More fawning bullcrap on the inscrutable wisdom of Obi-Wan Leyland

I was thinking the same thing. I'm sure he of the Justice has his reasons, but damn, brother, your hatred for Leyland and Larry Brown are bordering on unhealthy.

Seriously.

 

Ah, you have put up the Donnie Walsh Conundrum. Is he a genius GM/president because he turned the Pacers into a franchise that contends for the playoffs year after year, or is he a doofus because in 20 years under his leadership the Pacers have only gotten to one NBA final?

 

Somehow, I think Phil Fulmer's name will be appearing here shortly.

 

And that says it all for me right there. Great job with the Bucs, great job with the Marlins, and now he's doing just fine this season with the Tigers, who haven't been the same since Placido Polanco got hurt.

 

Real tough to win with Barry Bonds and Bobby Bonilla in your outfield. Leyland stuck around for four seasons post-Bonds and had a .445 winning percentage. His "great" Marlins team was 92-70. During his one year in Colorado, the Rockies won the fewest games in any year from 1995-2003.

Polanco's only been out since Aug. 16. Omar Infante has hit just as well.

 

Neifi will save them, dudes

 

And the Tigers are 12-22 without him.

 

It's combination of a multiplicity of factors. Luck is one of them, but having the right combination of folks at the right time is perhaps the biggest one.

No one labeled Bill Belichek the second coming of Vince Lombardi in his first job at Cleveland. Not a one.

You've got to have a GM who is on the same page with you personnel-wise and who makes good decisions most of the time. In the NFL, that means drafting well and that's something that the Patriots have done. In baseball, that means someone who can make good trades that won't completely gut the farm system to win now.

And in the NFL, you don't have to be a great coach to win a Super Bowl. Remember the last coach of the Cowboys to win a Super Bowl? Yes, for those not paying attention, it was mental midget and master of corruption Barry Switzer.

So no, by that rationale, Leyland is no genius. In fact, this Jedi master may be about to get the Mace Windu treatment.

"Absolute power........bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz!"

 

And while technically it is only a half-game, it could be viewed that the Tigers still have a whole game lead.

The Twins cannot just tie the Tigers for the AL Central lead. By winning the season series, the Tigers hold the tiebreaker, if it should come down to that.

 

Still, the Tigers lead is smaller than Kenny Rogers cock.

That is to say, as small as it can possibly be.

I never thought that would happen, no matter how good the Twins played. Detroit was damn far out in front.

 

They were also 2-5 in the week prior to his injury.

 

BINGO.

Fact is, coaches really don't make all that much difference. Some are better than others, and I suppose Leyland is better than average (his career sub-.500 WL percentage notwithstanding), Larry Brown over 30 years has proven, given the right personnel, he can win, ditto for Nick Saban, yadda yadda so on and so on.

It's just that the constant deificiation and mystification of pretty much all these guys -- the breathless paens going into orgasmic fits over the fact that this guy looks at films, this other guy calls his players by nicknames in the locker room, and most of all, this last guy believes in defense and fundamentals -- just makes me laugh.

Guess what. They ALL look at films. They ALL call their players by nicknames. They ALL believe in defense and fundamentals.

Leyland didn't tell Polanco to get injured. He didn't tell Verlander and Bonderman to hit the wall.

He didn't tell Dombrowski to allow the fatass clubhouse cancer Dmitri Young back on the roster, although he did compound that mistake by actually putting the lazy fatass woman-beating druggie in the lineup, just as he compounded Dombrowski's moronitude of allowing Neifi Perez to besmirch his active roster about 1,000 times by actually putting one of these most useless wastes of human protoplasm in MLB history out onto the field to absorb outs, destroy rallies, and fuel opposing offenses.