Sayonara Baker. Photo via UPI
In a move that surprised me, the Nats announced mid friday 10/20/17 that Dusty Baker would not be renewed. I’m guessing that also goes for his whole staff.
I think he did an excellent job with the team this year, given the ridiculous number of injuries the team faced. He clearly stabilized the clubhouse post Matt Williams. The knock on him prior to his Nats career was handling of pitchers, over-use of relievers, and a general lack of modern baseball strategy. But his tenure here has seen none of these issues; there’s quibbles about starter over-use earlier in the year, but that was more about his decrepit bullpen than him riding his arms too heavily. The team shifts and plays modern baseball; I see no evidence that he’s a Mike Scoscia-level old-school hard head. So I’m not exactly sure why they felt the need to move on.
I don’t think you can pin the playoff loss on Baker either; when your team hits .186 and loses two games where the starter threw 6-no hit innings … its tough to win. Some people keep mentioning his sticking with Jayson Werth instead of Howie Kendrick … or his lineup construction choices batting Werth 2nd (nevermind that lineup construction theory has been proven to be practically negligible over an entire season). I’m not sure I agreed with the quick hook of Scherzer in his start, much like I hated the quick hook of Scherzer in game 5 of 2016’s NLDS. But otherwise, its hard to blame the manager for this playoff loss. I mean, if Jose Lobaton‘s foot doesn’t come off the bag, do the Nats rally and win game 5 and we’re still playing playoff baseball right now? If the ridiculous 5th inning sequence of events doesn’t befell Scherzer’s outing … are we having a different conversation?
Mike Rizzo took over in 2009 and he’s now set to be on his 6th full time manager. I’m beginning to wonder about the workability of this front office. Here’s the history step by step of Rizzo’s manager selections:
- in 2009, He inherited Manny Acta and an awful team and whacked him mid-season. Fair enough.
- He elevated then-bench coach players’ manager Jim Riggleman to the job and let him lead a mediocre to bad team for another year and a half.
- In 2011, when Riggleman finally had the team playing .500 ball, by all accounts Rizzo refused to even take a meeting with him to discuss his job status, leading to Riggleman’s resignation (my take on it here from the time).
- He then appoints the guy he apparently wanted all along in Davey Johnson … who led the team to a .500 record the rest of the way, just as Riggleman was doing.
- The team improves 18 games in 2012, but then slumps and misses the playoffs in 2013, at which point Johnson gets whacked.
- Rizzo brings in his old Arizona buddy Matt Williams, who catches the team as it recovers from its injury issues and leads them to the 2014 playoffs, where he badly over-manages and the team loses in four.
- By the end of 2015, the clubhouse is in absolute disarray, as documented by WP beat writer Barry Svrluga here: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3. There’s some amazing information here, and its no shock that the team not only missed the playoffs but whacked Williams soon after the season was over.
- The team then had the embarrassing interlude with Bud Black.
- then they hired on Dusty Baker and tried to save-face with the Black situation, saying Baker was their choice all along.
- And now they’ve whacked Baker after a season where he’s possibly in line to be Manager of the year.
That’s 5 full time managers in 8 seasons at the helm. Does this sound like a good strategy to you? Look at some of the better teams out there; they’re not cycling through managers every two seasons.
Is this a concern?