What if Rocco Baldelli is Actually a Good Manager?

[USAFChief]

35 minutes ago, Hosken Bombo Disco said:

I’ll just say Rocco is the fourth best manager in that Tweet you posted

I'd put Rocco ahead of Molitor. I think Molitor was exceptionally poor at handling a pitching staff.

 

 

But as to the OP...he isn't.

 

 

[Rod Carews Birthday]

It's easy to find something you disagree with in a manager and use it to decide that the guy is an idiot.  You can do the same thing with your boss or the CEO of your company.  Those things are like watching the stock market minute by minute.  There are people that do it and it's probably ridiculously stressful.  If you take the long view of the stock market (at least so far!) things will work out in the end.

The same thing is true with baseball managers.  I've written many times that they get too much credit and too much blame, but what is undeniable is that he has the support of his players and they just had a successful season, particularly in the second half.  That makes him a good manager.  At the end of the day, what he decides regarding pitchers, pinch hitters, batting philosophies, or making Castro his fifth starting pitcher just for the fun of it doesn't matter.  We can decide that we would do it differently, but that doesn't make the manager a fool. There are just too many decisions to be made for all of them to be "right."

[rv78]

Seriously, comparing Rocco to past Managers is an exercise in foolishness. I see absolutely no correlation of managerial ability between Kelly, Gardenhire and Molitor to Rocco based on their W/L records. No one should. Different eras, different budgets, different players.

We can agree the Twins played better the 2nd half of the season, due to what? A weaker schedule. Not necessarily better play. All Managers have to have good players to win. Rocco got those players this year. Does that make him a better Manager than he was when he didn't have the better players? Not likely. Would Kelly, Gardenhire. and Molitor have as good of a record as Rocco had they been given the same teams as Rocco? My guess it would have been better. The true test of how good a Manager is, is how he does with less, not more. Rocco has only lost when he has had less. Was Mike Krzyzewski a great basketball coach because he was good or because he had a stable full of All-Americans every year? The only thing Rocco has proven to this point is that he can win some games if he gets the right players. That doesn't automatically make him a "good manager". The bigger question is, did Rocco win as many games as he should have with what he was given. 87 wins in 2023. 78 wins in 2022. Was this team, with so much better health, an Ace pitcher, way more depth, a weaker division, a better team by only 9 games? Doesn't seem like it was enough of an improvement to me, Maybe throwing games away is not good managing.

[Fire Dan Gladden]

The best measurement I can think of as to if a manager is good/effective/etc. is did they get more out of their players than expected?

Correa and Buxton were NOs, but injuries played a part of that.  Miranda, Vazquez, and Gordon definitively underperformed.

You can make an argument that basically every other player on the roster played at or above expectations.  How many players this year had "career" level years?  Julien, Kiriloff, Wallner, Solano, all had very productive years in large part to how well they were protected and put in positions to be successful (L/R splits anyone?).  Getting the most out of your players... 

Their record was about what was expected in the pre-season.  Personally, I think Correa and Buxton alone cost them around 7-8 wins.

The reactionary calls for Baldelli to be fired truly need to stop.  At worst, he is average.  There is a decent chance he is pretty good and getting better.
 

[Boswell]

14 hours ago, Fat Calvin said:

What if he isn't?

The franchise went 3-3 in the postseason this year.  As such, the Twins had the 5th best result out of the 12 teams in the playoffs (and the 30 teams overall).  
 

So, Baldelli is indeed a successful manager.. and deserves to be hailed as “good enough” to end the 18-game, 19-year long pandemic of losing and the 21-year long failure to advance in the playoffs.  
 

I do wonder about the nature of his Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde personality, as the guy becomes a lunatic when he’s angry.   He usually has the Cool Dude exterior, but the guy with a filthy mouth and a raging vengeance breaks out on occasion.  
 

So, can’t say I like him as a person - but that’s hardly relevant to his job performance.   

 

 

[Beast]

12 minutes ago, Boswell said:

The franchise went 3-3 in the postseason this year.  As such, the Twins had the 5th best result out of the 12 teams in the playoffs (and the 30 teams overall).  
 

So, Baldelli is indeed a successful manager.. and deserves to be hailed as “good enough” to end the 18-game, 19-year long pandemic of losing and the 21-year long failure to advance in the playoffs.  
 

I do wonder about the nature of his Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde personality, as the guy becomes a lunatic when he’s angry.   He usually has the Cool Dude exterior, but the guy with a filthy mouth and a raging vengeance breaks out on occasion.  
 

So, can’t say I like him as a person - but that’s hardly relevant to his job performance.   

 

 

3-3 in the postseason with 2 wins coming at the hand of an absolute hammer of a SP does  not make him a successful manager.

Im not even saying he isn’t, but good grief we have a low bar around here. 

[Andrew Bryz-Gornia]

As far as I'm concerned Baldelli is a very good manager. Here are the common complaints I've seen.

1) He doesn't get fired up / doesn't fire up the team well.

Too many fans think the best way to motivate someone is to yell at them or someone else, probably because it's what they experienced as a player or it's what they would do in that situation. I *hated* coaches that did this. My 10th grade basketball coach is an example and in a season where we went winless unless the 10th grade JV players joined us, his act made me want to quit, not play better.

2) He doesn't know how to manage a bullpen.

Everyone says this about their team's manager. Yawn.

3) Too many pinch-hitters / pinch-hitting too early.

He's putting his hitters in the best positions to succeed. Especially when the opposition uses an opener where he's followed by a bulk guy that throws with the opposite hand, why wouldn't you use the platoon advantage if you have hitters with better numbers against that guy? I understand the concern that you might run out of players, but that's getting into "Gardy needs 3 active catchers" fearmongering. I also saw frustration that Julien was getting pulled early, especially with good numbers against LHP in the minors, so I'll admit that was one thing that puzzled me a bit. Julien barely walked against LHP in the majors this year, though, so maybe they knew something that we didn't. 

One last thing, I bet the constant pinch-hitting kept players fresher because while they weren't getting full days off all the time, they also knew they could enter any game at any time and thus had to stay mentally focused more frequently. 

4) Too much analytics / not enough feel. 

The best teams are using analytics and I bet Baldelli has job security because he follows what Falvey/Levine want. Plus, Molitor was fired as manager partially because he wasn't a good enough conduit between the front office and clubhouse. 

---

Meanwhile, the things I feel Baldelli does well are...

1) Good bridge between front office and clubhouse

Some people hate that he might not use his gut as much as they'd like, and maybe it's because I'm a math teacher, but I'd prefer to see data-informed decisions. We need to view decisions through a "was it a good process?" lens instead of "was it a good outcome?" because not every good process works out, and not every good outcome comes from a good process.

2) Great clubhouse harmony

He's proactive with notifying players, such as that first game where Julien was pinch-hit for before his first PA, Twins reporters said after the game that the players knew they might get pulled without hitting, or he maps out rest days about a week in advance. Players don't experience surprises with him. 

3) Adapts to his personnel

Baldelli hasn't game-managed the same every year, which was already addressed by Hans.

---

Overall, there aren't many managers that I think do a better job than Baldelli. I feel most people that complain about him would complain about virtually any manager the Twins employed. 

[Blyleven2011]

Baldelli won division titles his first two years. In 2021, Josh Donaldson, JA Happ, Matt Shoemaker and Alex Colome made sure there wouldn’t be a three-peat. 

And dropping Gallo from the playoff roster this year  helped get the Twins win  ...

With an article like this I miss the bashing that he got in the past , and some of those that think he is a good manager  , they were bashers before  , just because we won 3 playoff games they are now siding with Rocco as a good manager still learning on the job ....

Is he a good manager , let's wait and see if he can manage through the entire playoff process and a world series  victory , and then have a article of this topic ...

[Shobae]

Good to see some good faith evidence based discussion around Baldelli, instead of the usual temper tantrums and anti-analytics rambling, for example, complaining that he pulled a certain pitcher in the 5/6th inning, with a career 4.85 ERA a third time through the line up.
I agree that manager are generally give too much credit for game results and that it's rather difficult to find a specific and repeatable measurement of their contributions. But I do think that managers have an outsized impact in the playoffs and that's probably where their on field decisions matter most. Now for Baldelli's tenure he has managed 3 playoff teams going 3-8, but I don't know how much of the 19-20 results were due to his decisions or just the twins scheduled playoff disappointments. However, having watched every game except ALDS game 2 I thought Badelli did an good job this playoffs and I couldn't find anything to strongly criticize here. So when it mattered most he delivered and I think that is worth praising.
The other thing I like about Rocco is his levelheadedness during the regular season and his focus on 162, which is important when you're playing a marathon like that. Hopefully, people will be more reasonable and reality based towards Rocco in the future, but I wouldn't count on it.

[Nick Nelson]

I'm curious to know how people think this team -- which finished in 3rd place last year with a .500 record and was projected to basically do the same this year -- would have done with a "better" manager. Would they have won 100 games? Won the World Series? What is this magical manager doing differently than Baldelli to squeeze more performance of this roster, with minimal contributions from CC/BB, exactly? 

The "grass is greener" delusion has never been stronger than with Rocco I feel like. "He manages the staff badly!!!" They allowed the fewest runs in the league!!

[USAFChief]

On 10/18/2023 at 8:16 AM, Nick Nelson said:

I'm curious to know how people think this team -- which finished in 3rd place last year with a .500 record and was projected to basically do the same this year -- would have done with a "better" manager. Would they have won 100 games? Won the World Series? What is this magical manager doing differently than Baldelli to squeeze more performance of this roster, with minimal contributions from CC/BB, exactly? 

The "grass is greener" delusion has never been stronger than with Rocco I feel like. "He manages the staff badly!!!" They allowed the fewest runs in the league!!

All that, and Baldelli somehow only turned that into 87 Ws. 6 games under what Pythagoras says they should have won.

For the record, Seth's preseason poll of TD writers and staff had them overwhelmingly winning the ALC.

Rocco isn't very good. It's that simple. 

[Boswell]

On 10/17/2023 at 11:28 AM, Beast said:

3-3 in the postseason with 2 wins coming at the hand of an absolute hammer of a SP does  not make him a successful manager.

Im not even saying he isn’t, but good grief we have a low bar around here. 

Well, when your predecessors are Gardy and Molly… who began and carried forward the abominable postseason losing streak that may stand for decades across the professional sports leagues of all nations, all genders… then, yes, Rocco reigns supreme. 
 

Baldelli was “good enough” to successfully lead the 2023 Twins to not just one, but -three- postseason victories.

As such, I’ve been converted to a “Baldelli believer” (a Belieber? 😂)  

Had the Twins pulled out another postseason donut and given us a solid 20 around our necks, you’re damn right I’d be getting out a pitchfork.  

So it goes.  How did it all get so foolish?

[Nine of twelve]

On 10/17/2023 at 2:17 PM, Blyleven2011 said:

Baldelli won division titles his first two years. In 2021, Josh Donaldson, JA Happ, Matt Shoemaker and Alex Colome made sure there wouldn’t be a three-peat. 

You left out the player whose contribution was the most negative (IMHO), Andrelton Simmons.

[Nine of twelve]

12 hours ago, USAFChief said:

All that, and Baldelli somehow only turned that into 87 Ws. 6 games under what Pythagoras says they should have won.

IMHO the Pythagorean estimate is flawed because it is based strictly on run differential. If a team has a higher than average number of blowout wins the estimate will be above the actual. If a team has a higher than average number of blowout losses the estimate will be below the actual. I think it's very widely accepted that a manager has little to no effect on the outcome of blowout games.

Here's a link to the records of MLB teams in close games.

https://www.teamrankings.com/mlb/stat/win-pct-close-games

The Twins had a winning percentage of .506 in these games, which is by definition about average. This is obviously a very limited bit of data, but going by this makes Rocco about average.

[stringer bell]

On 10/17/2023 at 7:33 AM, Bodie said:

I'll never respect Rocco as he is either a) utterly ignorant, or b) a flat-out liar.

EVERY time a player leaves a game, the post-game press conference includes a "not as bad as it looks", or a "probably a day-to-day thing" report on the injured player before the next day's "official" report of said player needing major surgery and a 60 day DL stint.

I realize he isn't a doctor or even a trainer,  but adding this to his history of baffling moves (esp. pitching, and weekly days off for position players beyond travel days) and strict analytical adherence, I see nothing to recommend him at all as a manager.

He'd likely make a good babysitter.  Assuming your child is bulletproof...

I disagree. I do think injury reporting is thankless—Rocco is limited in what he can say and doesn’t want to reveal anything that would give opponents a competitive advantage. I would like to see examples of minimizing injuries, as well. 

[ashbury]

On 10/20/2023 at 9:29 AM, Nine of twelve said:

https://www.teamrankings.com/mlb/stat/win-pct-close-games

The Twins had a winning percentage of .506 in these games, which is by definition about average. This is obviously a very limited bit of data, but going by this makes Rocco about average.

This kind of analysis would have me believe also that Dusty Baker is about average. Likewise Terry Francona.  Bruce Bochy has a pretty good reputation but this chart would have me say he's below average.  Buck Showalter was manager of the year for the Mets last season; this season he's a chump sez the chart.

Look also at the comparison of the 2023 column to the last column, for last season.  I don't see a lot of correlation, which means that managers get smart or dumb on each cycle of the Earth around the Sun.

If anything, my memory of studies is that close games are irreproducible results, and about the last thing you look at when drawing conclusions about something lasting.  Instead the teams that win the most comfortably, more often, are the better teams.  A manager has more input in making that happen than you give him credit for - getting the right players into the right situations, maintaining a good clubhouse, knowing how to handle his starting pitchers, etc.

But in any case slicing and dicing manager data is really hard.

[stringer bell]

In an earlier post, I disagreed with a criticism of Baldelli. For the record, I think he's a decent manager, but not among the very best. Most of what a manager does is limited by his roster. You can't have much of a running game if your whole team is made up of plow horses. You can't play for the big inning when you don't have power, etc. Rocco showed that he is amenable to playing small ball with squeeze bunts and double steals when he had the right personnel at the plate or on the bases. He also showed he doesn't have a particularly quick hook for starting pitchers. 

I don't think the Pythagorean argument really holds much water. It's a nice view of a team's strength, but sometimes, like this year's Padres, you continue to lose close games. I would expect a run closer to the Pythag next year because of regression to the mean (same for the Padres BTW). 

I didn't like the aggressive pinch hitting moves, particularly subbing right handed hitters for lefties when the other team had several right handed relief pitching options. I thought he handled the bullpen well. It did seem like most of the season he was looking at the big picture and wasn't willing to risk overusing a pitcher and maybe that was helped by not having any other good teams in the division.

In the end, managers all know a lot of baseball and they have much more information than the average fan. A manager that has success one year doesn't get stupid the next when the team flounders. They may, however, lose the clubhouse because they didn't treat players properly or were duplicitous in their dealing with them. Rocco seems to be very well-liked by his players. 

[Nine of twelve]

On 10/20/2023 at 11:29 AM, Nine of twelve said:

IMHO the Pythagorean estimate is flawed because it is based strictly on run differential. If a team has a higher than average number of blowout wins the estimate will be above the actual. If a team has a higher than average number of blowout losses the estimate will be below the actual. I think it's very widely accepted that a manager has little to no effect on the outcome of blowout games.

Here's a link to the records of MLB teams in close games.

https://www.teamrankings.com/mlb/stat/win-pct-close-games

The Twins had a winning percentage of .506 in these games, which is by definition about average. This is obviously a very limited bit of data, but going by this makes Rocco about average.

 

23 hours ago, ashbury said:

This kind of analysis would have me believe also that Dusty Baker is about average. Likewise Terry Francona.  Bruce Bochy has a pretty good reputation but this chart would have me say he's below average.  Buck Showalter was manager of the year for the Mets last season; this season he's a chump sez the chart.

Look also at the comparison of the 2023 column to the last column, for last season.  I don't see a lot of correlation, which means that managers get smart or dumb on each cycle of the Earth around the Sun.

If anything, my memory of studies is that close games are irreproducible results, and about the last thing you look at when drawing conclusions about something lasting.  Instead the teams that win the most comfortably, more often, are the better teams.  A manager has more input in making that happen than you give him credit for - getting the right players into the right situations, maintaining a good clubhouse, knowing how to handle his starting pitchers, etc.

But in any case slicing and dicing manager data is really hard.

Many say that managers have more of an effect on the outcome of close games than on the outcome of blowout games. I agree that certainly there are many criteria that should be used to evaluate the performance of a manager. I didn't do a good job of emphasizing that this is a very small, narrow bit of data and can not be exclusively used to determine whether a manager does a good job. I was actually trying to contrast using a team's record in close games with using the Pythagorean estimate.

[Alex]

Ended up 4th in Manager of the Year voting.   While that's far from winning the award, I got some flak from some folks here for even saying he would get "some" votes.

 

[Alex]

Double post.