Now we know what we already know

A few days ago, I said that the choice of manager would tell us how much “total authority” Randy Flores has with the club.

Now we see this story.

Considering that Brad Ausmus was interviewed before Randy Flores was hired…..considering that there is no hint that Ausmus was brought back in to interview a second time with Flores….considering how much followers of the team suspect that the shadow front office of Jim Crane with Jeff Bagwell in his ear is running things….considering that Ausmus is best buddies with Bagwell.…..this is no surprise.

So now we know what we already knew. Total authority does not mean what most would think it does. For Randy Flores, it appears to have limits.

Did this tie into the reason Matt Kleine, the Milwaukee Brewers assistant GM pulled out of the Astros’ GM position? Was he told that he would have to accept a manager hand-picked for him? We will likely never know all the details of that story.

So, what do we have with the new manager Brad Ausmus?

• A former player, Ausmus played 18 seasons as a catcher in the majors, including 10 with the Astros, and the balance with the Padres, Tigers and Dodgers. He played two shifts with the Astros, who brought him back after two seasons with the Tigers.
• Though overall a middle-of-the-road hitter with little power, he hit an iconic home run in the ninth inning of the 18-inning marathon game against the Braves in the 2005 NLDS. This home run tied up a game that, one inning earlier, had been a 6-1 deficit for the team. Nine insane innings later, Chris Burke hit another homer that would win the NLDS in a season that would end in the Astros first World Series appearance.
• He has also 5 years’ experience as a manager.
  • Overall record 384-422
  • 4 Seasons with the Tigers – 314-332
  • 1 season with the Angels – 72-90
• His only playoff appearance was in his first season in Detroit, when he took over a team that had made the playoffs three straight seasons. They fell off the next season (a season without Max Scherzer and with Justin Verlander going 5-8). His third season was over .500 and then they played badly in his last season in Detroit – the season after Verlander was sent to the Astros and their starting pitching was so bad that Mike Fiers was their best pitcher.
• After working as a bench coach, he moved up to manager with the Angels in 2019. Though this was a season where Mike Trout played in 134 games and won the MVP, it also featured late career /boat anchor Albert Pujols. This was the season that the team was led in wins by Tyler Skaggs with 7, who died of an opioid overdose in July. (note they were 42-43 the day he died and 30-47 between then and the end of the season).
• Ausmus has served as a bench coach with both the Oakland A’s and the New York Yankees in the last few seasons.

So, what do we think about this hiring?

This is kind of a meh hiring. It is neither exciting, nor totally demoralizing. The worst thing about it to me is that it sets in stone that the GM does not have total authority and that meddling will continue.

In my mind, I compare this to the hiring of Phil Garner back in the day. A good, tough, everyman player and a smart manager. Garner had more experience managing than Ausmus, but similarly had a so-so record and so-so success before his Astro stint. Phil, who was posthumously inducted into the Astros Hall of Fame this year, famously took over the club in the middle of 2004 and managed the club to its first playoff series win. In 2005 he managed them through the famous Chronicle “tombstone” headline (signifying the team was dead in June) to rise from the dead, make the playoffs and then make the World Series (thanks to Ausmus’ home run among others).

Brad will only do as much as the roster Randy Flores (or Jeff Bagwell and Jim Crane) provides him. Managers get too much credit for good seasons and too much blame for bad seasons. Yes, they affect games with their decisions (both ways), but rarely are they the reason a team plays way beyond or beneath their talent.

Anyways, those are my personal thoughts. What are yours?