I'm increasingly convinced Henry wasn't interested in hiring a Dombrowski "type" -- he was interested in hiring Dave Dombrowski, and Dave Dombrowski only. Obviously, he has an enormous amount of professional respect for the guy, and when the opportunity finally arose to grab him he didn't hesitate. Cherington was collateral damage at that point, but I suspect he otherwise would have kept his job in the offseason if the Tigers hadn't moved on from DD.
Red Sox announce Dave Dombrowski is their new president of baseball operations.
- Thread starter jimbobim
- Start date
I wish we would hold off with "Trading High" on Shaw. He shows an awful good approach at the plate. Maybe the light just came on for him. Of course Nava had a pretty good run there too and look what happened to him at the plate. It's always hard to say if they will keep it going but Shaw has looked awfully good with a bat.Drek717 said:
I imagine we'll find out soon enough if the new regime believes in trading while value is high.
Yeah, I really think the comments about how Dombrowski is replacing Lucchino, rather than Cherington, are misguided. Of course, it's impossible to know exactly what Lucchino's authority with regard to baseball ops really was, but he was part of the ownership group. All GM's are subject to ownership involvement to varying degrees. I doubt Cherington viewed reporting to Lucchino as the same thing as bringing in an executive to specifically oversee baseball ops.
Lucchino may have had some input on roster decisions and direction, but he was never the public face of the roster construction of the Boston Red Sox. Dombrowski would have been, with or without Cherington. Whether they say so publically or not, I think Henry and Werner knew that this move was signifying the need for a different direction in baseball ops. They may have loved to have had Cherington back in a reduced role (albeit with the same title), but their intentions were pretty clear IMO.
Lucchino may have had some input on roster decisions and direction, but he was never the public face of the roster construction of the Boston Red Sox. Dombrowski would have been, with or without Cherington. Whether they say so publically or not, I think Henry and Werner knew that this move was signifying the need for a different direction in baseball ops. They may have loved to have had Cherington back in a reduced role (albeit with the same title), but their intentions were pretty clear IMO.
AB in DC said:
My guess is that Cherington perhaps was led to believe he would have more autonomy with Lucchino stepping away and Kennedy only taking over the business half of his responsibilities, perhaps even be promoted to the position, rather than have a guy hired from the outside that essentially cuts his legs out from underneath him.
In other words, whatever latitude Cherington had working under Lucchino he isn't/wasn't going to get under a "Dombrowski type".
Yossarian said:
I don't think it's been a feature of this thread, but Henry employed Dombrowski in Miami from 99 to 2001. Henry sold Miami and bought the Sox in 2002. The Marlins went on to win the WS in 2003 in part with the core Henry/Dombrowski built.
“@alexspeier: Cherington had believed that he was a ”participant“ in the process of Sox figuring out the way to correct course. At that point…”
“@alexspeier: …when after weeks of dialogue with John Henry he hadn’t been privy to team’s thoughts, he felt he couldn’t be ”all-in“ if he stayed as GM”
“@JMastrodonato: Cherington said he specifically asked about front office structure when he hired Jerry Dipoto last week and heard nothing like this.”
“@alexspeier: …when after weeks of dialogue with John Henry he hadn’t been privy to team’s thoughts, he felt he couldn’t be ”all-in“ if he stayed as GM”
“@JMastrodonato: Cherington said he specifically asked about front office structure when he hired Jerry Dipoto last week and heard nothing like this.”
AB in DC said:
Of course he did, but he also had a lot of non-baseball-ops responsibilities, which Dombrowski won't. It's kind of inherent in the situation that the new GM will have less responsibility and autonomy than the old one. And on top of that, in the new regime Ben would be one of the holdovers whose mess Dombrowski was hired to clean up. There's a lot of humble pie to swallow in that scenario; I can understand Ben taking a pass.
soxhop411 said:
So Cherington will be leaving with bad feelings, too. When was the last front office departure we had that occurred with no rancor on either side? Jed Hoyer 6 years ago?
Savin Hillbilly said:
Still, the only reason that Ben become GM in the first place is that Lucchino won the power struggle against Theo on baseball ops. So I always viewed Ben the GM having less responsibility and autonomy than Theo the GM did.
This feels like a smaller change in direction than 2011. Am I wrong?
I don't have much sympathy for Ben, happens all the time when upper management is thinking about making a change. What were they supposed to do tell him they were interviewing DD? It's a performance based business. Management had spent almost $400 million in 2014 and 2015 for two last place teams.twoBshorty said:
twoBshorty said:
If there were no rancor on either side, why would there be a departure in the first place? It's not like we're Tampa where everyone acknowledges that there are limitations with the job and people who excel will want to leave for greener pastures.
AB in DC said:
I think you may be. From the beginning, the Henry era has been dominated by a power struggle or dialectic between Lucchino and the GM du jour. The change from Theo to Ben only changed one side of that dialectic. This changes both. There's a new sheriff in town. This will be the biggest transformation of the organization we've seen since Henry et al bought it.
ShaneTrot said:
I don't really have sympathy either (something tells me Ben will be just fine in post-Red Sox life), but if what he is saying is accurate, I'm somewhat confused why the Red Sox were (supposedly) surprised he (Cherington) declined to stay on as GM.
I think the meme that "Ben hoarded prospects" is unwarranted because it becomes a lazy shorthand for problems with the Red Sox that anyone can imagine would've improved the team without these moves having any basis in reality and depending on hindsight for confirmation.DourDoerr said:
It's not that any of us can't think prospects aren't going to pan out and should be dealt (heck, I've felt that about draft picks as soon as they were made), but the team has only held them too long if there's an actual proposition that they turned down (like
For the record I don't think bringing in DD means the Sox are looking to divest themselves of prospects. Trades like those made for his more memorable deals in Detroit, but his overall history suggests a good evaluator of talent. JWH et al didn't hand him this new position just to fix such an immediate problem.
Edit: Montero, not Olivo.
RULE #1: NEVER TRUST HR.czar said:
Cherington already had a history when he willingly stepped down as co-GM after the gorilla suit incident blew over and Theo came back. Maybe Henry just expected he would act the good soldier again.
That was my take. I'm judging only from tweets but Cherington came off to me as a whiner. Reminded me a little of Jim O'Brien packing it in after Ainge made a rebuilding trade.ShaneTrot said:
soxhop411 said:
Actually, that's en vogue. If he was using sticky notes, he'd be downright hip.
soxhop411 said:
You mean he wasn't entering notes using a frictionless, serendipitous app developed by a Stanford-based start up on a tablet touch-screen?!?!
We're DOOMED!!!
czar said:
I don't think they were really surprised at all. Not involving Ben in the decision about who his next boss would be pretty much screams "you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem".
Yeah don't you usually trade high on guys who play positions where you don't have a massive gaping hole?strek1 said:
jscola85 said:
And you never know if the "Cherington was offered GM spot, unexpectedly refused" aspect is even true, or an agreed-upon narrative to make sure that a good person appears to go out on his own terms.
Makes complete sense. I would also be surprised if Ben has trouble finding a decent job soon, even if it is not technically a GM role. Byrnes got one of those "VP of baseball operations" jobs twice after he was fired as a GM.dcmissle said:
SoxVindaloo said:
If I was running a team I'd probably hire every recently unemployed GM I could if only to get some insight on what other teams are doing/thinking, who they like, what their blind spots might be, who's a good scout to poach, etc. That kind of information's got to have considerable value.
It's like we're talking about mob bosses over here.Green Monster said:
The quote that sticks with me is Ben's previous "I've always had a boss and I assume I'll still report to someone" line when the LL news broke. Ownership said they were going to split baseball and business ops up, so how is DD coming aboard different than the boss he expected to get?
My real concern is that Dipoto is loyal to Cherington and heads elsewhere.
Oh, and after seeing the pictures, he does look like Mr. Rodgers.
I am going to come out strongly in favor of the move to bring in Dombrowski. Looking at individual moves or even strengths and weaknesses of individual teams he's constructed misses the forest for the trees. He's built a winner everywhere he's been, and he's worked in different eras and under owners with different philosophies from win now to blow it up. The net of everything is quite positive, as shown by that graph several pages back, despite ways to quibble with its methodology. I'm sure he's well v, ersed in modern analytics and has the scouting background to know both what they tell you and, more importantly, what they don't tell you.
The biggest advantage is that he won't be emotionally attached to any of the players in the organization. He has also shown two traits that I think are key to building the pitching staff that this first-rate offense deserves. First, he's shown that he can properly value the future vs. the present in prospect trades. Second, he's shown that he clearly understands the Charley Finley maxim: "It's not signing superstars for big money that will kill you, it is signing nonstars to superstar money that will kill you. In that vein, I hope that one of the first things he does is discuss the "never acquire a pitcher over 30 on a long-term contract" edict with John Henry, and the second thing he does is explain why overpaying for Miguel Cabrera is very different from overpaying for Ric Porcello. Put another way, explain why "overpaying in dollars to underpay in years of commitment" is not necessarily a higher risk-return investment frontier--to put it in Henry's wheelhouse--than as any other strategy for acquiring top tier talent.
The second tier signings of Ramirez, Sandoval, and Porcello to first tier money, came from that edict, though to my knowledge there was no specific edict from ownership to sign those particular players this particular offseason. Thus, those decisions lie squarely in Ben Cherington's lap. In contrast, the hands of the Detroit owner are clearly documented in the long-term big money contracts handed out by Dombrowski. At least in the signing of Miggy, I remember without having to look it up a quote attributed to Illich along the lines of "I just can't imagine Miggy ever playing for anyone else."
So Bravo to ownership for recognizing there was a problem, and taking a bold step to fix it by bringing in one of the best of all time. If Ben Cherington truly had the oppportunity to work for Dave Dombrowski and turned it down, just add that to the long line of bad decisions he's made in the past 4 years. Even in 2012 with the brilliant house cleaning after they fell out of contention, he made many small decisions -- like trading Reddick plus for Bailey and Lowrie plus for Melancon -- that were questionable even without hindsight, and the failure of those transactions led to the need to punt the 2012 season.
The biggest advantage is that he won't be emotionally attached to any of the players in the organization. He has also shown two traits that I think are key to building the pitching staff that this first-rate offense deserves. First, he's shown that he can properly value the future vs. the present in prospect trades. Second, he's shown that he clearly understands the Charley Finley maxim: "It's not signing superstars for big money that will kill you, it is signing nonstars to superstar money that will kill you. In that vein, I hope that one of the first things he does is discuss the "never acquire a pitcher over 30 on a long-term contract" edict with John Henry, and the second thing he does is explain why overpaying for Miguel Cabrera is very different from overpaying for Ric Porcello. Put another way, explain why "overpaying in dollars to underpay in years of commitment" is not necessarily a higher risk-return investment frontier--to put it in Henry's wheelhouse--than as any other strategy for acquiring top tier talent.
The second tier signings of Ramirez, Sandoval, and Porcello to first tier money, came from that edict, though to my knowledge there was no specific edict from ownership to sign those particular players this particular offseason. Thus, those decisions lie squarely in Ben Cherington's lap. In contrast, the hands of the Detroit owner are clearly documented in the long-term big money contracts handed out by Dombrowski. At least in the signing of Miggy, I remember without having to look it up a quote attributed to Illich along the lines of "I just can't imagine Miggy ever playing for anyone else."
So Bravo to ownership for recognizing there was a problem, and taking a bold step to fix it by bringing in one of the best of all time. If Ben Cherington truly had the oppportunity to work for Dave Dombrowski and turned it down, just add that to the long line of bad decisions he's made in the past 4 years. Even in 2012 with the brilliant house cleaning after they fell out of contention, he made many small decisions -- like trading Reddick plus for Bailey and Lowrie plus for Melancon -- that were questionable even without hindsight, and the failure of those transactions led to the need to punt the 2012 season.
alwyn96 said:
You mean you'd want to know what other teams WERE thinking that got their execs fired.
It feels like they're more splitting Lucchino's portfolio than filling his position. Dombro is much more hands-on daily in the talent side than Larry ever was, there's little question of that. I doubt Ben anticipated the hire would result in a micromanaging increase.OCD SS said:
It's pretty clear that Dombro and Farrell are Henry Guys. The GM's role the next 3 years are going to be to provide those guys with information.
8slim said:
Not at all. Just saying the opportunity arose and the Red Sox pounced. We probably won't ever know if they were planning on getting rid of BC. I don't think they were.
I think there has to be an expectation of being competitive, but I doubt anyone but the shrillest critics would deem anything short of the playoffs as unacceptable.JimD said:
Edit: I should also note, that the appearance of progress (e.g. signing/trading for a big name FA pitcher; shoring up the pen with a major acquisition) will likely be as important as the actual results on the field as far as that question is concerned.
As long as they're clearly trying to compete, I'm okay if they ultimately fall short.JimD said:
We're about five pitchers and some luck away from being a very good team. Neither of those are particularly easy gets, but neither of them are absurdly impossible gets either. Luck in particular, does not make rational business decisions.
I agree with a lot of the above, but have to disagree with the notion that one can't look back and observe that BC held onto more of his prospects than he should and thus devalued them in the exposure. Sure, teams are following players and consider long term performance, but they don't actually know how they'll play in the majors until they play in the majors. Once they're daylighted though, a lot becomes apparent and the players do lose luster. If a car dealer has a new car to sell and he knows it's a lemon, he would like to sell it to you before a test drive when it becomes apparent that the brakes are squishy, the heater doesn't work, etc. BC didn't decide which players were lemons - he kept most of them until they proved they were lemons or not.OCD SS said:
It's true that I can't offer prospective trades that BC turned down, but I think it's reasonable to assume decent prospects have value and one should be able to turn them over if you have confidence in which ones to trade. And he eventually did trade those prospects - despite the poor performances with Boston - so some teams were tracking and still had some faith which reflects that there could have been a market prior as well. BC's method of player evaluation all the way to the major league level is risky in that one reveals your hand every time. I think DD's hiring is a reaction to BC's tenure, much like a team replaces a "players' manager" (like Francona) with a hard-ass "players' ebola" (like Valentine). DD's hiring was also one of opportunity and familiarity, but I'd agree that a great reason was his ability to evaluate talent before that talent hits the major leagues. It's a bonus that he'll now get a big head start to the offseason.
As for "lazy shorthand" - well, I plead guilty to the shorthand, but think one man's "lazy" is another man's "efficient."
SoSH Baseball has some opinions and hot takes on the Dombrowski hiring: http://sonsofsamhorn.com/baseball/teams/al-east/boston-red-sox/dave-dombrowski-opinions-and-hot-takes/
It's long, but oh so worth it at the end. Seriously. Dan Ennis is genius, and the graphics department really outdid themselves.
It's long, but oh so worth it at the end. Seriously. Dan Ennis is genius, and the graphics department really outdid themselves.
Not sure if this was posted anywhere else already but here's Dombrowski being surprisingly frank on Hanley:
DD also would not have extended Porcello on those terms:
DD also would not have extended Porcello on those terms:
However Dombrowski works out in Boston, I think we will rue the hamhanded way that Cherington was treated at the end. Contrary to others here, I think Ben's chops as a farm system administrator and his 2013 title will help him get another position soon and many of his lieutenants will almost certainly follow him out the door after seeing how Cherington's loyalty was ultimately repaid. This was unnecessary in my opinion - Cherington was probably gone within the next year in any event but it could have been done in a more respectful way that could have allowed the team to potentially hold on to some of these valuable contributors. Now Dombrowski is going to likely have to completely rebuild the farm system administration while simultaneously deciding on who to deal away and who to keep after a great deal of institutional knowledge about these players has been allowed to walk out the door.
So I really don't understand what the function of a GM is going to be in this scenario. Its sort of like Theo with the Cubs - in everything but name he is the GM (which is exactly why Ben wouldn't stay on). My only hope is that he finds an excellent GM who heavily favors analytics that will challenge his assertions and be supported by ownership. IMHO, he was only giving lip service to the analytics when discussing it last night on the broadcast, ie just another piece of information.
I am also terrified that he thinks Bradley is a better player than Betts
I am also terrified that he thinks Bradley is a better player than Betts
DourDoerr said:I agree with a lot of the above, but have to disagree with the notion that one can't look back and observe that BC held onto more of his prospects than he should and thus devalued them in the exposure. Sure, teams are following players and consider long term performance, but they don't actually know how they'll play in the majors until they play in the majors. Once they're daylighted though, a lot becomes apparent and the players do lose luster. If a car dealer has a new car to sell and he knows it's a lemon, he would like to sell it to you before a test drive when it becomes apparent that the brakes are squishy, the heater doesn't work, etc. BC didn't decide which players were lemons - he kept most of them until they proved they were lemons or not.
It's true that I can't offer prospective trades that BC turned down, but I think it's reasonable to assume decent prospects have value and one should be able to turn them over if you have confidence in which ones to trade. And he eventually did trade those prospects - despite the poor performances with Boston - so some teams were tracking and still had some faith which reflects that there could have been a market prior as well. BC's method of player evaluation all the way to the major league level is risky in that one reveals your hand every time. I think DD's hiring is a reaction to BC's tenure, much like a team replaces a "players' manager" (like Francona) with a hard-ass "players' ebola" (like Valentine). DD's hiring was also one of opportunity and familiarity, but I'd agree that a great reason was his ability to evaluate talent before that talent hits the major leagues. It's a bonus that he'll now get a big head start to the offseason.
As for "lazy shorthand" - well, I plead guilty to the shorthand, but think one man's "lazy" is another man's "efficient."
Who are we actually talking about? When the talking heads discuss "prospect hoarding" it's usually with an eye towards driving their own content cycles and the short term benefit they derive from having big deals made. The thing is that the upper level guys Ben has kept off the table are now playing for the Red Sox. He "hoarded" Xander, Mookie, Swihart, maybe Vazquez and EdRo? Apparently teams called after JBJ in the winter and were told he wasn't available, so that definitely looks like a mark in his favor as opposed to the general, short-term consensus around here and the rest of the internet. I have no doubt they were willing to deal other players, like Owens, Johnson, Checchini, Marerro, Barnes or any other list of guys farther back who've fallen away. The thing is none of them really looked like the sort of top prospects that drive major deals. Any player that's too young to drive a deal because he hasn't "been exposed" is likely still seen to be risky enough that you can't get much for them anyway (So Margot wasn't going to headline a deal for Hammels - This is why you don't see prospect for prospect trades.) The rest of the industry in MLB is not that dumb.
The important thing for me is that the "day trader" approach is almost diametrically opposed to both player development (because you're making early calls on players with less information, and that increases your risk of getting burned) and an approach of "deep depth." Even the guys that we think might turn into impact talent have wound up making significant contributions to the team this year (and in year's past that have been more successful) and those minimum wage fixes allow you to plug holes while retaining the flexibility to make larger moves elsewhere (how well those resources are spent is a separate discussion).
Gash Prex said:
Were we watching the same broadcast? I didn't get that impression at all. His point more or less was that analytics is a useful piece of the puzzle but you have to understand their limitations. When he was talking about Iglesias for example, "I don't need analytics to tell me that Iglesias is/isn't a great shortstop". Fangraphs pegs Jose at 1.5 UZR/150 this season and RngR pegs him at below average (-0.7) in 2015.
He then went on to acknowledge situations in which his eyes can't totally decipher what's going on, pitch framing. He might hear from a scout that a certain catcher frames pitches exceptionally well but it takes a lot of data over a season(s) in order to really "see"/determine if that player is getting favorable calls compared to others.
There is not a single GM in baseball that makes decisions solely based on WAR or PECOTA projections or what have you. There has always been a balance between stats and scouting. Dombrowski isn't a dunce, he's an ivy educated executive with extensive scouting experience. You don't stay in the game for 40 years without adapting.
JimD said:
What was so disrespectful? I don't know about anyone else, but I'm never consulted when my boss is being replaced. Ben knew he wasn't going to be reporting to Sam Kennedy, and I've heard nothing indicating that he was expecting a direct line to Henry/Werner. So he knew he was getting a new boss one way or the other.
JimD, on 20 Aug 2015 - 08:57 AM, said:
JimD said:
If you think this was disrespectful or distasteful just wait for DD's meeting/conversation with the Manager recovering/treating for cancer in which he probably will be reassigned and maybe given a raise for cover. For BC, find it hard to believe he didn't sense that he would lose some baseball decision making authority. I don't buy the Theo Epstein Defense of NESN and Henry forced Hanley Pablo or Porcello on me. All have played to their worst possible outcomes this year and the Boston outrage machine over 1 year of performance ignores that players can bounce back( I think Sandoval and Porcello can bounce back but Hanley needs to accept a move to 1rst and going on the DL with nagging injuries. I hate the idea of trading good pieces so Henry can avoid the luxury tax repeater violation.). The farm system the Sox have is begging for some pieces to be traded. Not a leap to think Henry and the rest of the baseball world thinks DD will make better trades in comparison to Cherington.AB in DC said:
My biggest gripe with Cherington isn't the money because if you asked him today would he have given 150-160 to Lester? Yeah and he said he wanted to build around Ortiz Pedroia and Lester yesterday. So get ready for Henry to throw mea culpas when DD throws out massive likely greater than Lester money to Free Agent A in addition to trading for pitching. My biggest problem with Cherington was sticking with sunk costs so deep into seasons from Stephen Drew to Nava to Napoli to Masterson to Vic. If the Red Sox had played Castillo JBJ Shaw in June or even July instead of waiting till August before finally parting ways with Nap and Vic he'd be slightly more defensible for this year.
Peter Abraham had a good point. Last time DD took on a President of Baseball Ops role, he kept him GM... And then fired him 6 games into their first season together.
I can see Cherington legitimately wanting out for that reason.
I can see Cherington legitimately wanting out for that reason.
