BCB - Tom Ricketts interview

[David]

I know many here aren't fond of Yellon (I guess I have never gone on his site nearly enough to form such an opinion), but this is sort of interesting.

 

http://www.bleedcubbieblue.com/2011/12/26/2657568/bcb-interview-tom-ricketts-part-1

 

a snippet

 

BCB: Was he eager to talk when you approached him?

 

TR: He was interested. I think Theo saw this as the next challenge for him, something that might fit. So we got together and talked for a few hours one day about philosophies and baseball and it just felt right from a baseball perspective, from a personality perspective. It seemed like we would get along well and be able to work well together. So we had that meeting and he came to Chicago and looked around and got comfortable with us and we got comfortable with him and then we went back to the Red Sox and said we’d like to finish this deal up.

 

BCB: When you hired him, or when you were going through this process did you anticipate him being in the position he is now or did you anticipate him being in the same position as Jim Hendry? Now you have a President of Baseball Operations and a General Manager, two people when there was just one before. Had you anticipated that or is that something Theo brought up? How did that all come about?

 

TR: I had read that he was looking for a higher title in his next position. He had said that in a public comment. We talked about it internally and thought it kind of makes sense. There’s a lot of decisions on the business side that roll up to the president of business and there’s all sorts of decisions that roll up to the top of baseball. If we can get a president of baseball operations and he can build his team around him I think we’ll be better off for it. So, it just made a lot of sense for us.

 

BCB: Maybe this would be a better question for Theo, but how do you view the difference in duties, what exactly are the duties now of the president of baseball operations beyond what Jed Hoyer is doing as general manager?

 

TR: I’ll leave it to Theo to divide up what he does versus what Jed does. They work very well together. As you know they’ve worked together for years and they’re pretty close. But in terms of what the president of baseball does versus the GM that will be kind of in his silo.

[davell]

Thanks for posting this. I've never considered BCB a "must read" so I've only been there on occasion. But there are 3 parts to this interview, with them running Tuesday and Wednesday. With Wednesday having the new CBA addressed some in it, which will be cool.

[javy knows my name]

Nice, thanks for posting. I wonder if Al will ask about the new CBA and whether the front office saw something like this coming or if they were totally caught off guard.

 

I'd also like to know how Tom plans on selling effing tickets next year, but I don't expect any hard-hitting questions.

[davell]

Yellon says in the comments section that he doesn't ask any hard hitting questions, because it's likely it would be the last time he'd be granted an interview.

[UMFan83]

Yellon says in the comments section that he doesn't ask any hard hitting questions, because it's likely it would be the last time he'd be granted an interview.

 

Lame. Instead we get to read his fluff every year.

[TruffleShuffle]

Yellon says in the comments section that he doesn't ask any hard hitting questions, because it's likely it would be the last time he'd be granted an interview.

 

Lame. Instead we get to read his fluff every year.

 

he doesn't have to grill ricketts angrily, but you can ask those types of questions and still leave the door open for future interviews. i doubt that successful businessman tom ricketts is going to throw a tantrum if he's asked a few pointed questions about the future of the organization.