I've said it before, but I think its worth repeating, I'm fine with Ned Yost. If DM gave me the power to hire a new manager, I would retain Yost.

That doesn't mean I think Yost is great or is responsible for a lot of wins. I generally think the manager can't get you many, if any wins, but he can definitely lose a lot of games. A manager is all downside, almost no upside. I think over the course of a full season and including all decisions not just focusing on the bad ones, on a net basis Ned doesn't lose many games. I don't think we can do much better. Assuming a very minimal ability at lineups and pitching changes, there are really only two ways a manager can significantly hurt your team.

1) He can forget that he's in the American League and play small-ball too much, too early. (Ned doesn't, he manages like an American League manager)

2) He can overwork our pitchers and hurt them. (Ned doesn't, he generally pulls young pitchers after 100, and doesn't let our vets go to 120+ more than once or twice in a row.)

Ned meets my very, very low bar of expectations, so he's fine. We had a long line of managers who failed one or both of those 2 tests I have for a manager, and Ned's the first one in a very long time who passes.

Hypothetical situation:
Royals make the wildcard this year but fail to advance. La Russa indicates that he would 100% manage the 2015 Royals given the opportunity. What do you do?

nothing

managers are so overrated it's not funny

Cardinals fans hated LaRussa....absolutely hated the guy.

Why? Because fans overreact and the manager is always the easy target.

You see La Russa a few nights ago when they interviewed him and showed him several times at his desk or area to watch the game? He looks like he could play lead in "About Schmidt II". Dude acts like he's not all there

I don't necessary agree.

Some managers have a knack for knowing when to pull a pitcher. That can absolutely help you win games. It can't be quantified, there is no stat to prove it but if you watch the games you can see it.

Some managers are good at getting the matchups that favor them. Again very hard to write that down on paper but Yost has been schooled a few times by it.

It's mostly handling the pitching staff.

Yost just goes by the standard baseball 101 rules, no 'feel' for it at all.

Veteran pitcher stays in through the 6th. If pitch count allows he stays until the 7th.

setup man in 8th
closer for the 9th. Unless it's not a save situation then Yost throws somebody out there until a couple of guys get on base. Then it's closer time

blah,blah,blah ... He could be reading a book and let a computer make the call.

Now that's not going to make a big mistake that everyone can blame him for either. It's the safe,standard practice method. Makes very little allowance for the specific situation.

Yost also puts 'not letting the starter take the loss' ahead of what is best for the team. imo

several things

Honestly anyone could make the moves yost does. I imagine somewhere he has a little cheat sheet in his pocket showing what to do. lol

That said, it keeps the players from getting pissed because there is never a decision made that can stands out enough to make them pissed.

No highs,No lows,No Risks,No reward, No fallout .....

Yost could not exist and it would be the same thing

No...because LaRussa is a douche. Everyone in baseball just understands this. He's a douche that does better with his talent than most guys. So there's that...

I do not believe that this is a thing that exists, at all.

I assume we're ignoring the extreme cases I referred to before when a manager comically leaves a pitcher in way, way, way too long running up huge pitch counts. I'm also assuming we're not talking about obvious situations like a pitcher at 95 pitches walks 2 guys and loads the bases in the 6th with one out and that big scary lefty slugger is coming up so you go get your good LHRP.

Those obvious things aside, "knowing" when a pitcher needs to come out reads like a belief in voodoo magic to me, combined with our natural human bias to focus on bad outcomes and forget good outcomes.

I do not believe in "good" managers.

I think managers are either bad or some degree of "acceptable". I think Ned is acceptable. So, I'm not interested in a change. If Ned was hypothetically replaced with another "acceptable" manager, I would be completely indifferent.

I guess I should mention a 3rd "test" that very rarely comes up, but that Trey Hillman actually failed.

3) If the players don't like the manager, then he needs to go.

I'm not interested in stories about how much players love a manager and are playing harder for him. I don't know how to tell the difference between a genuine love for the manager, or PC happy talk that all players are used to feeding to the reporters. It is rare that we hear about a widespread dislike for the manager, but when it happens, you've got to act on it. I don't think players should have a vote on retaining a manager you otherwise want to get rid of, but they can basically fire him.

Yosted tonight's game away.

1 run

Can Yost bat too?

He went back to old Ned tonight and left Ventura out to dry at nearly 100 pitches. Ventura scrapped out 6 innings of 0 run ball with horrible control. Take that and get to your lights out pen.

Trade
 

Should have tried to move him by trade the past few weeks, maybe other owners thought the Royals success was the result of their manager.:banghead::banghead:

yeah I kinda question leaving Ventura out so long with our dominant ass pen, and also why take Ibanez out when he appears to own their closer?

He was trying to save the bullpen. Geez guys, it's not hard to figure out.

We have to sustain the bullpen through 2 more months of baseball, and they've showed signs of fatigue.

Yost isn't a mensa, that's for sure...but I'm not going to beat him up for this. We scored 1 freaking run.