Best Boston General Manager -- the 00s

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

If you came over from this thread, you'll have a pretty good idea of what's going on.

Recently I was thinking that during this century, Boston has had a lot of smart (and a couple of dumb) guys running their four franchises. What prompted this thinking was the absolute heist that Danny Ainge pulled off with the Nets a few years ago (Pierce, Garnett and Terry for three unprotected number ones, the right to flip picks and some flotsam) and I think that may have been the best deal (not draft pick) that any Boston GM has made since Duquette landed Pedro.

After you tally up the draft picks, the trades, the free agent signings; which GM has made the best moves? In the comments say which moves you loved and which ones you hated.

A couple of caveats before we begin:

1. I chose 2000 as the beginning of this poll because that's when most Boston GMs began, but Dan Duquette's and Rick Pitino's careers began prior to that. If you want to weigh the moves made during the 90s, that's fine by me. If you don't, that's okay too.

2. For simplicity's sake, I have Mike Hazen and Dave Dombrowski as a two-headed beast. Hazen has the GM title, but Dombrowski seems like the moves man. I have no idea how their responsibilities are split and I'm not going to hazard a guess because I'll be wrong. Same thing with Bill Belichick and Scott Pioli.

3. Finally, I know that the Bruins, Celtics and Patriots don't play baseball but I couldn't figure out a way to cross post to all four Boston sports forums, so I stuck with the Sox forum because it gets the most eyeballs.

4. I really wanted to add Chris Wallace, Jeff Gorton, Mike Port and a separate line items for Belichick and Pioli and Cherington and Hoyer but there are only so many responses you can give.

5. See the next thread about the Worst GMs of the 2000s. Again, you can only ask one question per thread.

 

[The Talented Allen Ripley]

The Pitino/Ainge timelines need to be edited.

 

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Fixed.

 

[Byrdbrain]

I am fascinated to hear the reasons behind whoever voted for Dombrowski/Hazen, I have high hopes and signing Price and trading for Kimbrel are nice but the best?

 

[Kliq]

I'd like to hear the argument for anyone other than BB/Pioli duo. I know Theo reversed the curse and all that, but that is in a sport were the money isn't even and certain teams (like the Red Sox) have a natural leg up on opposition and can afford to sign Schilling while also paying Manny and Pedro tons of cash. BB's ability to continually find productive players from all over the place, from the first round to the waiver wire, is uncanny.

 

[benhogan]

Belichick.

As a NY football Giants fan I can't for life of me understand why they handed the keys, after Parcells, to Ray Handley, clock Guru, and not the young mastermind behind their ferocious defense...

 

[Lose Remerswaal]

I'd like to hear the argument for anyone other than BB/Pioli duo. I know Theo reversed the curse and all that, but that is in a sport were the money isn't even and certain teams (like the Red Sox) have a natural leg up on opposition and can afford to sign Schilling while also paying Manny and Pedro tons of cash. BB's ability to continually find productive players from all over the place, from the first round to the waiver wire, is uncanny.

There are folks here who don't like Bill Belichick. I know, I know, hard to believe, but they just don't like him.

 

[grimshaw]

I can't imagine there is any competition whatsoever until you go back to Red Auerbach. Him and Belichick are so far above everyone else in Boston sports history that 3rd place is probably the more compelling discussion.

Theo is 3rd IMO - but an argument could be made for any GM who can maintain dominance with a cap.

 

[lexrageorge]

I voted for Belichick for the reasons that have been stated above and elsewhere.

However, as to why some folks would have picked other GMs, we probably need to keep in mind that this board is promoted by its very name as being a Red Sox oriented board. And we are in the Red Sox forum. Not all Red Sox fans will be Patriots fans. For the die hard Sox fans who could care less about football (they do exist), the breaking of the 86 year old curse on an October night in Saint Louis in 2004 crowns Epstein as the greatest Boston GM since at least Red Auerbach.

As for Ainge's 2 votes, he did pull off a coup of a trade in a league where the rules are stacked against a team like Boston making that kind of a trade.

The Sox did win the title in Fenway in Cherington's tenure, so I'm OK with his one vote.

Not sure why someone would have voted for a guy that's been here less than a year and has yet to win anything with the Red Sox, but every poll has its outliers.

 

[GreyisGone]

Really the only argument against Belichick the GM is that he also had Belichick the coach to help him.

 

[Al Zarilla]

There are folks here who don't like Bill Belichick.

I don't remember seeing that stated here except occasionally in a game thread in the heat of a (seldom) Pats game that isn't going great. The onside or pooch or whatever it was kick vs. Philly was one. Josh McD gets it way more than BB. If you like to win, you have to love BB.

 

[reggiecleveland]

I was trying to come up with an argument against Belicek and I came p with the fact he has has a great QB the whole time. But I remember he was part of drafting him and the coach who decided to play him. He is the opposite of Pitino in almost every way. Bland,unemotional, almost reclusive. He finds a way to make the players he can get fit his system.

 

[Tyrone Biggums]

You could actually make a case for Danny Ainge for a few reasons. He broke up that 2003 team, acquired KG and Ray, managed to keep Paul Pierce and then traded KG and Pierce for a massive heist. Hired Doc and CBS. The reason why he is not considered the best is because of a somewhat subpar draft record and KGs injury in 2009. Also not resigning Tony Allen killed that team. In most markets the success that Theo or Ainge had would make the case for the best GM in the market. Boston is spoiled by a ton of success.

 

[Rough Carrigan]

Belichick.

As a NY football Giants fan I can't for life of me understand why they handed the keys, after Parcells, to Ray Handley, clock Guru, and not the young mastermind behind their ferocious defense...

Was it Parcells or was it Lombardi who there was suspicion afterward that he helped pick an inferior successor to make his era look even better?

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

I understand why Belichick is winning, but I think it's Theo. Winning in football is all about the quaterback. 13 of the last 15 Superbowls have featured either Tom Brady, Peyton Manning or Ben Roethlisberger. The Patriots have had an incredible run, but having arguably the greatest quarterback of all time is a luxury no baseball team can lean on. Without being able to have that kind of advantage, Theo Epstein built two World Series championship teams and left the skeleton of a third behind when he departed prior to the 2012 season (Ortiz, Pedroia, Ellsbury, Lester, Bogaerts, Lackey, Buchholz, and Andrew Miller). He operated in a division with a financial behemoth when there was no salary cap in play and very little in the way of disincentives to spend your problems away, and an unbalanced schedule that force them to play that monster of an organization 18 or 19 times every season.

That he then turned around the Cubs and made them an absolute juggernaut of a team in as long as it has taken the Red Sox (mostly through Cherington) to turn around a similarly bloated and declining roster but only to the degree that they are expecting to be competitive for a playoff spot, not the best record in the league just solidifies my belief that he's the best in the sport. Of course, this is best in Boston, so the Cubs success doesn't get included here. It's just a nice additional bit of evidence that the credit I'm giving him as the best in town during the 2000's is justified.

 

[Moviegoer]

What Theo has accomplished in Boston makes him one of the best executives in baseball right now, there's no denying that. But what Bellicheck has accomplished has made him one the best football brains of all time. Possibly the best period. I'm not sure I see the QB as being quite as much of a make or break aspect as you do. It sure as hell helps of course, but football is ultimately far too much of a team sport for that to be such a do or die situation. Cam Newton is one the best in the league, but without a better team around him nobody was able to pick up the slack from his bad Superbowl performance. And Manning has been pretty subpar for some time now but got another ring because of the team around him.
In most any other town Theo would be the hands down best, but Boston has an embarrassment of riches in this department the last couple decades and Theo is a tough luck second.

 

[Buzzkill Pauley]

Really the only argument against Belichick the GM is that he also had Belichick the coach to help him.

Nah, there are more.

I voted for Theo because although Belichick won under the cap, his competition was likewise under the same cap constraints.

That is to say, at no time did Belichick ever face off against a team with unfettered resources like the New York Yankees.

People around here must be forgetting just how huge a hurdle the late-90's/early-00's Yankees were for Theo to lead the Sox over. Steinbrenner did not operate the Yankees under the same fiscal constraints as his competitors, which is something that simply can't be said about owners of the Steelers, Colts, Broncos, or Ravens.

The Sox had a big payroll, too, but making the playoffs in 6 of Theo's first 7 years, when there was foremost always the Yankees to overcome in the AL East, is IMO the most impressive feat as GM of a sports team that I've witnessed.

 

[reggiecleveland]

Who has had comparable runs to the Pats though? No NFL team is really close. The Cards, Giants are at least comparable to what the Sox did under Theo. Theo was fantastic though, make no mistake.

 

[JimBoSox9]

I understand why Belichick is winning, but I think it's Theo. Winning in football is all about the quaterback. 13 of the last 15 Superbowls have featured either Tom Brady, Peyton Manning or Ben Roethlisberger. The Patriots have had an incredible run, but having arguably the greatest quarterback of all time is a luxury no baseball team can lean on. Without being able to have that kind of advantage, Theo Epstein built two World Series championship teams and left the skeleton of a third behind when he departed prior to the 2012 season (Ortiz, Pedroia, Ellsbury, Lester, Bogaerts, Lackey, Buchholz, and Andrew Miller). He operated in a division with a financial behemoth when there was no salary cap in play and very little in the way of disincentives to spend your problems away, and an unbalanced schedule that force them to play that monster of an organization 18 or 19 times every season.

That he then turned around the Cubs and made them an absolute juggernaut of a team in as long as it has taken the Red Sox (mostly through Cherington) to turn around a similarly bloated and declining roster but only to the degree that they are expecting to be competitive for a playoff spot, not the best record in the league just solidifies my belief that he's the best in the sport. Of course, this is best in Boston, so the Cubs success doesn't get included here. It's just a nice additional bit of evidence that the credit I'm giving him as the best in town during the 2000's is justified.

My grandchildren, learning about Boston's sports Golden Era at the turn of the century, will read this argument and buy it. It's the logical, accurate, right thing on paper...Football, QBs, SB appearances, properly weight the score to account for the luck of having Brady, and inch Theo ahead in the final tally. If Theo takes the Cubs to the promised land, I'm certain it will become a determinative argument to the majority. And in any other city in any other time, I'd give him the crown gladly.

But I saw this motherfucker work live.

Lumping Brady's SB totals in with Manning and Rothliesberger undderrates the extent to which Belichick has sucked the air out of the rest of the AFC's playoff success in his tenure. The other two have also suffered through multiple poor team seasons in a way Belichick only has nightmares about. He's not just sharper and luckier; he's operating on a level that I'm not sure more than four or five people in the league actually comprehend. There's also a nature/nurture component to getting the best QB ever out of the bottom of the draft, no? Drafting, salary cap, his ability to get the other 52 guys around Brady to be good enough year in and year out would be literally unbelievable if I wasn't watching the games every week.

Theo's been a little bit sharper and a little bit luckier than a lot of sharp and lucky folks in baseball, but you could also argue he got 2 World Series out of one great idea - pairing Moneyball's OBP focus with gazillions of dollars and talent, then left Boston unclear whether he was the right guy to bring them all the way back, and hasn't won anything with Chicago yet. There's multiple question marks in the portrait that paints him as a maestro, and if the Sox had won the Series in '86 I don't think he even gets Jeb Bush votes totals here.

 

[Buzzkill Pauley]

Who has had comparable runs to the Pats though? No NFL team is really close. The Cards, Giants are at least comparable to what the Sox did under Theo. Theo was fantastic though, make no mistake.

The Steelers (playoffs in 10/15 seasons) and especially the Colts (playoffs 12/15 seasons) are certainly comparable to the Patriots (playoffs 13/15 seasons).

And to repeat again, the Patriots have never faced -- and can never face, under the current rules -- the sort of intra-division hurdle in the AFC East that the Yankees have historically presented, and continue to present, to the Red Sox and the rest of the AL East. That kind of dominance by means of financial advantage simply doesn't exist when roster spending is hard-capped.

I don't count actual winning of the championship a matter reliant on the GM at all. In all sports, actually winning through depends foremost on the players, the coaches, and most especially the health of the team's key players being preserved through the course of the season.

 

[dbn]

Really the only argument against Belichick the GM is that he also had Belichick the coach to help him.

This is exactly why I did not vote for BB. If the question was who is the best GM and manager/head coach combo, I'd vote for Bill Belichick and Bill Belichick without a second thought. (edit: Theo and Tito would probably be my #2, Danny and Doc maybe #3, but I'd have to think about the other contenders.)

I'm not sure Bill isn't the right answer for just GM, too, but I think Ainge is a good choice and is whom I voted for.

 

[bankshot1]

I can't imagine there is any competition whatsoever until you go back to Red Auerbach. Him and Belichick are so far above everyone else in Boston sports history that 3rd place is probably the more compelling discussion.

Theo is 3rd IMO - but an argument could be made for any GM who can maintain dominance with a cap.

While i agree with both your assessment of BB and Auerbach (who to me is in a class by himself) but I just want to mention that Dick O'Connell, former Sox GM from the mid 60s to the late 70s, was a very good GM, and hugely instrumental in turning a perennial loser with a racist history into a contender while finding/promoting players like Reggie Smith, George Scott, Jim Rice and Luis Tiant. If not for the moron Heywood Sullivan, and the takeover of the Sox, O'Connell may have realized a World championship.

sorry for the mini-hi-jack.

 

[grimshaw]

Nah, there are more.

I voted for Theo because although Belichick won under the cap, his competition was likewise under the same cap constraints.

That is to say, at no time did Belichick ever face off against a team with unfettered resources like the New York Yankees.

People around here must be forgetting just how huge a hurdle the late-90's/early-00's Yankees were for Theo to lead the Sox over. Steinbrenner did not operate the Yankees under the same fiscal constraints as his competitors, which is something that simply can't be said about owners of the Steelers, Colts, Broncos, or Ravens.

The Sox had a big payroll, too, but making the playoffs in 6 of Theo's first 7 years, when there was foremost always the Yankees to overcome in the AL East, is IMO the most impressive feat as GM of a sports team that I've witnessed.

Interesting take, but I think you need to also factor in how awful the division was besides the Yankees, very much because of payroll disparity.. From 2003 - 2007 the only other team to crack .500 over that time was the Jays (twice including an 82-80 season). The rest of the division (including the Jays) combined was 1092-1329. Once the Rays started to figure things out, the Sox run of dominance started to fade under Theo as well. Getting into the playoffs was actually pretty easy because of those factors. Overcoming the Yankees in a short series, odds-wise was going to happen eventually because series tend to be crapshoots.

Also - the team Theo took over had a Pythag projection of 100 wins from Mike Port's 2002 team, so it's not like he had a bunch of scraps to work with once coming in.

 

[smastroyin]

People overrate by far the difficulty of the NFL cap, which with it's unguaranteed contracts, tags, and very short average careers is nothing like the NBA or NHL caps. Put another way, how often has an NFL team really felt bad about losing a guy because of his cap hit?

This is also to say that these arguments are all circular, and while I understand the discussion and the point, trying to fine tune the argument from sport to sport is nearly useless.

 

[chrisfont9]

Really the only argument against Belichick the GM is that he also had Belichick the coach to help him.

Well, and Laurence Maroney, Brandon Meriwether, Ellis Hobbs, Chad Jackson, Eugene Wilson, Bethel Johnson, almost everyone they drafted from 2005-08, and so forth. But their drafts have gotten good again, and anyway Belichick is the greatest coach with the greatest QB and an ability to fit people into a system, so they succeed despite some poor drafting over the years.

I voted for Theo because of the hand he had in building three winners, without the greatest coach of all time to turn it all into results.

 

[dbn]

Well, and Laurence Maroney, Brandon Meriwether, Ellis Hobbs, Chad Jackson, Eugene Wilson, Bethel Johnson, almost everyone they drafted from 2005-08, and so forth. But their drafts have gotten good again, and anyway Belichick is the greatest coach with the greatest QB and an ability to fit people into a system, so they succeed despite some poor drafting over the years.

I voted for Theo because of the hand he had in building three winners, without the greatest coach of all time to turn it all into results.

There has been rather a lot of discussion in BBtL over the years about teams/GMs/coaches ability to draft, and the general consensus has been that it's really hard to judge draft ability even though it's rather easy to single out picks that didn't work out, for each and every team. I suspect that it'd take less time to look up the Patriots' bust-picks than it would to look up their great picks.

 

[The Best Catch in 100 Years]

The Steelers (playoffs in 10/15 seasons) and especially the Colts (playoffs 12/15 seasons) are certainly comparable to the Patriots (playoffs 13/15 seasons).

Nice try, but no. In the two seasons in which they missed the playoffs, the Patriots went 9-7 and 11-5. Of course, Brady barely played in the 11-5 season, and that was the only year in the history of the current playoff system in which an 11-5 team missed the playoffs. They have kept up this insane level of consistency without the benefit of the periodic high draft picks any normal team gets when they have a bad year (or, say, tank a season to get Andrew Luck). Also the Colts and Steelers never won an NFL-record 21 games in a row, or had a perfect regular season.

On the payroll thing, the gaps between the 2015 opening day payrolls of the Tigers and Royals, and the 2014 Dodgers and Giants are quite large too--are Dayton Moore and Brian Sabean also better GMs than Bill Belichick?