Sports Radio Service


		Managers and Bob Melvin By Jerry Feitelberg September 22, 2011

	One of the things in baseball hat has always amazed me is the number of people who want to manage a big league baseball team. Every coach on every team dreams of managing. Players, usually utility infielders and backup catchers, also dream of skippering a franchise. The question is why. Baseball, as most people know, is a game of failure and managers know that when they are hired that somewhere down the line, the day will come when they will be dumped by their team. No one knows for sure what the reason is. Some people will say that he got fired because he wasn't tough enough on the players. Others will say that he was too tough on the players. Managers will get fired if the team plays poorly and others will get fired even though the team wins but doesn't exceed expectations. A good example of this is the story of Dusty Baker. In 2002, Dusty lead his team, the San Francisco Giants to the National League Pennant but the Giants lost the World Series. It is not clear if Dusty left voluntarily or he was asked to leave by ownership. To be a big league manager is not an easy task. The manager has to set the tone for the club. Players have to know their roles and they have to know that their manager will fight for them when calls don't go their way. The manager has to be able to work with the front office and give input to the people that are making decisions on players. Do we need an left-handed pitcher or a power hitting outfielder? Who is available and who can we trade for? Some managers are kept out of the loop and others work quite well with the General Manager. There are managers who were clowns before they became great. Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel was considered a clown as a manager. He managed the old Brooklyn Dodgers in the 1930's and the Boston Braves in the 1940's. His teams were terrible. When Stengel won the job as manager of the New York Yankees in 1949, people were shocked but all Stengel did was win 10 pennants and 8 World Series as skipper of the Yankees. Just amazing. The answer is that he had better players with the Yankees and they ruled the baseball world. So this brings me to the A's manager Bob Melvin. Melvin received a three year contract to manage the Oakland Athletics today. Melvin is a Bay Area product who went to Menlo-Atherton high school and the University of California. Melvin played ten years in the Majors with several teams and had an undistinguished career. He was a backup catcher for the most part but learned the intricacies and nuances of the game while on the bench. Bob was a coach and received a World Series ring in 2001 for his services for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Bob was hired in 2003 to be the manager of the Seattle Mariners. He was there for three seasons before moving over to Phoenix to manage the Diamondbacks. The D-Backs won the division in 2007 and Bob was named NL manager of the year. Bob's tenure in Arizona ended mid-season in 2009 when he was fired. Remember managers know that when they are hired that they will be fired. We wish Bob all the success in the world as he tries to get the A's back on track and get them over the .500 mark in the future. It will not be easy. The A's will have to make decisions very soon on which players they want to keep and how much money they have available to go after free agents. Stay tuned fans and let's see what happens in the off-season as the A's prepare for 2012.