I have read 2 of the 3 bios and Zumstag's chapter. Martin is such an interesting guy.

Yeah, but if my nephew was a young shortstop with a 122 OPS+, I'd probably start him, too. Particularly when my next best option was Larry Wolfe.

Well, okay.

plus, he got him cheap.

Bert and a Dead Man Walking for Smalley, Cubbage, a Bill Singer rental, 22-year old RH prospect Jim Gideon and $250K in 1976.

I am continually suprised how many idiots have risen to the pinnacle of their profession.

It's just the Peter Principle in action. An idiot might even get to be President if he has the means and connections.

I think baseball creates a particular problem for itself because it's essentially still an Old Boys' Club. To be a manager, first you need to have been a pro ballplayer who made some friends in high places. Preferably, you're a Catcher or middle infielder, and they'd rather you're not a Pitcher. You could have a degree in management, a deep understanding of statistics, game theory, and baseball, and a great way with people--it really doesn't matter. You're never managing the Twins or any other big league team unless you've played some pro ball.

Then you either need to have high name recognition so someone will give you a chance to manage shortly after you retire from playing, or perhaps the personality for broadcasting which might raise your profile, or else you should be willing to spend years managing in the minors in hopes that your organization might eventually promote you to the top instead of hiring some big name, while waiting for some famous retreads to get a 3rd or 4th crack at the job before some club is ready to try an unknown.

If you're really, really lucky, when you do finally get that 1st chance, your hiring will coincide with the rise of a crop of young talent that's just about ready to break out. More likely, you're the third choice of some cheap or desperate club in deep rebuilding mode, and you hope that you can do just enough with the team so that your reputation isn't permanenty stained by the stinking mess. If the team shows some spark of improvement under your watch, maybe you'll get added to the pool of retreads after you're fired. But if you happen to be Cito Gaston, I don't know what to tell you.

Is it really any wonder that a lot of teams actually are managed by unqualified idiots? What exactly are Ron Gardenhire's qualifications to manage, anyway?

He played pro ball, badly. He has a gregarious personality. He paid his dues managing in the minors, before TK asked him to be the Twins' 3rd base coach, where he spent a decade hitting groundball practice and deciding whether to wave runners home. Finally, he was fortunate that the top job became available with an org that preferred to hire from within, when Paul Molitor didn't want it because Contraction hung over the club, just as a homegrown crop of young talent was on the rise and the dominant team in the division was scrapping down for a rebuild. That about sums it up, doesn't it?

I second everything Frightwig said. The system isn't set up to get the most talented manager.

If you need a good first hand account of the workings of baseball - Ball Four is an excellent source.

Right on. Every other sport has coaches that were not pro players. Baseball? They're non-existent. Hell, even Tony LaRussa, who is sort of the odd-man-out if you lined up all the managerial backgrounds, was even a ballplayer.

Let's examine basketball. If basketball worked like baseball, Trent Tucker would be coaching an NBA team and Flip Saunders would be lucky to have a booth job. And no one EVER would have heard of Lawrence Frank, because he'd be on the outside looking in.

That being said, management in pro sports is so messed up anyway. In what other profession is the manager-level talent paid a whole lot less than those he manages? How is that supposed to work?

In what other profession is the manager-level talent paid a whole lot less than those he manages? How is that supposed to work?

I think it makes sense for sports, though. How many people can do what Alex Rodriguez does? How many people can do what Ron Gardenhire does? If management started demanding salaries on the same scale as the players, you can bet that teams would start going outside the industry to find managers. The players wouldn't like it at first, but eventually they would deal with it. Who likes their boss anyway?

Good stuff 'wig. Wish I'd found yer blog before you put it on the shelf.

Moss isn't suggesting that it should be done differently, rather that it is a system that by its nature isn't really workable. If RG were getting paid more than Johan, Moss would puke.

It's also interesting (to me, anyway) to consider that in basketball and football, it's not uncommon for head coaches to have coached in college at some point in their careers, either as a head coach or an assistant. When is the last time a manager was hired who had been a college baseball coach?