Bob Melvin has been fired. The firing should not be seen as an indictment of Melvin, but instead of GM Josh Byrnes.
Baseball managers can’t do much to help, or hurt, their team. Firing one is the easy way for a baseball front office to deflect blame away from the GM, scouts, and minor league system for team performance. But the real problem with supporting scape-goating the manager is that if improvement occurs, the idiots in the mainstream media will say “DBacks improve thanks to new manager,” because they are generally too stupid to realize that correlation is not causation.
If the DBacks improve, it will because the players play better. Playing ability is almost all talent; managers’ yelling won’t help you hit a curveball. Within a year or so of getting to the majors, you know what you’re going to get with most players, because minor league performance is generally a very accurate predictor of major league performance. So, anyone expecting huge breakout seasons from guys with three or more years in the league will be disappointed. Late career breakouts should arouse suspicion. The DBacks might have a little leeway as so many guys are 25 or below.
But fretting over the manager distracts from the real issue: talent on the field. Lack thereof goes to the front office, not the manager. Firing the manager should almost always be considered a mea culpa by the front office that they have been doing a bad job. Remember this.
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