pollardsvision
Footballguy
now, a baseball manager's job isn't rocket science.
they do very little in the way of strategy.
for teaching, they have an entire farm system plus hitting and pitching coaches.
they wear their little baseball uniforms, fill-out lineup cards, and do press conferences (i know that's oversimplification, but compared to other coaches, they do very little).
the most important thing they do is manage players and their confidence.
to most, piniella on thursday is a small issue, but considering that managing players' confidence is about the only answer a manager would have when the "office space bob's" came asking "so, what is it, exactly, that you do around here?", it's a major issue.
on thursday afternoon, piniella publically mentioned that he'd like to switch rotation spots for hill and marquis b/c the pirates kill lefties. the problem was that marquis was battling the flu and likely wouldn't be available anyway. there's not much wrong with making the switch, but you just don't bring it up (publically) unless you are 100% sure you are going to make the switch. with what he did, he may as well have approached rich hill before the game and said, "hey, kid, i really think you're going to get rocked today and i'd like to pull you from the start, but marquis is sick so i have no choice but to start you. good luck"
in the grand scheme of things, not a major issue and hill's a big boy and should've just pitched better, but this is just an example of piniella tanking on his most important job description. when you do little else, just try not to F with your SP's head before his start.
now i understand why the mariners perennially underachieved with arod/griffey/unit.
they do very little in the way of strategy.
for teaching, they have an entire farm system plus hitting and pitching coaches.
they wear their little baseball uniforms, fill-out lineup cards, and do press conferences (i know that's oversimplification, but compared to other coaches, they do very little).
the most important thing they do is manage players and their confidence.
to most, piniella on thursday is a small issue, but considering that managing players' confidence is about the only answer a manager would have when the "office space bob's" came asking "so, what is it, exactly, that you do around here?", it's a major issue.
on thursday afternoon, piniella publically mentioned that he'd like to switch rotation spots for hill and marquis b/c the pirates kill lefties. the problem was that marquis was battling the flu and likely wouldn't be available anyway. there's not much wrong with making the switch, but you just don't bring it up (publically) unless you are 100% sure you are going to make the switch. with what he did, he may as well have approached rich hill before the game and said, "hey, kid, i really think you're going to get rocked today and i'd like to pull you from the start, but marquis is sick so i have no choice but to start you. good luck"
in the grand scheme of things, not a major issue and hill's a big boy and should've just pitched better, but this is just an example of piniella tanking on his most important job description. when you do little else, just try not to F with your SP's head before his start.
now i understand why the mariners perennially underachieved with arod/griffey/unit.
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