Olney: Piniella Wearing on Players
Yesterday, Brian mentioned in the comments that "one thing that appears not to have changed with the new regime: the public posturing by the manager seems mostly designed to deflect blame away from himself."
ESPN.com's Buster Olney adds to that today:
The new manager has been openly critical of the players, repeatedly suggesting in his post-game remarks that the problems lie with them, and privately, some players are very critical of the manager and what they view as his tendency to turn them into scapegoats.
. . . .
Piniella needs to start mending fences with his players quickly, displaying more patience and support. Fair or not, some of them already are hardening this view of him -- that he tends to make decisions based on emotion and impatience, and that he tends to blame them for failure, while being readily available for praise when the team succeeds. Which is how many of the Devil Rays came to view him during his tenure with Tampa Bay, but those players were young and absorbed the criticism. The Cubs, a team of veterans, are not reacting as sedately.
Losing breeds contempt. The Cubs need to start winning.
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scapegoating
I've come to think that the responsibility of the manager (and coaches in general) is not so much to make players successful, but rather to put them in situations that offer the best chance for success. That's a hard thing to judge, but I think it's fair to question the way Piniella has gone about things in this regard. His handling of the bullpen, for example, has seemed less and less logical - and more "based on emotion and impatience" - as they've continued to struggle. Zambrano has obviously stayed in games too late at least twice, which is not the best situation for success; it was so obvious last week against the Dodgers that he was exhausted, Mark Grace was practically pleading from the booth for Zambrano to be removed. And I know his hands are tied to some degree, but his handling of the outfield situation seems arbitrary so far.
I do have (some) patience, though, and I realize it's too early to come down too hard on Piniella. But I think Olney's right: "more patience and support" on Lou's part definitely seems like a good idea.