I was absolutely blown away by the National League manager of the year vote and you don't have to look much further than team accomplishments to see why.
93-69, first place in their division
88-74, third place in their division
86-76, third place in their division
It's pretty obvious the first team I mention above had the best year. Yet, the second two had managers finished ahead of the first.
In a stunning vote, Charlie Manuel, who led the Phillies to their third straight division title and second straight World Series, finished sixth in the NL manager of the year vote. That is not a typo. Sixth.
San Francisco's Bruce Bochy and Atlanta's Bobby Cox finished fourth and fifth respectively. How do teams who finished third have a better manager than a team that won its division, especially when one of those teams is in the same division as the Phils? That makes no sense.
An argument could easily be made that Manuel could have beaten out a couple of the managers that finished in the top three.
Los Angeles Dodgers manager Joe Torre finished third and St. Louis' Tony La Russa finished second. Both teams won their division and the Dodgers were the best team in the National League.
Besides Manny Ramirez missing 50 games due to a suspension, neither dealt with the things Manuel did.
The Phils skipper did an amazing job with closer Brad Lidge, who was terrible all season. He stuck with his closer for most of the season, nursing his psyche. And despite one blown game in the World Series, Lidge had a great post-season.
Manuel dealt with a ton of injuries to his bullpen. He dealt with a terrible season from his lead off man. He overcame all odds and guided his team back to a second straight World Series.
The voters missed the boat on this one.
I'm not saying Manuel should have won the award. Colorado's Jim Tracy won after taking over as Rockies manager in late May with the Rockies 14 1/2 games out of first and then guiding his team to the playoffs.
So no, I'm not saying Manuel should have won. I am saying that he should have fared better than he did.
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2 comments:
The manager of the year award usually goes out to the manager of the "surprise" team in the league. In other words, the team that no one thought was going to be any good, but finished with a pretty good record. Hence, Charlie doesn't deserve the award since it was pretty much expected that the Phils would win 93 games, if not more, based on the talent on the team.
I agree to a point which is why I agree that Tracy won it. But I would think a team should have to win a division for a manager to be in the running. Thus, I definitely do think Manuel should have been higher than 6th.
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