It wasn’t supposed to be this way. The endless drone of social media convinced many to swim under the thin ice of an argument that if only the Reds would rid themselves of the incompetent Manager Who Shall Not Be Named, the team and their young, promising core could finally have a fighting chance to break through to the surface and live up to expectations because well, you know, accountability.
Enter Terry Francona. As the field leader of the wealthy and committed Boston Red Sox—and later the Chris Antonetti-led Cleveland organization—Francona enjoyed the fruits of money well spent by the former and frugal, smart front office leadership by the latter, culminating in a managerial record that foretells entry into the Baseball Hall of Fame someday. And Francona just oozed accountability.
If the question was who could push a group of electric arms and a young core of promising lumber-swinging youngsters to a postseason run, then Terry Francona was never the answer because managers—no matter the perceived pedigree—simply don’t enjoy that kind of influence over player production.
Shopworn phrases such as “good managers put players in a position to succeed,” are empty calories posing as baseball wisdom. As with another meaningless sports insight—“momentum”—shoveled to the public by “expert” NFL commentators looking to fill time and make sense of every moment, it’s a truism that should have long ago been interred with the dead at Shakespeare’s Agincourt.
For Reds fans, this is a very tough pill to swallow. A beloved Sparky Anderson inherited a budding superstar in Johnny Bench, a relentless Pete Rose, and a supporting cast of big talent in the form of Tony Perez and Lee May, along with just enough pitching talent that blossomed together—albeit only briefly for some—all buttressed by a brilliant front office run by Bob Howsam, who would merely add the best second baseman to ever walk the earth and, um, fostered the addition of some serious machine-like power via trade to mitigate the loss of May.
Lou Piniella benefited from talented roster that won 87 games in 1988 under manager Rose, and rebounded in part from the media circus that engulfed the franchise during the former manager’s betting scandal, leading to a disappointing 75-win season. That 91-win championship season began in a sprint, as the club raced out to a 30-12 record through May, then “momentum” over the next 4 months faded as the team barely scratched out a .500 record.
These two men led teams that are responsible for 3 of the 5 World Championships that define the first professional baseball club. It’s perfectly understandable they are held in such high regard. So much so, that local media and podcasters now fawn over Francona, convinced he has the same magic wand Sparky waved. Reds radio play-by-guy Tommy Thrall was so enthralled (sorry, not sorry) he proclaimed Terry worth 10 wins, which must have made ownership absolutely giddy, as they no longer need to consider trading away the entire farm system for, say, Aaron Judge, who Fangraphs graded as worth 10.1 wins above replacement this past season.
If managers are so critical to a team’s success, why did the Padres hire Craig Stammen, a former reliever with no coaching experience to speak of? Tony Vitello will be patrolling the Giants dugout—also with no professional experience. The Twins looked at longtime Pirates manager Derek Shelton and said, “he’s our man,” undoubtedly because of all that success in Pittsburgh. Walt Weiss is back, this time in Atlanta. Apparently there’s more to his skill set than what he showed in Colorado a decade ago, never winning more than 75 games.
If you truly believe major league baseball managers have a Paul Skenes baseball-like grip on the fortunes of a club, someone tell me why Craig Counsell, the highest paid manager in the history of the game, earned basically the same as Emilio Pagán last year? Nobody in Milwaukee seems too concerned about losing the brilliant Counsell. His replacement just won Manager of the Year for the second season in a row.
Clearly, the people doing the hiring—those who you would think might have the best handle on what makes a successful manager—have no idea, and instead flail about, whether than means turning to college coaches, stern taskmasters, or simply selecting from a vending machine of choices from the old boy network.
The Reds won 83 games with Francona at the helm. They won 82 two years ago with the previous guy driving the bus. If you think the 6 win difference from 2024 was evidence of Ten-Win Tito’s leadership, well, okay. You may have been inside a clubhouse I wasn’t given access. But those two teams were different. Francona got a lot of worthwhile innings out of Brady Singer and a resurgent Noelvi Marté. He got more from T.J. Friedl, but less from Elly. He got fewer innings from Hunter Greene, but an All-Star season from Andrew Abbott. Neither manager got any offense from Matt McLain, but at least Francona got some defense, something Jonathan India was short of.
What that all amounted to was a 2025 team that produced a weighted runs created offense of +92, versus their 2024 wRC+ of +89. Francona was gifted a team pitcher performance that posted a 3.86 team ERA, while the 2024 version produced a 4.09 ERA. Marginal, but real differences. Add in the variance that comes with the game of baseball, the way the ball bounces, etc., and it’s easy to understand what accounted for that six win spread, rather than crediting them exclusively to the new pair of legs pulling on those managerial baseball pants.
While fans everywhere were skewering the 2024 Reds for—as one radio guy put it—“running around like idiots on the base paths, imagine that!,” ignoring information that showed they were producing base running success at the same rate people routinely laud the Brewers for doing, a year later they were doing an about face and blasting Francona for pumping the brakes on the running game.
The same idiotic blame game laid at the feet of the last guy turned it’s gaze to Francona as epitomized perfectly by this:
You cannot make this stuff up. And by a former player, no less.
We tend to mythologize managers who win. George Anderson understandably stands head and shoulders above the others in that regard. I tend to think the most important attribute a manager can have is the respect of his players. Losing a clubhouse is a real thing. Beyond that, Francona may have a philosophy that demands starting pitchers going deeper into games, but if Hunter Greene tells his manager he’s ready to come out of the game after 99 pitches and 6 innings in a postseason elimination game, as Tarik Skubal said to respected manager A.J. Hinch after throwing 16 pitches 100 mph or more, you take him out.
Yes, dear manager, you may want your players embracing more “situational hitting,” but you better have players who can do that, or you may just be giving up barreled balls for weak double play grounders.
The reality of today’s game tells us that front offices make the critical decisions guys like Earl Weaver used to own. I care little about the individual decisions a manager makes during the season. If one works, great. If it doesn’t, tomorrow is in front of him to recalibrate and make a different choice. I do care about the decisions a manager makes when the season is on the line. John Schneider’s love of sacrifice bunting might very well have cost the Blue Jays their World Series rings just as Dusty Baker’s decision to keep Aroldis Chapman in the bullpen spitting sunflower seeds during high-leverage situations that weren’t save worthy may have prevented Cincinnati from putting away the San Francisco Giants in 2012.
If you say a lackluster final 4 months of the season was turned around by Piniella’s demanding leadership, I would ask that you check the box scores of those 10 postseason games, particularly the ones that held the mighty bats of the Oakland Athletics to 8 runs over 4 games. José Rijo, Tom Browning, Rob Dibble and Randy Myers answered the bell for Lou. They pitched. The Reds made history.
They say Sparky put Bench, Rose & Co. in charge of keeping clubhouse order and setting tone. If you say the respect those huge talents had for their manager made that possible, I would agree. But in the end, the players did the heavy lifting, just as Scott Rolen did for Baker. That’s the way it always works in the end, no matter how much we insist on mythologizing the father figures of our game of ball.
Or, as Weaver said when asked how many games a manager wins and loses during a season, he replied, “Every single one.”
