Neyer's Book on Baseball's Greatest Blunders includes....

[thedaymen]

hiring Dusty.

 

Here's an excert from his interview with Salon's King Kaufman:

I want to start with one of your last chapters, "Cubs Hire Dusty Baker." I know everybody wants him fired now, but he took them to within five outs of the World Series in his first year, and he's had a record of success. How was that really a blunder?

 

Well, I happen to think Dusty Baker is a good manager in some situations but isn't in others. He might have been perfect that first season, but he certainly hasn't had any luck keeping his young pitchers healthy. Now, do I blame him for that? Not necessarily. I think Mark Prior might well have gotten hurt regardless. And it is true that the pitcher he's worked the hardest, Carlos Zambrano, has been perfectly healthy.

 

But really what it comes down to is that if you look at the Cubs, leave aside for a second Prior and [Kerry] Wood, their pitching, look at their hitting. They finish near the bottom of the league in on-base percentage every season, and in part that's because Dusty Baker, as you know, has this incredible affection for Neifi Perez and other players and has no patience for young players.

 

But "Cubs hire [general manager] Jim Hendry" then. He keeps making the deals, or do you think he's just doing Dusty's bidding?

 

Oh, I think Jim Hendry is more than a willing accomplice. No question. When you write about managers, it probably makes more sense to focus on the general managers, or even the owners. I mean, somebody hired Jim Hendry, right?

 

If you're going to do a truly accurate book about great blunders and you want to talk about who really is responsible, you could just write about the owners. Write a whole book about stupid things the owners did, because the owners are ultimately the ones who are responsible for everything that happens. I just think it's a lot more fun to write about Dusty Baker than about the Tribune Company.

[thedaymen]

More later in the article:

 

That's our big blunder. But getting back to the first question, you know, if Steve Bartman doesn't get in Moisés Alou's way or Alex Gonzalez doesn't make an error on that particular ball, Dusty Baker could bring the Cubs to the World Series, and then there's no way you can call hiring a guy a blunder if he brings you to the World Series for the first time in 58 years.

 

I think that's true. That's absolutely true. There's no question that our perception of managers and teams do hinge upon luck all the time. I would say that Dusty Baker could have made better luck for himself in that game. In a different chapter in the book there's a sidebar about Dusty Baker in that game, the fact that he didn't have anybody warming up to replace Mark Prior. When Prior fell apart there was nobody ready to come in, and Baker should have at least had somebody ready, if not in the game at the exact moment.

 

But no, you're absolutely right. There is an element of unfairness throughout the book because, in most cases, with a little bit of luck here and there, not just the Dusty Baker chapter, most of the chapters about managers in particular would not exist if the manager had just been 0.2 percent luckier than he was.

[cheapseats]

Interesting. I just posted excerpts from an article written after Game 2 of the LCS in 2003 that was extremely critical of Dusty.

 

It might be unfair to blame Dusty after the fact for the Cubs poor state of affairs, but it's not like a lot of smart people didn't predict that these things would happen under his leadership.

[thedaymen]

Interesting. I just posted excerpts from an article written after Game 2 of the LCS in 2003 that was extremely critical of Dusty.

 

It might be unfair to blame Dusty after the fact for the Cubs poor state of affairs, but it's not like a lot of smart people didn't predict that these things would happen under his leadership.

 

Neyer was very critical of Dusty throughout 03. Someone around here has a quote on their sig.file from him.

[NewUserName]

My brother who lives in the Bay area and is a big Giants fan warned me when the Cubs got Baker. He basically said that he will not play young position players and will overuse pitchers. I remember in 03 being 50/50 on Baker. Couldnt argue against a guy who had the Cubs winning. I was just infuriated about his treatment of Bellhorn, Choi and Cruz. Sadly in Cruz's and Bellhorn's case it was for such great players like Lenny Harris and Shawn Estes. I was so upset with Dusty after game 6 of the LCS I wanted him fired right then. Letting Alou make too much of a deal out of the Bartman ball, not even having someone warming up going into the inning with Prior coming upon 100 pitches. Since then I havent looked back. Dusty is the most overrated manager in all of baseball. Probably my most disliked figure in all of sports at this point.