Time for Leyland to go?

[Manocad]

The Tigers had one of the best records in baseball at home this year, and one of the worst on the road. That's obviously something mental which I lay at the feet of the coach. Additionally, I've continually watched the Tigers lose games simply because they were outcoached. I can't count the times I've watched the Tigers lose a game by a run to a team that steals, sacrifices, bunts, and squeezes, and it seems that Leyland will only lay down a bunt if it's his 7, 8 or 9 hitter at the plate.

Now don't get me wrong--I'm not saying there are a lot of better options out there. But I'm not sure at this point if Leyland will ever get this team over the top due to his coaching being the added x-factor.

Thoughts?

[TSE]

You're years late on this one. Leyland has no sense of baseball logic, he has an overly rudimentary understanding of management strategy, and he also doesn't know how to coordinate and manage his coaches who are also struggling in way too many facets of the game. We need major coaching help or these guys will keep discounting our players and failing at getting the most out of them. To me that is one of the worst sins you can do on a professional sports team, is having the guys on the sidelines serve as anchors to the players on the field. Why do these guys keep drawing paychecks to lose? It's completely illogical and not fair to the fans. The honorable thing to do would be for these guys to return the money they have collected and to resign, unless they can certify that they have done their homework and have arrived at a solution. I'm sick of seeing people continue to make big bucks to not perform in high profile jobs, it's getting really old.

[ajaX82]

He should have been fired after the fiasco last year. He certainly should be gone now. I fully expect him to be back though

[TSE]

It was just announced very recently that the Tigers are retaining ALL of their coaches for next year. For the most part that is a financial reason because the bulk of them probably have like one year remaining (or low cost options) on their contracts (I'm guessing), so the cost in dollars may have been somewhat of a nuisance to replace them all. Not sure what the Tigers are thinking for the long-term but maybe they see next year as a transition towards major overhaul changes for the 2012 season and beyond. There isn't much in the FA market that is going to help us radically change the team for an efficient cost, and barring a complete re-organization of trading everybody on the team, there is little that they can do to get great shape for next year while simultaneously building a beautiful foundation for the 2012 and beyond era. It's going to take 2 offseasons to clean up the mess without having an uber-aggressive approach to do it in one season, which in my mind isn't really wouldn't be that difficult in theory to somebody who is willing to have a firesale of darn near the entire club, but I don't think the Tigers can see a 1 offseason solution that they would dare to entertain. They would consider that option to be embarrassing and too risky to their own personal equity.

So by the time 2012 comes they will then settle in on a fresh set of coaches for the future. But of course my vote would be the firesale option because to me that clearly gives us a MUCH MUCH better position for the 2012-2020 period, which is worth a LOT more than the 2011 season by itself, and we could still actually obtain a larger quantity of logical and high caliber long-term keepers for even the 2011 season than to do it the traditional way that I'm sure the Tigers will be doing. But again, that's a highly complex solution that would require brass balls on DD's part after he spent so much time trying to build the team in a completely different way. It takes great courage to declare that you have done everything the wrong way and that you are going forward with a completely fresh and revolutionary approach that goes against your last several years of baseball philosophy. The Tigers are too conservative to want to entertain that PR storm.