Friday, October 5, 2007

Pirates Fire Tracy

The Pirates hired Neal Huntington to be their new GM and gave him the decision on whether or not Jim Tracy will be the manager anymore. After about a week and half of reviewing the situation, he decided to let him go. Tracy's style of play that helped when he managed the Dodgers could not turn the Pirates in to much of anything. In his first year with the team, they were 67-95, and this season they finished 68-94. Many Pirates fans and experts were upset to see Tracy hired over Jim Leyland, who was willing to manage the Pirates after six years away from the position. It's hard to say what Tracy did well. He was able to develop some good young players, but his staff ruined some as well. He worked with Jason Bay in the outfield, but not enough to balance out his numbers at the plate. Although Joe Girardi may be waiting for the Yankees job to open up, which might as well stay with Torre or go to his right hand man Don Mattingly, he has a good reputation for putting a solid youthful team together like he did with the Marlins and could probably work with some of their young pitchers and struggling catcher Ronny Paulino. Other possible managers include Dusty Baker, who was in the NL Central for several years. Neal Huntinton is known for player development and will probably find the manager who is best known for developing youth. Maybe he will look to a manager in the minor league systems who has developed players and made a successful team. Ryne Sandberg might be interested, but I'm just speculating.

1 comment:

timy1 said...

tracy is not the problem, the GM and their payroll are.