Twins promote Antony

[jay]

Could have been such a nice opportunity to congratulate a man on a promotion. There are likely years of opportunity to assess the job he does. I'm bummed this community couldn't take the chance to just say congratulations to the man.

 

Rarely can and this has unfortunately happened elsewhere as well. This thread has been moderated already, but there's a case for more.

 

Congrats, Rob!

[cmathewson]

My thoughts exactly as I was reading thru this thread. A very visable portion of a GM's job is making trades, an ex-scout will know more about players than a person that has risen thru the business side of the company. Look no further than Bill Smith.

 

When he first retired, Ryan was quoted as saying that Antony has a rare gift for scouting, all the more rare since he did not play the game, so he never developed those instincts. What he has learned is necessarily more analytical. I would have no problem with that if he used all the tools in his arsenal. But several interviews have shown him to lack basic SABR skills. This is a problem if you didn't grow up around the game. (If you did grow up around the game, you tend to be overconfident in your scouting judgements, which is the other kind of problem.)

 

BS is the poster child for a guy who didn't grow up around the game and never learned to use math to compensate for his lack of instincts. I have some hope that Antony will escape Smith's fate. But he better study up.

[gunnarthor]

It takes alot more than articles and interviews to assess relative ability and specific skills sets.

 

Not on the internet, buddy.

[Otto von Ballpark]

Would an outside candidate for GM even be able to succeed in the Twins org? That FO has to be so damn insular, full of guys who came up together and trust eachother. An outside GM would get steam rolled by the ol' boys club that likely dominates that office.

In a way, I think this may have happened to Bill Smith. Obviously, he was an insider, but he was not a scout, so I think he basically delegated a lot of GM duties/decisions (I would be curious how much of that delegation was by choice, and how much may have been forced on him). In particular, Gardy's fingerprints are all over those 2008-2011 teams. I worry that Antony may eventually suffer a similar fate, although hopefully he and the organization learned from the Smith fiasco.

 

As frustrating/conservative as TR can be, it's pretty awesome that he doesn't often make the "obvious" moves. (Except, of course, when the obvious move is adding a better pitcher the previous couple offseasons... ) I love it now when Gardy complains about his team or roster -- in a way, it means the GM finally is doing his job again!

[JB_Iowa]

A GM with a scouting background is great ... if that person also WANTS the business-side portion of negotiating contracts and administering a fairly large part of the organization. Some of those duties can obviously be delegated but ultimately the GM is the one who has to take responsibility.

 

A GM with a business type background could also be great -- if that person has a good understanding of analytics and can use them in conjunction with what the scouts are seeing and analyzing.

 

It's just never easy to walk on water.