Roenicke Fired; Counsell Hired

[msiris]

Now its Melvin's turn.

[Thunder Muscle]

Bill Michaels on Twitter is going after fans that are ragging on Melvin, said they are blind, don't remember the 90s, and are in a "what have you done for me lately" mindset. Haha.

[Kerb Hohl]

At the MLB level, Melvin is doing fairly well. I don't like some of the moves for relievers or giving up a pick for Lohse, but many of those moves had Mark's hands on them.

-Has a 6 WAR catcher signed to an incredibly cheap deal.
-Has a 10+ WAR CF that was pulled in for almost nothing (Hardy was left for dead) also on an incredibly cheap deal.
-Garza's deal was probably below market value for someone of his caliber.
-Braun was signed to what seemed to be a steal.
-Aramis they've probably held on to too long but was a solid deal at its inception.
-Picked up Marco Estrada off the scrap heap and later flipped him for a top 5 (for any position) hitting 1B against RHP (defense not withstanding).

It all comes down to getting zero elite pitching and only questionable above-average pitching from the minor league system over the past 5 years (and closer to 10 years outside of Gallardo being pretty good).

For what it's worth, this isn't a huge endorsement for Melvin. Time to move on and work on a new model at building this thing. I just think that his contributions beyond whatever hand he has on minor league stuff has improved over the past few years. For whatever it's worth, he holds some bit of responsibility for the minor league system being a pile of trash by hiring those guys and also not selling at certain times.

[Thunder Muscle]

Time to move on and work on a new model at building this thing.

That's where I am at with it. Push comes to shove, I feel he's been above average overall and from the day he started until now the organization is a in a MUCH better place. But I feel the regime is stale and its time for a fresh look. That's not necessarily going to guarantee better results but it seems like the timing is right for new ideas, direction, etc.

[paulpressey25]

Bill Michaels on Twitter is going after fans that are ragging on Melvin, said they are blind, don't remember the 90s, and are in a "what have you done for me lately" mindset. Haha.

Melvin has done a nice job. But now the farm system is bare, and he's obviously not the guy to rebuild it, otherwise he would have done so at some point in the past decade.

What I found most interesting was how Attanasio pulled the old Herb Kohl trick about how it was all Melvin's idea to fire Ron and how Melvin was the one responsible for so few player moves this offseason. This is straight out of Herb's bag where you employ the GM to take the heat for your meddling.

[LUKE23]

I find it hard to say he's done a nice job. I know it's hard in a small market, but we have one playoff series win, and that's with us being in full win now mode for at least the last 8 seasons. 6 playoff wins total. And he does need to take blame for the poor drafting, as he is the one who appoints the scouting director. He also continually made trades that emptied the farm system without replacing any of it. That and poor drafting is why we have no high ceiling talent that close.

He's done OK on his trades. Drafting and FA have both been well below average overall (although drafting was strong under Jack Z). I wouldn't say he's the worst GM, but below average for sure.

[M-C-G]

Melvin had an 18 point email on why Counsell should be hired...or was it 18 reasons Ron wasn't the guy, or somewhere in between. Does this mean that Melvin wanted Ron gone but Mark trumped him?

Interesting dynamic between Melvin and Mark that is for sure.

[Kerb Hohl]

I find it hard to say he's done a nice job. I know it's hard in a small market, but we have one playoff series win, and that's with us being in full win now mode for at least the last 8 seasons. 6 playoff wins total. And he does need to take blame for the poor drafting, as he is the one who appoints the scouting director. He also continually made trades that emptied the farm system without replacing any of it. That and poor drafting is why we have no high ceiling talent that close.

He's done OK on his trades. Drafting and FA have both been well below average overall (although drafting was strong under Jack Z). I wouldn't say he's the worst GM, but below average for sure.

The Brewers are in a tougher division (not impossibly tough like the AL East) with the Cubs being a spend-heavy team in the early 2000s and the Cards being a consistent power throughout.

I've gotta think if you look at the playoff series wins in the past decade I'd have to think the Cardinals and Giants have like 12 series wins apiece and everyone else in the league has less than 3.

The funny thing is, when they were in the early "win now" stage in 2007-2010ish, I hated all of Doug's complimentary moves. Now, from 2011-2015, I've liked a lot of his majors moves but the minors system has been trash to back that up.

[Madtown]

At the MLB level, Melvin is doing fairly well. I don't like some of the moves for relievers or giving up a pick for Lohse, but many of those moves had Mark's hands on them.

-Has a 6 WAR catcher signed to an incredibly cheap deal.
-Has a 10+ WAR CF that was pulled in for almost nothing (Hardy was left for dead) also on an incredibly cheap deal.
-Garza's deal was probably below market value for someone of his caliber.
-Braun was signed to what seemed to be a steal.
-Aramis they've probably held on to too long but was a solid deal at its inception.
-Picked up Marco Estrada off the scrap heap and later flipped him for a top 5 (for any position) hitting 1B against RHP (defense not withstanding).

It all comes down to getting zero elite pitching and only questionable above-average pitching from the minor league system over the past 5 years (and closer to 10 years outside of Gallardo being pretty good).

For what it's worth, this isn't a huge endorsement for Melvin. Time to move on and work on a new model at building this thing. I just think that his contributions beyond whatever hand he has on minor league stuff has improved over the past few years. For whatever it's worth, he holds some bit of responsibility for the minor league system being a pile of trash by hiring those guys and also not selling at certain times.

I'm with you. I like Melvin. He was on board when we had our resurgence with Fielder, Braun, Weeks, Hardy, Hart, etc. He seems like he's a good guy. Like you, I also don't think that he's responsible for some of the win-now moves (giving up 1st for Lohse. Those appeared to be all on Mark and really limited what Melvin could do.

That said, Melvin really has failed to do much to offset those moves. This is an organization that really needs a rich farm system to survive. We haven't really had any good prospects since Jack left for Seattle. IIRC, he really was the man behind the drafts that netted us that amazing core. Although, to be fair, it's not like Seattle is lighting the world on fire.

I wish Counsell wasn't hired until next season. I feel like he's almost set up to fail. Melvin needs to go. I'm assuming a new GM will want to pick his guy. I was hoping Mark realized that there needed to be a paradigm shift in the vision of this organization, but I don't think he has yet. If/when he does, I think it'll be then end for both Melvin and Counsell. Non of this has been Counsell's fault, IMO.

I hate to say it, but this organization will be better off long-term if Chicago puts us out of out of our misery by taking a majority of the next 5 games. IMO Mark needs a clear sign that we just don't have the talent.

[El Duderino]

In general i've liked Counsell so far and i get that the starters haven't been good, but he's really been riding a couple of the guys in the bullpen so far.

Jeffress was a nice pickup by Melvin and i like his future, but he leads the league in appearances right now and he's been used 6 times in the last 9 games. On the flip side, KRod has only been used three times simply because he's the designated closer.

This is a bad team and hopefully Counsell doesn't end up getting Jeffress hurt just because the rest of the pen sucks.