Should Clint Hurdle Be Manager Of The Year?

he is decisive. I don’t agree with much of his in-game management, but he seems to be convinced in his ideas, and acts on them. If he is, as I assume, as candid with his players as he is with the press, the players must appreciate that. I was iffy on this hire, but he seems to be keeping the players focused and in line.
Do we give some credit to NH and FC for this selection as well? Everyone seemed pretty upset when someone else didn’t get the job (Wedge maybe, I can’t remember), maybe they had it right all along.

but my reaction to Hurdle’s performance at PirateFest was less than enthusiastic as well. I felt like he stepped into a great situation, for several reasons—-his personality following Russell’s, his manner and aphorisms being red meat to a Pittsburgh fan base, minimal expectations, and reasonable expectation for significant improvement over a 3 year period. Conversely, Russell was in a no-win situation from the start—-terrible team that was clearly going to be blown up, no short-term relief in sight, a five year (optimistically) rebuild. I’m sure it wasn’t designed this way, but I always felt the hire of Russell at that time was a stroke of Machiavellian genius by the FO. In a way, he was the perfect guy for the disaster that was quite likely to follow. I agree with your points about both men. Hurdle’s probably manager of the year (or Gibson, I guess) at this point, but in two years when the honeymoon is over and some of the in-game moves cost runs or games at crunch time, we’ll see where things are. More than anything, I give Hurdle credit for being smart enough to recognize and grab the opportunity here. Think he regrets the Mets position?

….that Hurdle seems to honor accountability as well. See, his benchings of McCutchen and Cedeno and Overbay.

And yet, he has his players’ backs as has been said. It’s a good mix and I think that’s part of the reason that this team clearly plays for him.

the bucs are three to 5 games over 500 with a month or less left i would say yeah he deserves it.but

MLB Trade Rumors indicates that Clint Hurdle is “probably the favorite to win the NL Manager of the Year.” If the Pirates finish the year with a winning record, I’d say that will almost certainly happen, and I’ll probably be fully behind it.

no jinx no jinx no jinx

Under Hurdle, there have been occasional lapses of attention and hustle, but Hurdle has generally responded by benching the offenders, after which those lapses have stopped being problems.

This cannot be understated.

and Pittsburgh doesn’t. Then it will probably go to Gibson.

Oh goodie, the manager getting credit for turning the team around.

they do have 2 manager of the years, right? or do they just combine AL and NL???

Hurdle is way better tactically than Russell, except for the occasional bunting.

Bullpen management now vs. last season is night and day. Plus he platoons guys like Jones. Plus the motivational aspect.

Obviously, Hurdle is a hugely successful hire, IMO.

Pirates bunted quite a bit more the first month of the season. Now, the bunts are generally in situations where the bunt makes sense (pitcher hitting, late game where 1 run can mean the difference).

The occasional difference of opinion as to the adviseability of a bunt in a particular circumstance is far outweighed by Hurdle’s management of the pen, his early hook on pitchers (starters OR relievers) who are struggling, and his fearless use of rookies in key situations (Watson and Moskos out of the pen, Presley batting leadoff, etc.).

…If we make the world series.

This is not the first time I have heard this opinion about John Russel and I could not disagree more. Never looked to me like JR was a real motivator… don’t even get me started about the ridiculous line ups last year. Come on!

I used to get very upset when managers would make sabermetrically incorrect strategy decisions. While I do think they deserve to be blamed when they err in such matters, I need to keep reminding myself that there are a lot of other factors in their jobs that I am not qualified to evaluate. It’s unfortunate that these responsibilities cannot be split between two people, but that is the reality of baseball today. I wish that Clint Hurdle would memorize “The Book” and act accordingly, but I can’t say he’s a bad manager because he doesn’t. Frankly nowadays I feel I have very little idea how good any manager is…

i mentioned this last year in another blog about teams that do complete rebuildings from the basement up: they hire a manager, usually a first timer, as a sacrificial lamb. they stick around for a few years and take a shitload of punishment in the meantime. once the team starts to bring along “core” type players he is relieved of duty and replaced with a more respected game time captain… this happened this season with Hurdle and also Manny Acta.

once the Cubs start rebuilding their MLB squad, Quade will be let go and a “name” guy will take his place. Dusty Baker replaced Mackanin/Narron once the team had their core.
cito gaston’s return to toronto. and of course, famously, Leyland replaces Trammell right when the team is turning the corner.

of course this theory is shot to shit by piniella failing badly with the young devil rays. the rays finally becoming respectable in maddon’s second season.

initially i have said that “name” managers, such as larussa and torre, only go into situations where they know they can win right away. i can throw Leyland into this group as well because of his quitting the Marlins, yet that situation was a clusterfuk that no one should have to go through.

so i think Hurdle is doing a great job at being a spokesman for the pirates team. we can always second guess his gametime management, which is understandable. but because his personality is such a stark contrast to JR, he appears to care more about the team than Russell, which is complete BS. If Hurdle were here in 2010, the team still would have been the worst team in baseball.