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Jim Riggleman?

In case you haven't heard, Mets GM Omar Minaya announced that Dodgers' Bench Coach Jim Riggleman will interview for the Mets' vacant managerial position this coming Wednesday. Jim Rigglewho, you ask?

Riggleman managed for parts of three seasons with the Padres and five seasons with the Cubs in the 90's. How did he do? Well, his teams, for the most part, were not very good. His managerial record is 486-598, or 112 games under .500.

Unforunately, our methods for evaluating managers are far less sophisticated and ubiquitous as those we use to evaluate players. Bill James, in The Bill James Guide To Baseball Managers, notes:

People like to talk about baseball managers, about Tony LaRussa and Bobby Cox and Joe Torre. The talk focuses almost entirely on who is a good manager and who is a lousy manager. The average fan has a one-dimensional image of a manager: He's good, or he's bad. If he's real good, he's a genius. If he's real bad, he's an idiot.

When the discussion turns to why a manger is good or why he is bad, you realize how little solid information is being used. On a talk show, 97% of all explanations as to why the local manager is an idiot will begin with the words "Well, one time he..."

Some believe that comparing a team's Pythagorean record to its actual record is a good measure of a manager's effectiveness. The thinking is that a good manager will be able to "get more" out of his players than they would otherwise be able to produce under an average or poor manager. For better or worse, here are how Riggleman's teams fared in this regard.

JIM RIGGLEMAN'S MANAGING CAREER

              RS   RA    W-L    PW-L   Diff
1992 Padres    35   40   4-8     5-7    -1
1993 Padres   679  772  61-101  72-90  -11
1994 Padres   479  531  47-70   53-64   -6
1995 Cubs     693  671  73-71   74-70   -1
1996 Cubs     772  771  76-86   81-81   -5
1997 Cubs     687  759  68-94   74-88   -6
1998 Cubs     831  792  90-73   85-78   +5
1999 Cubs     747  920  67-95   66-96   +1


For those who don't know, Pythagorean winning percentage is calculated thusly:

RS²

Eric | October 24, 2004 - 01:51 AM EST | TrackBack: 0
Category: Mets Rumors

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