2011 Managerial Search Discussion: But Does He Know the Game??!?!?

[THE_REAL_MIBS]

Just a little more info.

According to a baseball source, Bobby Valentine interviewed for, and was offered, the job as Marlins manager but turned it down, thereby removing himself from contention for the position.

Valentine, 60, confirmed to MLB.com that he would no longer be pursuing the job, which was opened when the club fired Fredi Gonzalez in June. The club has not commented on the reported offer.

Valentine won't be Marlins' next manager

[Namaste]

Bobby Valentine withdraws name

smart guy

[rmc523]

Bobby V has officially withdrawn his name

At this point, please just stick with Edwin

I agree, just stick with Edwin - I think he'd do a good job if everybody was healthy and they gave him even just a bit of help with the bullpen......of course I was one of the apparent few that liked Fredi too (who unsurprisingly was named Atlanta's manager until 2013 with a 2014 option today).

[Ramp]

smart guy

disagree

while he doesn't get to make as many moves as he would like, he has no pressure locally or nationally and if he can so a little better than .500, he can springboard from here to a "real" team

(see Girardi and Fredi)

[Mainge]

I hope he's not a serious candidate - I'm sure he's a nice guy, but he wasn't a very good 3rd base coach I thought (Joe Espada on the other hand, was really good this year), so I don't know if one can expect much better as manager.

Deciding to hold or send runners home really isn't related at all with managing.

[Namaste]

disagree

while he doesn't get to make as many moves as he would like, he has no pressure locally or nationally and if he can so a little better than .500, he can springboard from here to a "real" team

(see Girardi and Fredi)

Valentine and the FO could not have started off any worse than they did. How can they cultivate a healthy working environment after that disaster? Why would Valentine want to deal with the headache that is the Marlins FO just to springboard? It's not like he needs money.

[Ramp]

I just don't know if Bobby is going to get another decent job otherwise

He doesn't seem like that wanted of a man

[rmc523]

He doesn't seem like that wanted of a man

I've read quite a few reports that he's a serious candidate for the Mariners' mangerial position......but of course he had the Marlins' job locked up just yesterday or whenever it was (well, I suppose those reports were accurate, since he was apparently offered the job, but declined it).

[Ralph]

Im cool with Edwin or BO. BO is just a coo name.

[Miamarlin21]

Am I the only one who doesn't care who our next manager is?

[FishFanInPA]

umm, this thread clearly shows we're Edwin fans.

[Swifty]

disagree

while he doesn't get to make as many moves as he would like, he has no pressure locally or nationally and if he can so a little better than .500, he can springboard from here to a "real" team

(see Girardi and Fredi)

Disagree there.

Being "highly thought of" springboarded both of them. In the case of Girardi, micromanaging with an unlimited budget and an input on the team shopping list pushed him high. With Fredi, I really think it's going to collapse pretty quickly. He wouldn't still be around blowing two double switches in a calendar year. He's going to piss off established bullpen arms with his "dry humping" strategy (God I love that description).

Valentine can't use us as a jumping off point because the book is out on him.

[Miamarlin21]

Well, I guess what I'm saying is I don't prefer one over the other. The players love Edwin from what they've told me (and not just PR talk)

[THE_REAL_MIBS]

Fredi Gonzalez was handed a playoff team to manage in Atlanta on Wednesday. Getting fired by the Florida Marlins in June didn't seem to hamstring his career all that much.

Joe Girardi got kicked to the curb by the Marlins, too, in 2006. All that got him was a chance to manage the New York Yankees, who won the World Series with Girardi last October and, as participants in the AL Championship Series, are in line to repeat.

Are the Marlins right about what it takes to run a baseball team and everybody else in the industry wrong?

Hey, come on, you don't need a graying, braying sports columnist to answer that one when any Little Leaguer will do.

Let's try a tougher question, like are the Fish finally ready to shoot for something else in a manager, something more conventional, something that might actually involve the kind of instinctive leadership that Jim Leyland and Jack McKeon utilized during the Marlins' own World Series years?

That is what Bobby Valentine apparently wanted to know.

ESPN's Tim Kurkjian reported Wednesday that Valentine has taken himself out of consideration for the Marlins' job.

Apparently Valentine was worried about getting tangled in the apron strings of a micromanaging front office in Miami, or being zinged by one of team owner Jeffrey Loria's mood swings.

It was enough of a concern for Bobby that the supposedly seamless move to make him Marlins manager at the time of Gonzalez's firing last summer went all to pieces. The whole process of getting to know the Marlins, Valentine said, was disturbing, confusing and insulting.

Them's fighting words, and Loria knows now that his friendship with Valentine, an old New York connection, isn't enough to flip them to delightful, comfortable and uplifting.

The search continues to find someone willing to take a chance with the hamhanded Marlins, and that probably means somebody new to the managing game, like Girardi and Gonzalez were at the time of their hiring.

Bobby Cox, bound for Cooperstown, fired this parting shot at Loria Wednesday on behalf of Gonzalez, the buddy he mentored in the Braves organization and then hand-picked to succeed him as Atlanta's manager.

"I knew Fredi," Cox said. "I knew what a great job he had done in Florida and for some reason the owner didn't appreciate it. Everybody else in the front office, the coaches, the players, the fans, did.

"It was sort of like a George Steinbrenner move. Let's get rid of somebody just to get rid of somebody. That was the case down there."

Muddy water under the bridge for Fredi, who probably would have left the Marlins for the Braves this off-season, anyway. He turned down a managerial interview with the Cubs last month, if further clues are needed.

Valentine wasn't a perfect fit for the Marlins, who expect their managers to toe a fine line, but at least he was a name. It would have been worth trying because a little sizzle is worth more than a lot of certainty at this stage in franchise history.

If the team is going to play around .500 anyway and finish behind the loaded Phillies in the NL East, it's better to have someone like the chatty, kooky Valentine on camera every night than it is Edwin Rodriguez or some other low-key choice.

The appeal of the shimmering Heat, already in business just a mile from the Marlins' ballpark construction site, demands a strong reaction.

Give South Florida sacrifice flies and double-switches alone and the grand old game of baseball eventually will draw in a retractable-roof palace about the way it does in a football stadium.

Clearly, Fredi is better off in Atlanta, which is good for him, and the Marlins are positioned to give fans something fresh and maybe a little frantic as they make the jump to the new ballpark in 2012, which is good for them.

If not Valentine, some other Type-A scrapper still could be the ticket, someone whose ego is a match for Hanley Ramirez and whose confidence allows room to tell everyone in the organization, including the owner, to back off and let him work.

Once I was greedier, wanting former Marlins coach Ozzie Guillen, but he has patched things up with the White Sox and is unavailable in 2011.

Oh, well. It's never perfect with these guys, even when they've got the manager that all the smarter organizations want.

Commentary: Bobby Valentine may be out, but Marlins likely will seek managers of his ilk
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Edwin Rodriguez has tried to keep his cellphone handy since he returned home to Puerto Rico on Oct. 3, hoping to get a call from the Marlins about managing the team next year.

But on a picnic Saturday in El Yunque National Forest, the skies opened up, sending Rodriguez and his relatives running for cover. In the confusion, he lost his phone.

"I had to wait until Monday to get a new one,' he said Thursday with a laugh. "But when I got it, there were no messages.'

Rodriguez, the Marlins' interim manager for more than three months, clearly isn't the club's first choice.

The Marlins made a multi-year offer to veteran manager Bobby Valentine, but he declined it because it didn't pay enough, a person familiar with the situation said Thursday. The Marlins won't comment.

Other candidates include New York Yankees bench coach Tony Pena, former San Diego bench coach Ted Simmons and Atlanta Braves scout Jim Fregosi.

"I would like to think I'm still on the list, either the first or fifth or the eighth (choice),' Rodriguez said. "I would like to get there for spring training and show what I can do for a full year.'

Rodriguez was 46-46 in relief of Fredi Gonzalez in his first major league managerial job. If Rodriguez isn't hired to be the manager, he said, he probably would not want to be on the Marlins' coaching staff.

"I want to manage in the big leagues,' he said.

Rodriguez, who began last season as manager of the Class AAA New Orleans Zephyrs, said he has two backup plans: a minor league coordinating job with the Marlins that would allow him to spend more time in Puerto Rico, or a position with the Puerto Rican government overseeing baseball programs on the island.

"Frankly, I'm going to be fine,' he said. "But obviously I want to manage the Marlins. I think I have shown I can do it.'

He spent the last week watching a qualifying tournament for the Baseball World Cup. He got to see former Marlins bench coach Carlos Tosca, who was third-base coach for the U.S. team.

Rodriguez still is hoping the Marlins call him.

"I think about it more than I want to,' he said, "but I'm so busy here.'

Edwin Rodriguez still wants Marlins managerial job that Bobby Valentin turned down

[Ramp]

managers of his ilk!