Should Kapler Be Fired?

[kmc1019]

Watching the Rays this season and last night take a bunch of recently acquired and mostly mediocre hitters and turn them in to something better should put their hitting coach Chad Mottola in contention for a Manager position somewhere. Would love to see the deep-pocket Phillies take a run at their entire scouting and player development leadership, really and as well.

[bigegypt0417]

That always made sense with the delay. Could be evaluating both Klentak and Kapler. Not sure they will fire both, but I could easily see a morass of "senior advisers" thrown in the mix.

They may also be getting their search and candidates together. Or they are quietly working with the next manager to see what they need and how their staff will look.

This just could all be them doing the work they need to plan next steps.

Klentak will get another year IMO.

[DurhamBull]

Watching the Rays this season and last night take a bunch of recently acquired and mostly mediocre hitters and turn them in to something better should put their hitting coach Chad Mottola in contention for a Manager position somewhere. Would love to see the deep-pocket Phillies take a run at their entire scouting and player development leadership, really and as well.

I agree. I feel like a common theme for Phillies’ teams is a lot of players not playing to their potential. I don’t know if stealing the Rays’ staff is the answer (my user name tells you that I’m personally invested in the quality of their AAA team!) but I suspect that a different staff could have gotten a lot more out of the 2019 team.

[baseballoldie]

Mets just fired Callaway.

Next Phillies pitching coach?

[andyb]

I don't buy into the idea that our coaches (like pitching coach) need to have decades of experience. I think the problem with Young is that he is good at the analytics side of the job and not the teaching side. He just was not ready for that.

There are plenty of more anonymous coaches that can fill this role. It is just apparent that last season our pitchers were not making good adjustments, whether that is Nola or Eflin or Velasquez or Pivetta. The younger pitchers just did not get better as a group, often regressing.

[Philsmania]

I don't buy into the idea that our coaches (like pitching coach) need to have decades of experience.

Yes, but these experienced guys have proven themselves. Sure, you can be bold and hire the bright new whippersnapper but is that really the safer bet?

[Philsmania]

Mets just fired Callaway.

Meanwhile, in Philadelphia....

There's one thing to be said about doing one's homework and making a careful decision but this is getting ridiculous. Successful businesses are those that are nimble and quickly adjust to circumstances. Unsuccessful businesses engage in, among other things, paralysis by analysis.

Simply put, this is embarrassing. Jeffrey Lurie needs to invite his good friend John Middleton and give him a good talking-too. Invite Pat Croce to the conversation as well so he can talk about what he did in 1997.

Next Phillies pitching coach?

I'll take that! But, of course, by the time the Phillies make up their minds what they are doing, he will have been long since scarfed up by someone else.

[xogfog]

Let the (hopefully) new manager choose his coaching staff.

[andyb]

Yes, but these experienced guys have proven themselves. Sure, you can be bold and hire the bright new whippersnapper but is that really the safer bet?

They don't have to be whippersnappers either. Just don't go for the hot media name all the time. I would have been fine with giving Dusty the manager's job for instance. Experience is good. It just does not have to be all in the majors or with the hot media candidate.

[zambonir]

It doesn't really make sense that it would take this long if it was merely Middleton trying to decide what to do, and/or consulting with advisers. It would make more sense if MacPhail is in trouble, since then Middleton does't have anyone to consult with or carry out his decisions. But what makes the most sense - and Stark's follow-up tweet said as much - is that there isn't a big change coming, and Klentak and MacPhail are simply deciding what else needs to be overhauled between the coaching staff and the front office.

Jayson Stark on Twitter

If there is a move the delay does nobody any good at this point. Makes the team look silly, hurts the employees who might need new jobs, costs the Phillies time and access to other candidates. Even Chris Young deserves to know what's next (though if Kapler does stay it wouldn't surprise me if he's merely demoted back to assistant or "pitching coordinator").

I'm sure this is not what will happen but if they did clean house it kind of stinks of a repeat of 2015, where Pat Gillick is going to have to come in. That might not be the worst thing if Klentak stays - Gillick an upgrade over MacPhail. It's a less good thing if Gillick and MIddleton are tasked with hiring a GM.

Talk of raiding the Rays is not wrong. At this point to get Chaim Bloom you would have to give him MacPhail's job (which is what he has there) not Klentak's. But you could double his salary I'm sure. And that team's future is always in doubt.

[bigegypt0417]

the season ended 4 days ago.

Do you really think the lack of an announcement equates to no work being done in the background?

I don't understand what's fascination of an announcement meaning the start of a process,.

[saycheese]

Firing Kapler and Klentak and not MacPhail simply isn't good enough. MacPhail will simply choose another GM that was part of his other losing organizations he built that we will be having this same conversation in 3 years. Simply put, either they all go (my preference) or its just Kapler and Klentak gets another shot to the get the manager right. I don't think it would be just Kapler and Klentak.

As MacPhail said you only get so many manager choices (about his GM). Well I am Middleton I say MacPhail only gets so many GM choices.

[zambonir]

It's the off-season. People want news if there is going to be news. And if they are changing the GM and/or president that means the team is already behind the eight-ball for both this off-season and future work (including hiring a new scouting director, and leaving our relatively green minor league development op with only interim supervision).

Another reason I'm still inclined to think there won't be a big change is that while the Phillies have been pretty airtight when it comes to gossip and rumors over the past couple of years, if they were really considering a new president, GM or even just manager, people (agents, employees of other teams) would start to hear about it.

Hey I just remembered Jimmy Rollins is one of Middleton's advisers (he and Schmidt are listed as executive advisers, not baseball ops advisers). Maybe he's being consulted and will recommend...himself.

As MacPhail said you only get so many manager choices (about his GM). Well I am Middleton I say MacPhail only gets so many GM choices.

Maybe so but you're supposed to get more than one!

This is look in the mirror time for Middleton. He either made a huge mistake hiring MacPhail or they created a really poor command chain (or both).

[baseballoldie]

Let the (hopefully) new manager choose his coaching staff.

IF there is a new manager, yes I would agree.

But if Kapler is retained, I can't see him wanting to work with a new pitching coach with MLB managerial experience who was just fired.

[zambonir]

Oh, I don't think Kapler would have much choice there. Charlie had Jimy Williams forced on him (and then Williams quit once he realized he'd never get to be the manager and they wouldn't give him a raise). In fact almost Charlie's entire post-Gillick staff was former major league managers (Lopes most notably, and they also hired Art Howe but then Texas gave him a better gig).

And of course Gabe had Kranitz more or less forced on him, until he didn't. I'm sure the entire staff was collaborative, Gabe wasn't going to hire Wathan of his own accord (and at the time Wathan still had a year left on his LV contract).

Callaway will probably just cash his check and wait a year anyway. Going right back to pitching coach probably means he never becomes a manager again.

Of course we could also hire Callaway. And John Farrell was the other finalist last time (along with Dusty).

[Jazzhead]

I say keep all the current management and focus instead on improving the player roster. Yes, management made mistakes in hindsight but none were really criticized at the time they were made. Yes, they made a bet on the young rotation developing, and hedged that bet by spending the bucks on the bullpen, and lost both the bet and the hedge. But there wasn't much disagreement from the phan base at the time. And lots of folks here and elsewhere nodded in agreement that trading prospects in July to shore up the pitching staff for a run at a one-game-and-done wild card was not a smart move. And given that we still have Bohn and Howard to improve the club going forward I am not going to rush to criticize management, especially given that we lost five straight to the Nats when it mattered most.

I say management doesn't need to be shaken up, but the roster does. Given Klentak's skill in getting cheap but effective bench bats like Miller, Bruce and Dickerson, I see no evidence that he can't evaluate talent and have no problem with letting him have another go at it.

[allentown]

They don't have to be whippersnappers either. Just don't go for the hot media name all the time. I would have been fine with giving Dusty the manager's job for instance. Experience is good. It just does not have to be all in the majors or with the hot media candidate.

This is true, but we have been even faddier than going with the hot media candidate. We've chosen guys from 'leading' organizations for jobs in which they have no experience at those leading organizations. We didn't need a pitching coach with decades of experience, but … some experience would have helped and a demonstrated ability to work with pitchers and teach skills and establish rapport and earn buy-in would have helped. Same for a manager who has actually managed -- doesn't need to be a greybeard, but some successful experience is a plus. Same for GM. Some successful experience in the baseball-side leadership was close to essential for an organization which was floundering as the Phillies were floundering. We hire the Braves international amateur whiz, but not to do international, to run the draft, which wasn't his expertise. We jumped on the analytics fad (well probably going to be an on-going staple of the decision-making of successful organizations), but our first big hire was a guy who wasn't noted for analyzing what to look for in scouting, or best modern approach to hitting, pitching, and in-game management -- no, we took a guy from the league front office whose specialty was analyzing contracts and arb offers/awards. You need some experience in the organization of people doing important jobs they are already familiar with. We are faddy in the worst possible way: a follower organization, without the key guys with enough baseball-side experience to actually be successful followers, but who seem arrogant enough to believe they are in the forefront of baseball thinking.

[Philsmania]

John Middleton could learn from Jeffrey Lurie

[zambonir]

I don't know that I'd give Lurie that much credit for being decisive, in reality it took him several years to fire Reid, not 24 hours. And the two years of Howie/Kelly dysfunction count too, as does some of the other turnover in the front office.

Of course the big difference is Middleton is not the sole owner. And he hasn't been doing this very long. Or doing anything, in his life, really. Lurie came from wealth but had some real business success, and owned the Eagles for 20 years before it paid off. Middleton is just the son of a guy who knew Bill Giles.

Which, to his credit, is why he hired someone to actually run the team where Giles and Monty ran it themselves. Except he seems to have gotten the wrong guy on the one hand, and still wants to meddle on the other. Which doesn't make him that different from owners elsewhere of course.

You gotta think at this point that either there's no change coming or when they do announce the change there will already be someone joining the organization at the time they announce.

[schillingfan]

I was just harassing Julio in a friendly fashion, not to worry,