Terry Ryan has stepped down as general manager of the Minnesota Twins.
In some ways, this was the quintessential Terry Ryan move. Like so many of his trades in recent years, it came as a surprise. Like some of his other moves, a veteran is moving so that someone within the organization can be promoted. He was also known to look towards the future, almost to a fault, and I think the timing here also indicates an eye on the future.
I can't speak much to the pre-2001 Terry Ryan, since I honestly wasn't paying very close attention during that era, but I think he's shown himself to be an above average GM in the period since then. He astutely recognized that you can make a good bullpen--a really good bullpen even--without paying a lot of money for free agent relievers. He showed a willingness to let veterans walk away when it no longer made sense for the Twins to keep them around. He turned trades that could have been mere salary dumps into organizational improvements. (To see his fingerprints on the big league roster, you need look no further than Will Young's organizational tree.)
Not that he is without fault. He's had some trouble the last couple of years gathering replacement to average level talent to surround his core talent. DH has essentially been a void ever since David Ortiz left. I would've liked to see him be a little more proactive about moving some of non-top prospects in the organization. He did a great job turning Travis Bowyer into Luis Castillo, but J.D. Durbin (control problems) and Mike Restovich (strikeout problems) never really fit with the Twins' valuation fetishes, and it would've been nice to see them moved for something, even if it was different replacement level talent.
Thanks to draft pick compensation, Terry Ryan's reputation for not making a big splash on the free agent market and for developing a lot of talent within the organization go hand in hand. By not signing any big free agents, he was able to keep all of his first round picks. Not all of those picks turned out or will turn out, but by holding on to those picks, he gave the Twins a better chance overall of maintaining a strong pipeline of talent to the big club.
For what it's worth, I tend to agree with Howard Sinker, Nick N. and Pat Reusse's view that there isn't a story behind the story here. Howard notes this quote from Mr. Ryan right up front:
“The defeats are getting a little bit tougher to take and the wins aren’t as much fun.†-- Terry Ryan
That stuck out to me, too, since it sounded eerily familiar to what Mike Hargrove said when unexpectedly resigning from his post as field manager in the middle of a long winning streak:
"But the highs weren't high enough, the lows were too low. That's putting it about as simple as I can." -- Mike Hargrove, July 1st
As an undergrad, and moreso as a grad student, I've seen numerous people get burned out. (And wondered from time-to-time whether or not I'm burned out myself.) When I saw it reported today that TR was 53, I was shocked. 53?! I thought he looked at least ten years older than that, and he admitted as much himself:
"I look like I'm 75 but I'm 53, and I'd probably be better served out in the field and out there on the diamond instead of behind that desk."
It seems clear to me that he's been under a great deal of stress, and I can understand why he would want to walk away from that.
I think that Reusse makes another astute point:
The instant analysis from the national baseball media will be that this is a terrible blow to the Twins. And when this team fails to contend in 2008, these analysts will be offering "I-told-you-sos."
This will be a knee-jerk reaction with no validity. The fact is that winning is cyclical for middle-market spenders in baseball, and the Twins are playing out the schedule in the first year of a down cycle.
That instant analysis will not be limited simply to the national media. From The Twins Geek:
Make no mistake - this is bad. How bad? As bad as losing Torii Hunter or Johan Santana?
Later, in conclusion, TG backs off his stance a bit, but still sees the move as a clear loss for the Twins. Meanwhile, Joe Christensen weighs in with:
You can pick apart the team’s moves and non-moves in recent years and kid yourself into thinking they’ll be better off without Ryan in charge. But this is like when an army loses a beloved general. There always have been good people underneath Ryan. But they will miss his leadership.
The underlying assumption here is that there's no way Bill Smith could possibly be as good as Terry Ryan. Given that we all know approximately nothing (or less) about Smith, I think now is the appropriate time to throw up our hands and plead ignorance. When Hargrove resigned, many Mariners fans thought his replacement couldn't possibly be any worse, but unfortunately for them, they were wrong.
So I'm not going to pretend to know anything about how good the Bill Smith Era will be. For one thing, it sounds like a restructuring of the front office will make his position different than Terry Ryan's:
Ryan's departure led to a reshuffling of the team's baseball department. Ryan in essence had been GM and director of player personnel. Because Smith is primarily an administrator, the club promoted Mike Radcliff from scouting director to vice president/player personnel.
If there's anyone in the front office that's more respected than Terry Ryan, it's Mike Radcliff. And from the sounds of it, Smith will be deferring to "his people" on many decisions, so it's tough to say that the Twins are in bad hands here. Of course, Radcliff is also something of an unknown in his new role, and that move could wind up hurting the Twins' draft in the future depending on who fills his old position. So much of this reshuffling is a gigantic question mark.
In the absence of information, for the moment, I'm going to expect Smith to be an average GM. Since I thought Ryan was an above average GM, I expect that this puts the Twins in a somewhat worse position, but I'm by no means ruling out the possibility that the Twins can get even more out of their new GM.
In Aaron's excellent post on the subject, he notes:
With that said, Smith faces a very difficult task. Hunter becomes a free agent this winter, and both Santana and Nathan hit the open market following next season. Toss in the new ballpark opening in 2010 and this is one of the most important points in franchise history.
Some have indicated that TR is just cutting and running when the future looks grim. To me, if he'd really been selfish, he could've mortgaged the future for one spectacular run in 2008, then leaving the long-term consequences (in the form of large, long-term, backloaded contracts) to his successor. Considering Terry's past loyalty to the organization through the near-contraction debacle, and his relationship with Bill Smith, I find it unlikely that he's intentionally trying to put anyone in a bad position here.
Quite to the contrary, with so many decisions to be made, Bill Smith now has the chance to put his stamp on the team. All too often, a new GM is thrust into an awful situation with a team that has few assets. With some stars on the big league roster and a farm system that's pretty deep in pitching, Smith is hardly in a hopeless position. By stepping up now, he's showing that he is not just ready, but willing to make the tough decisions. While I agree that there are many important decisions to be made, I disagree that this is a bad position to be in.
I think I liked Kevin Towers' summary the best:
"He could have done it for 40 years, but with Terry, you figured there was a point in time where he'd say, 'I've had enough.' He's an honest man with a tremendous integrity, and a great evaluator. The best way I can put it is he's a baseball man."
I'll admit to a moment or two of panic when I first heard the news yesterday. Initial worry about TR's health and deep-seated, anti-Pohlad cynicism were the dominant tones.
After a few hours, (and after listening to the press conference and reading much of the same media you've linked to) I'm almost feeling a little bit hopeful. I don't think I have any delusions about what kind of situation Bill Smith is up against as he tries to reach contract agreements with certain players, but now I'm extremely curious to see how this off-season plays out. I'd been feeling pretty pessimistic about all of that until today, but now I am allowing myself to be just the smallest bit cautiously optimistic.
As you said, Bill Smith has a chance to put his stamp on the team, and while he faces some major hurdles in retaining talent, Terry Ryan hasn't gutted the farm system. The team has obvious - hell, glaring - weaknesses at a few key positions, but perhaps a fresh pair of eyes and hands at the helm is what is needed in order to address those problems. At the very least, we are going to see some very interesting things happen in the upcoming months.
Extremely thoughtful, well-reasoned post, ubes. It's the best I've read about the entire situation.
Excellent job. I wanted to post something on Ryan myself, but I just couldn't get it done. I will say that I'm glad that Ryan will be around to help his successor, because Ryan struggled early in his tenure. He was faced with some tough issues -- the premature aging of Kent Hrbek, the loss of Shane Mack to Japan, and the overnight loss of Kirby Puckett. I thought the '96 team, with Puckett could have been something, but it was a HOF bat from really being somebody. Ryan signed a string of old Minnesotans -- and Paul Molitar was a good player for him, but Winfield and Steinbach weren't all that good.
He botched the Travis Lee deal, which in hindsight was okay. Once it became clear that he had to cut salary and rebuild, he pretty much gave away all of his talent for nothing (Ron Coomer was about all he got for Tapani, Erickson, and others). It wasn't until the Knoblauch trade that he finally got something for his best talent (then again, Knobby was his best asset). I would say it took Ryan several years to really grow into his role -- and that's not something the Twins can really afford right now.
Ryan should get the biggest share of credit for pulling this team out of the depths of despair -- but he also deserves some of the blame for letting it get that bad. All in all, he did a very good job for several years as GM. His last two years were less than stellar. Big challenges face his successor.
Winfield was a McPhail signing.
That is correct. That's what I get for seat of the pants bloviating.
One difference between the McPhail-Ryan transition and the Ryan-Smith transition is that Ryan is still with the team. I'm sure Ryan will be happy to weigh in on any decision making if asked.
I wonder how long Terry has been mulling this over? I'm sure it wasn't spur-of-the-moment. In typical Terry Ryan class, he waited to announce his resignation on an off-day in the schedule.
TK was about that same age when he stepped down, no? Perhaps TR learned a little something from the fellow.
Yeah, Reusse's first line is that TK was 51 when he stepped down.
The difference to me is that TK has his rings, and TR wasn't quite able to get over the hump, so it seems like it would've been a lot easier for TK to walk away.
I was able to watch the first half of the press conference. Seeing Grandpa sports choke up and not be able to be ask a question was sad. He really does need to ride off into the sunset.
I agree that the Terry Ryan move should be taken at face value, however:
Bill Smith made a comment along the lines of "now we will have everyone in a position where their real talents lay". He actually paused afterwards, and hurried to steer his comments in another direction, but I thought I caught the stumble for what it was. The organization realized that we were headed into unchartered territory for the Twins, with several big name stars needing to be signed. Terry's weakness in my opinion has been evaluating and signing "Major League" talent. (especially the negotiations with these talents) Star-caliber players and their agents like to be shown respect and given a little ego boost now and then. Terry does not do that.
I think either a) Terry Ryan realized that we would be unable to successfully keep a good chunk of the team together, and stepped down for good of the team, or b) Dave St. Peter, Jim Pohlad applied some pressure in this area that Terry was uncomfortable with.
Either way, it was still Terry's decision and he bowed out gracefully. I am glad he is sticking around to evaluate talent. I am also glad he will not be at the negotiations table anymore. I truly hope Bill Smith is an effective negotiator, as he has his hands full. I felt much better after listening to all parties at the press conference. Unfortunately, we will have to wait a long time before we can even begin to evaluate this move on results.
Terry’s weakness in my opinion has been evaluating and signing “Major League†talent.
He did make some comment along the lines of today's game requiring a brilliant negotiator at GM, and that he wasn't a brilliant negotiator. So I think there may have been some admission on TR's part that he wasn't really cut out for the upcoming negotiation--or at least that that was adding to his stress level.
Gleeman-esque length. Nice synthesis.
Hasn't Smith been the point man on contract negotiations for some time? If true, I think that points to no degradation in front office performance on retention of talent. That, combined with a fresh(er) perspective on the free agent market and on trades give me reason to hope for a slight uptick over the near term. No more Cuban dictators; maybe a few more Dennys Reyes-type successes (although, to be fair, Reyes was more Cuban dictator in prospect than he was the incredible success he turned out to be last season).
Dennys was also a Minor-league signee that started the season in the minors and only got called up when... Shoot, I forget... Liriano made the rotation? Romero got traded? Who the hell was the Loogy to begin 2006? Was it a Crain injury?
Anyways, had Ramon and Ponson and the Dictator Duo been minor-league signees that began the season there and got called up because of injuries, minor-leage performance, or other players' major-league non-performance, I think they would have been good decisions.
However, they were signed (minor-league or major-league contracts), but all 4 started the team on the ML roster with a starting spot.
I still think the Twins should have gone after Runny Elvis Hernandez before this season.
Dennys was also a Minor-league signee that started the season in the minors and only got called up when… Shoot, I forget… Liriano made the rotation? Romero got traded? Who the hell was the Loogy to begin 2006? Was it a Crain injury?
Here's the transaction report sequence:
4/29/06 Placed DH Ruben Sierra on the 15-day disabled list with a strained biceps.
4/30/06 Purchased the contract of LHP Dennys Reyes from Triple-A Rochester.
The only lefty in the pen for that first month was Liriano, although he wasn't really used as a LOOGY. Liriano was promoted to the rotation on May 19.
Liriano was promoted to the rotation on May 19.
Btw, that happened 2 days after this move:
5/17/06 Optioned RHP Kyle Lohse to Triple-A Rochester and recalled RHP Boof Bonser from Rochester.
They had thought about bringing Reyes with the roster after spring training, but sent him to Roch to have him work on pick off throws
they also brought Gabe White and Darrell May in on make-goods for spring training and had the Real Deal trying to make the club. That's at least 4 lefties (including Reyes) that TR sorted through to find one LOOGY.
sent him to Roch to have him work on pick off throws
I always thought that was a bogus excuse.
IMO, Reyes was in part punished because he missed time to play in the WBC, and he was also the odd man out with an 11-man staff because Liriano was too impressive in camp to send him back to AAA. He still should have made the team to open the season, but management elected to bring up Groundskeeper Willie, instead.
That's as fine a piece on Ryan that I'll likely read all day. Nicely done, Ubes.
Thanks, glad you liked it.