mark Kotsay in CF or start a clearly out of gas Shaun Marcum in the 2011 playoffs. Yet Ron Roenicke made those choices. We can see clearly today that Craig Counsell wouldn't make those same decisions.

[TURBO]

No one can tell me managers don't matter when the whole world knew it was a bad idea to play Mark Kotsay in CF or start a clearly out of gas Shaun Marcum in the 2011 playoffs. Yet Ron Roenicke made those choices. We can see clearly today that Craig Counsell wouldn't make those same decisions.

 

True, but during the course of a season, CC does make some head scratching decisions, that can not be argued. He is not untouchable, and questioning certain moves is ok to do as a fan.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

No one can tell me managers don't matter when the whole world knew it was a bad idea to play Mark Kotsay in CF or start a clearly out of gas Shaun Marcum in the 2011 playoffs. Yet Ron Roenicke made those choices. We can see clearly today that Craig Counsell wouldn't make those same decisions.

 

True, but during the course of a season, CC does make some head scratching decisions, that can not be argued. He is not untouchable, and questioning certain moves is ok to do as a fan.

 

Absolutely. One of the most hotly contested debates about Counsell was his usage of relievers based on being ahead or behind on the scoreboard. His philosophy is spot on analytically and mathematically but it's hard for people to accept. In many people's minds he's waving the white flag even when down a run. In truth, since you can't use guys like Hader and Jeffress every day, it makes more sense mathematically to save them for the games you have the lead. And the way they locked down games they led late, and how well the key guys have held up late in the season shows he handled them correctly.

 

Arizona had a season recently where their record was something like 20 games better than their Pythagorean. It was because they refused to use their best relievers in games they were trailing. Drove fans nuts, but it worked. Much the same happened here. That's 100% the manager's call. Other managers would have done things differently. It likely would've led a burnt out bullpen.

[topper09er]

No one can tell me managers don't matter when the whole world knew it was a bad idea to play Mark Kotsay in CF or start a clearly out of gas Shaun Marcum in the 2011 playoffs. Yet Ron Roenicke made those choices. We can see clearly today that Craig Counsell wouldn't make those same decisions.

 

True, but during the course of a season, CC does make some head scratching decisions, that can not be argued. He is not untouchable, and questioning certain moves is ok to do as a fan.

 

 

 

Arizona had a season recently where their record was something like 20 games better than their Pythagorean. It was because they refused to use their best relievers in games they were trailing. Drove fans nuts, but it worked. Much the same happened here. That's 100% the manager's call. Other managers would have done things differently. It likely would've led a burnt out bullpen.

 

Um you do not know that. Maybe that is a great hypothesis, but you cannot be sure

[Ennder]

How could you study this? What is the control? There is no way to compare the outcomes of what the manager did vs what he did not do. Its like analyzing the 3rd base coach. Maybe we know the times he gave the wrong send and the runner was out, but there is no way to know if he gave the correct hold call. Great example this year on April 10. Bottom 10, 2 outs Brewers up 1 lefty at bat with Jennings and Hader in the bullpen. CC leaves in Hoover who gives up the tying run, how can you analyze whether that was the right move or not?

 

 

You do it at a macro level not a micro level. The truth is fans think the manager makes or breaks a team but it is hard to find any evidence that they have even as much impact as a single good player. I know it is fun to come and blame the manager every time a RP gives up a run but when you look at those decisions at a macro level they just aren't the big deal fans want to make them out to be.

 

And as I said above, if Molitor had some ability to take talent and elevate way above its natural level we would have seen it more than just one season. That season just looks like an outlier and nothing else.

[Invader3K]

Bando was a terrible GM but I put more of the blame on ownership and MLB. Small market teams in general and the Brewers in particular were really hamstrung by economics. It took revenue sharing and a new stadium to give the Brewers a chance to compete. Without those Milwaukee would not have a team right now.

 

For those too young to remember 1992 was really a watershed year. Brewers had a very good team powered by great pitching and team speed but no power (weird huh) yet the economics were so bad we could not make a trade to pick up anyone for the stretch run because it was not in the budget. This would have caused a lot more of an uproar but for two things, the Brewers stayed in the hunt and Yount was chasing 3,000 hits which he got in September. Toronto clinched the division the last weekend of the season (and would go on to win the world series). In the offseason Molitor, Dan Plesac and Chris Bosio left in Free Agency and Gantner retired.

 

I was a huge baseball fan growing up but 1992 and the offseason gave me a bad taste in my mouth. At roughly the same time that the Brewers were being eliminated from the playoff chase Brett Favre was making his first start as a Packer QB (9/27/92). In the ensuing offseason the Packers signed the biggest free agent in football history with Reggie White.

 

This 6 mos. or so time frame is when the Packers significantly surpassed the Brewers as the dominant sports team in the state in terms of interest and coverage. The Badgers going to the Rose Bowl after the 1993 season also pushed the Brewers farther down the food chain. The rest of the 90's was just an ugly mess for the Brewers, epitomized by those god awful 90's era uniforms.

This is a huge point here that I hadn't really thought about before.

 

As a kid who was 12 years old in '92, the Packers were pretty much a sports after thought among myself and most of my friends. We all loved the Brewers. We paid attention to the Packers, but we'd also have our laughs about some of the Majik Era ineptitude on the field.

 

There was definitely a big shift amongst us, and amongst I'm sure a huge portion of the state, after the rise of Brett Favre and the signing of Reggie.

 

As far as the ownership issues, Selig really should have sold the team before the early '90s rolled around. There was no way the team was going to keep up with the way contracts in MLB were changing under his stewardship.

[Thurston Fluff]

Arizona had a season recently where their record was something like 20 games better than their Pythagorean. It was because they refused to use their best relievers in games they were trailing. Drove fans nuts, but it worked. Much the same happened here. That's 100% the manager's call. Other managers would have done things differently. It likely would've led a burnt out bullpen.

 

I'm not so sure I buy that. People tend to view a player's talent level as a set number when in reality talent is more a range of possibilities than a static number. As an example there was a thread about Kris Davis' batting average because it is so rare to be so stable for several years in a row like that. There was also a thread about how stable Hernan Perez's production has been for several years now. They are at one end of the spectrum while some others have much more volatility from year to year. Yet that volatility gets smoothed over in a five year period which make it appear like each player would give you roughly the same production from year to year.

Given that some players have more range in their production from year to year than others it seems to me a team with a lot of players who are wildly inconsistent from year to year is bound to be harder to peg a set number of wins for.

[topper09er]

How could you study this? What is the control? There is no way to compare the outcomes of what the manager did vs what he did not do. Its like analyzing the 3rd base coach. Maybe we know the times he gave the wrong send and the runner was out, but there is no way to know if he gave the correct hold call. Great example this year on April 10. Bottom 10, 2 outs Brewers up 1 lefty at bat with Jennings and Hader in the bullpen. CC leaves in Hoover who gives up the tying run, how can you analyze whether that was the right move or not?

 

 

You do it at a macro level not a micro level. The truth is fans think the manager makes or breaks a team but it is hard to find any evidence that they have even as much impact as a single good player.

 

OK, so its not being done at all then. Its like projections, they are only useful on the average, but for an given individual player they are worthless.

Even at a macro level, I don't see how you can compare what actually vs what might have happened in some alternate universe in order to conclude that in both universe you get the same outcomes anyways so it doesn't matter.

[True Blue Brew Crew]

 

Arizona had a season recently where their record was something like 20 games better than their Pythagorean. It was because they refused to use their best relievers in games they were trailing. Drove fans nuts, but it worked. Much the same happened here. That's 100% the manager's call. Other managers would have done things differently. It likely would've led a burnt out bullpen.

 

Um you do not know that. Maybe that is a great hypothesis, but you cannot be sure

 

You're right, there's no way to prove how things would've worked out differently had CC used his best guys more in games the Brewers trailed. Sometimes the only means to quantify different scenarios is with common sense. The Brewers wound up winning their last 8 games and finished with the most NL wins by a razor thin margin. Those final 8 games included 5 that were decided by 2 runs or less. The bullpen has been outstanding in September and a big reason they won those 8 straight. If the Brewers bullpen had been used differently and not been somewhat managed/limited throughout the season, do you think they win all 8 games? Because they needed every one of them.

 

We've seen previous managers use the best arms throughout the season in games the Brewers trailed but were close. Those teams had a recurring theme of having the bullpen fade towards the end of the season. It's up to each individual to decide if there's a correlation. To some it's obvious. To others its not.

[Ennder]

OK, so its not being done at all then. Its like projections, they are only useful on the average, but for an given individual player they are worthless.

Even at a macro level, I don't see how you can compare what actually vs what might have happened in some alternate universe in order to conclude that in both universe you get the same outcomes anyways so it doesn't matter.

 

No, its just being done in an intelligent way. Trying to judge a manager by looking at every single decision individually would never work. Of course it isn't perfect but it doesn't need to be. The question of whether a great manager is worth 5 wins or 10 wins or 30 wins doesn't require perfection. The ballpark answer is most likely 5 wins while I'm sure there are those who believe in the 30.

[topper09er]

 

Arizona had a season recently where their record was something like 20 games better than their Pythagorean. It was because they refused to use their best relievers in games they were trailing. Drove fans nuts, but it worked. Much the same happened here. That's 100% the manager's call. Other managers would have done things differently. It likely would've led a burnt out bullpen.

 

Um you do not know that. Maybe that is a great hypothesis, but you cannot be sure

 

You're right, there's no way to prove how things would've worked out differently had CC used his best guys more in games the Brewers trailed. Sometimes the only means to quantify different scenarios is with common sense. The Brewers wound up winning their last 8 games and finished with the most NL wins by a razor thin margin. Those final 8 games included 5 that were decided by 2 runs or less. The bullpen has been outstanding in September and a big reason they won those 8 straight. If the Brewers bullpen had been used differently and not been somewhat managed/limited throughout the season, do you think they win all 8 games? Because they needed every one of them.

 

We've seen previous managers use the best arms throughout the season in games the Brewers trailed but were close. Those teams had a recurring theme of having the bullpen fade towards the end of the season. It's up to each individual to decide if there's a correlation. To some it's obvious. To others its not.

 

I am not saying you are wrong, just that you cannot present this as some known fact. If Christian Yelich didn't hit a HR every other AB in September the bullpen usage doesn't matter. Despite saving Hader so often all season long he gave up back to back HRs on last Monday, so I don't see how CC should credit for his bullpen usage winning that game.

 

 

We've seen previous managers use the best arms throughout the season in games the Brewers trailed but were close. Those teams had a recurring theme of having the bullpen fade towards the end of the season. It's up to each individual to decide if there's a correlation. To some it's obvious. To others its not.

 

Pretty broad generalization here, what is your evidence?

 

2008 - offensive collapse

2011 - starting pitching collapse

2014 - offensive collapse

 

 

Let see John Axford 2012, 75 appearances, only 12 where the Brewers were trailing. In 2011 when he was lights out he made 74 appearances with 6 where the Brewers were trailing. I guess those extra 6 innings over 6 months is the obvious correlation I am missing.