Plan the 2016 parade.

Next year should be do or die for Ventura and Hahn. They clearly want to go for it again, so there needs to be good transactions and Ventura needs them ready out of the gate.

Good point, fathom. My question is ... are they going to extend Robin or is it the last year on his contract? The players matter much more than the manager and we have lousy players, sure, but like I said before the White Sox style of play reflects VERY BADLY on Robin: Horrible bunting (and yet he calls for bunts like all managers do when they need to move a runner in certain situations), gawd-awful defense, just horrendous; piss poor baserunning; amazingly bad situational hitting (guys won't go the other way when we NEED a hit, even with the shift on, granted this is not just a White sox problem).

 

Basically the only thing I think Robin does well is manage the pitching staff (the best manager in baseball history couldn't do better maneuvering bullpen pieces since most of our bullpen pitchers have been abysmal the past few years) and manage well in extra inning games (except the 2 every year we run out of pitchers).

 

Overall I'd give him a D-plus as a manager. You guys willing to grade him??

Thome for Manager 2017

 

S.O.S. Same old s***.

 

Manager barely matters unless it is someone as insane and toxic as Ozzie. Ned Yost was the biggest dumb piece of s*** manager in baseball, until their young players finally started playing well. Now he's a genius. And if you want to argue "hey, I never said Ned Yost is a genius," then look at the Royals record and see how much the manager matters if you have a lineup full of valuable players.

 

The amount of anger and vitriol heaped on Robin is at about a 10 when it should be more like a 1.5.

 

That should be directed at KW. When Ozzie left there really wasn't a formal hiring process. No interviews, just persuading an former player with no experience to manage a team.

 

That should be directed at KW. When Ozzie left there really wasn't a formal hiring process. No interviews, just persuading an former player with no experience to manage a team.

 

I would direct blame first at:

 

Adam LaRoche

Avisail Garcia

Jeff Shark

Alexei Ramirez (for half the season)

 

If those guys play as expected, way less meatheads are going crazy about the manager, who doesn't matter.

Rick Hahn is a Ken doll. Good enough. When Jerry croaks we'll get this ship turned around. Til then, sit back and strap it down.

I would feel better if Robin would admit he did a s*** job this year. He was proclaiming playoffs before the season. We're 10 under .500 for goshsakes.

loyal at times to a fault.

 

Hahn would dump his ass I'm sure, but he's got Jerry to answer to

Disgusted.

 

As I wrote elsewhere, managers should be assigned WAR. If they were, I'd give Ventura a -5 to -8 range. Just pulling that out of a hat. But I think there is no question managers make a difference. And it starts with whether the team plays good fundamental baseball. Do they field well, or as well as they could give their talent? Do they run the bases well? Do they move runners over? Bunt if called upon? If they dont, this is a managerial problem.

 

Anyone think the Giants win the World Series without Bochy? Any of the 3 they just won?

 

Managers also make in game decisions that win and lose games. Ventura is not good here either. They set lineups, decide who sits, etc.

 

Ultimately, how can Ventura hold any player accountable when he hasn't been held accountable himself??

 

Another wasted year coming up. Sox could be better, but there is no way they will overcome the anchor that Ventura is for the team.

 

I don't live in Chicago, but I'm not going to see them when they come to DC or Baltimore. And it's hard for me because I have a 12 year old son who loves baseball.

You can add to your list how the team played coming out of spring training. The team was not ready to play and that IMO is the manager and his coaching staff's fault. Fundamentals are really bad on this team. Most of the ream came from other organizations so it's not like we taught them, but you would think the manager would see the bad play an speak to them and/or assign a coach to help him improve with a warning thats not how we play baseball here. To be honest I think some of our guys that came up through our farm system seem to have better fundamentals than many of the others. I hate to rip on Robin because there's only so much he can do but I don't think he's doing enough. Bottom line he's the manager and responsible for how the team should play.

You can add to your list how the team played coming out of spring training. The team was not ready to play and that IMO is the manager and his coaching staff's fault. Fundamentals are really bad on this team. Most of the ream came from other organizations so it's not like we taught them, but you would think the manager would see the bad play an speak to them and/or assign a coach to help him improve with a warning thats not how we play baseball here. To be honest I think some of our guys that came up through our farm system seem to have better fundamentals than many of the others. I hate to rip on Robin because there's only so much he can do but I don't think he's doing enough. Bottom line he's the manager and responsible for how the team should play.

 

 

exactly .... 100 %

Disgusted.

 

As I wrote elsewhere, managers should be assigned WAR. If they were, I'd give Ventura a -5 to -8 range. Just pulling that out of a hat. But I think there is no question managers make a difference. And it starts with whether the team plays good fundamental baseball. Do they field well, or as well as they could give their talent? Do they run the bases well? Do they move runners over? Bunt if called upon? If they dont, this is a managerial problem.

 

Anyone think the Giants win the World Series without Bochy? Any of the 3 they just won?

 

Managers also make in game decisions that win and lose games. Ventura is not good here either. They set lineups, decide who sits, etc.

 

Ultimately, how can Ventura hold any player accountable when he hasn't been held accountable himself??

 

Another wasted year coming up. Sox could be better, but there is no way they will overcome the anchor that Ventura is for the team.

 

I don't live in Chicago, but I'm not going to see them when they come to DC or Baltimore. And it's hard for me because I have a 12 year old son who loves baseball.

Bochy managed teams have lost at least 86 games 8 times. His first 2 seasons in SF, they lost over 90 each time. Now he is a genius. Funny how a better roster works. Go check out Joe Torre and Booby Cox records when they didn't have good players. Even Joe Maddon's.

For ten or fifteen years under KW, we've been attempting to catch lightning in a bottle throwing together players from different teams (mostly with losing organizations, although a few have been exceptions) and expecting that mixing in a few home-grown players would be enough to get it done.

 

Obviously, Sale, Rodon, Ramirez and Abreu have held their own, but they spent very little time in our system and were fundamentally-flawed (the Cubans) in some mental or defensive aspect of the game that hasn't been correctable at the major league level.

 

The club hasn't been able to draft and develop a single impact player that was sound on both sides of the ball, both offense and defense. Thompson might actually be the closest, but who knows if his hitting will hold up. Avi Garcia, Soler and Viciedo are essentially the same player, and even Eaton's had a lot of issues putting all aspects of his game, offense/defense/fundamentals/baserunning together at the same time, at least not on a consistent basis.

 

That's simply not going to work in this day and age. The White Sox can't afford to pay the Heywards/Uptons/Gordons/Cespedes so we consistently get stuck with the next tier down in terms of talent, with Robertson being the only free agent other than Dunn who was close to his prime as a player (and both 2-3 years past, realistically).

 

 

Other than Buster Posey, SF a decade or fifteen years from now will have zero players getting more than 10% in their Hall of Fame votes, but they will have at least 3 World Championships during that time period.

 

That says something about the level of managing they've received.

Next year should be do or die for Ventura and Hahn. They clearly want to go for it again, so there needs to be good transactions and Ventura needs them ready out of the gate.

Just to note - the "all in" moves this idea would require are extremely likely to damage the franchise for multiple subsequent seasons.

Just to note - the "all in" moves this idea would require are extremely likely to damage the franchise for multiple subsequent seasons.

 

you may have a point ... i guess it will depends on the game plan they develop.

 

a great post. it took me a long while to come up with something.

Next year should be do or die for Ventura and Hahn. They clearly want to go for it again, so there needs to be good transactions and Ventura needs them ready out of the gate.

This year should have been do or die for Ventura. Hahn should have hired his own guy in the first place.

Bochy managed teams have lost at least 86 games 8 times. His first 2 seasons in SF, they lost over 90 each time. Now he is a genius. Funny how a better roster works. Go check out Joe Torre and Booby Cox records when they didn't have good players. Even Joe Maddon's.

 

As Caulfield said, there weren't any great players on those Giants teams other than Buster Posey and Baumgartner. I mean they won the World Series with our castoff starter Jake Peavy in the #2 hole!!

Let's not discredit the Giants' roster. Bochy is an incredible manager, but they were way more than just Bumgarner and Posey on the field.

Bumgarner has a decent chance to merit consideration for the Hall of Fame if he can sustain his recent level of pitching another five years, but guys like Cain, Hudson, Peavy and Lincecum became shades of their former selves and they still won.

 

Sure, they had Sandoval as well, but it will be hard to name more than a couple of position players from that starting roster a decade from now.

 

What will stand out is the pitching, Posey and Sandoval.

http://www.southsidesox.com/2015/10/3/9443...t-robin-ventura

 

Says it better than most could on the subject of Ventura.

 

Also, it's not clear that Ventura received an extension of any sort, just that he's being "retained" as the manager for next season...with the obvious concern now that the new bench coach (let's say, Jose Valentin or McEwing if he doesn't go to the Mariners) then automatically starts out as the back-up QB and the pressure's going to be immense on the team (regardless of what they do in the off-season) to get off to a much better start than in 2015.

 

As things stand right now, they're going to be picked for last place (behind DET) by about 80% of the baseball writers out there. And that woul be the case even with Yasiel Puig and Iwakuma/Latos coming on board, possibly.

Edited October 3, 201510 yr by caulfield12

http://www.southsidesox.com/2015/10/3/9443...t-robin-ventura

 

Says it better than most could on the subject of Ventura.

 

Also, it's not clear that Ventura received an extension of any sort, just that he's being "retained" as the manager for next season...with the obvious concern now that the new bench coach (let's say, Jose Valentin or McEwing if he doesn't go to the Mariners) then automatically starts out as the back-up QB and the pressure's going to be immense on the team (regardless of what they do in the offseason) to get off to a much better start than in 2015.

After the 2013 debacle, the White Sox did not announce Ventura's extension until January.

Disgusted.

 

As I wrote elsewhere, managers should be assigned WAR. If they were, I'd give Ventura a -5 to -8 range. Just pulling that out of a hat. But I think there is no question managers make a difference. And it starts with whether the team plays good fundamental baseball. Do they field well, or as well as they could give their talent? Do they run the bases well? Do they move runners over? Bunt if called upon? If they dont, this is a managerial problem.

 

Anyone think the Giants win the World Series without Bochy? Any of the 3 they just won?

 

Managers also make in game decisions that win and lose games. Ventura is not good here either. They set lineups, decide who sits, etc.

 

Ultimately, how can Ventura hold any player accountable when he hasn't been held accountable himself??

 

Another wasted year coming up. Sox could be better, but there is no way they will overcome the anchor that Ventura is for the team.

 

I don't live in Chicago, but I'm not going to see them when they come to DC or Baltimore. And it's hard for me because I have a 12 year old son who loves baseball.

If you think managers have enough of an impact to have -5 or -8 WAR then they are vastly underpaid. No way. Also, Bochy is a good manager but to me the Giants are the poster-child for why baseball playoffs are a crap shoot. They won because Cody Ross randomly became Mike Trout for a few series and Bumgarner became Superman.

As Caulfield said, there weren't any great players on those Giants teams other than Buster Posey and Baumgartner. I mean they won the World Series with our castoff starter Jake Peavy in the #2 hole!!

How many great.players have been on the White Sox the last 4 years? You confirmed my point. A manager can't make junk a playoff team.

If you really think RV is the reason the Sox aren't a playoff team, you need to get off the Sox will suck for the foreseeable future and have so many holes train.

If you really think RV is the reason the Sox aren't a playoff team, you need to get off the Sox will suck for the foreseeable future and have so many holes train.

 

No but it's been long enough where another voice is needed. He's one of a handful of coaches who have gotten a 5th year with his record. That's really what it comes down to. At some point you have to make a change just by default.