Hairyducked Idiot

That sentence was immediately preceeded by them saying he was still the man or something like that. It was a two-faced answer. "He's going to be our GM, unless he decides he's not." Dodged. But nobody heard that. Because they said so much other quote worthy stuff. Nobody heard that because they wanted to hear other stuff. Because it leads to the answer they want and because it's more exciting that way. If we were Boston fans hoping for him to stay, we wouldn't be focusing on the second part of the quote. There'd be lots of talk about how they were asked directly if Epstein was still the man and ownership saying "He is." Just like when they were asked about non-lateral moves. They said their policy was to allow such contact requests, but there have been times where they haven't, and declined to elaborate on specifics. But I've seen it said a few times now that they said they would grant an interview if it was for a non-lateral move.

That sentence was immediately preceeded by them saying he was still the man or something like that. It was a two-faced answer. "He's going to be our GM, unless he decides he's not." Dodged.

Nah I don't think so. There was obviously a reason why they came on the radio. I think they had an agenda behind a lot of what they were saying. The Epstein stuff was only a small part of a larger interview. They dodged the question as hard as they possibly could, and moved on to talking about Carl Crawford and nutrition and stuff.

Of course, you realize, that will not stop us from doing so. And I find it entertaining as heck. Please, continue.

I imagine baseball is just like any other industry: Lots of rumors and speculation, most of it baseless. Some executive in the Yankees or Dodgers or Rockies organization is going to have some random opinion on whether Epstein is going to leave Boston or not, and it's based on nothing more than you or I's speculation. These national reporters are reporting the truth when they say "around the game, people are saying..." but it's still meaningless.

It's possible they were speaking in the most generic way possible and there's nothing to be gained from parsing it.

Just out of completely random curiosity, does anyone want to try and put a yearly WAR on the difference between Epstein and Hendry in the Cubs' future. Epstein and a mediocre GM? Epstein and a second-tier choice like Hahn?

Didn't you make fun of me for half-seriously bringing up the MacPhail/Epstein parallel like 20 pages ago?

Yes.

Is Theo still the man for you? "He is. But you have to understand, there's a certain shelf life for these jobs ... You can only be the manager a certain amount of time. Tremendous pressure cooker here. Theo is not going to be the GM forever. ... He's been the guy, he's the guy now, we feel apart at the end of the season, and we're upset about that. No fan could be more upset than I am about the result this year. But he's done a tremendous job for us over the last 8 years." Is it possible to hire a new manager until you are sure who your GM is? "I think it's not desirable to proceed that way, if you don't know who this person's immediate boss is. I've been in situations where that has happened, but I think the most desirable situation is the one you outlined (where there's stability)..."

But they also said there have been times when they declined permission for a non-lateral move.

Trying to transcribe their Epstein answer as best I can. "How do you know that? Because those things are supposed to be kept private. We have a policy of not discussing who has been, whether permission has been asked for xy or z. Every year we get requests for peole we never discuss. That's our policy. Our position on that is that we don't comment on requests. We get requests every year. We don't tlak about them publicly. A few years ago, we got a request about Epstein, and you never heard about it. ... blah blah blah about privacy and why it's good... Our consistent policy has been not to discuss whether a request has been made for permission." Talk about sometimes they grant the requests and sometimes they don't. "If it gets out, and he doesn't go, then somebody looks bad. Either the team that asks looks bad, or if he interviews for the job and doesn't get it, he looks bad." "There is a certain protocol in this game. It is, if someone asks permission for a job that's not lateral, you give them permission. I'm sure there are examples where it didn't happen. Where somebody said we're still not. (Do they play games, add some title?) That's been known to happen. We don't mean to be evasive, but this is one subject where we don't feel the need for there to be full disclosure. ... blah blah blah about personal privacy." Okay, they are giving nothing.

SoSH is an interesting place. There are a few smart posters, but man they have an ... interesting perspective. Apparently the most likely scenario is that the Red Sox are going to make the playoffs at least 8 out of the next 10 years.

Uhh...Brian Roberts, as has already been mentioned like 10 times in this thread? Just doesn't feel the same to me. That stuff was normal offseason "hey, there's a good player, we might get him." We're treading on some unprecedented ground here, in a cool way.

Trying to remember the last time there was this much drama around a possible Cubs move. Nomar? The time we thought about trading Sosa at the deadline?

The next time one of these plane/apartment shopping/singing in a bar/whatever rumors comes true, it will be the first time. It's bound to happen eventually, I guess.

Kaplan?

B&B are entertaining, but they don't know crap about sports and every opinion they have is wrong.

It's like watching Fischer play chess or Michael Jordan play basketball or Dusty Baker shred an arm. He's simply the best at what he does.

+1 million. Whether Epstein belongs at the top or the bottom of the "awesome possibilities" list, we are at least picking from that list, and not from the Randy Bush or Ned Colleti pile.

I already compared Epstein to a MacPhail/Hendry hybrid. I'm contrarying as hard as I can, what more do you want from me?

Friedman/Epstein/Beane/Cherington/Hahn/Everyone else = acceptable. Friedman/Cherington/Hahn/Epstein/Beane/Everyone else = Contrary just for the sake of it!

I'm looking at the reasons for those 90+ wins a year and considering how likely they are to be replicated if he were hired in Chicago. I know that's a bit deeper than geeking out over 2 WS rings and a recognizable name, but try to keep up. Boston's best assets have come through Boston's scouting and development system, of which Epstein has only been one part of a large whole. He won't be bringing that entire organization with him. Boston's other best assets have come through trades when they were able to leverage the high-quality assets from that scouting and development system. He won't have that for at least a couple of years with the Cubs. Boston's worst assets have come from the free-agent market. Especially pitching. The Cubs' best hope for the next few years is in trying to build a team through the free-agent market. Especially pitching. It's worth considering that in the pantheon of awesome, stathead managers, Epstein might not be the Cubs' best fit.

Please name the guys better than Epstein. I'll toss one defendable name out there in Friedman. Now, please enlighten with the rest of these names. Besides Friedman, I would prefer taking a shot at an "unknown" like Hahn or Cherington before Epstein. Another poster just said he likes Epstein because he's proven what he can do, but my worries about Epstein are because we've seen what he's done. I'd consider him at the bottom of the "awesome" pile, or next-to-the-bottom above Beane. Almost everything that's happened for Boston during his run has been because of their awesome farm system. He's had a few nice, cheap MLB finds, mostly in the early years of his tenure, but otherwise it's been the farm system developing awesome talent and him either plugging that into holes or using it to trade for prime MLB talent. But I think the analogy I made yesterday stands: He's a slugger with a ton of RBIs. Without more information, we don't have a good way of knowing how much of the farm system was his doing and how much was the Boston organization as a whole. Or more to the point: We have no way of knowing how much of it he can replicate here. And since the hope that he can replicate it here is pretty much the entirety of his candidacy, that uncertainty makes me rather bearish on him. He'll still be a stat-minded general manager, which is awesome. But other than that, I look at him and see Jim Hendry's free agent signings combined with Andy MacPhail's winning pedigree.

Epstein over Jim Hendry? Exciting Epstein over any random candidate they might have considered? Awesome. Epstein against the pool of awesome names that have been talked about? Disappointing, a little, imo.