Campione: Ignorant Need Not Apply: The Mind of the Manager Must Evolve

And crawling out of that Francesspoolian swill comes this gem from Cashman…

Mattingly seemingly aligned himself with Torre once he was added to his staff and made standing by Torre his priority. Cashman again did not name names, but made it clear there were people on his “field staff” who routinely ignored his directives and lied about their execution of the orders. On the topic of Derek Jeter’s declining defense, Cashman says, “There is no doubt that here was some problem with Derek’s range. It was obvious. You could see that he lost not one but two steps.” When Cashman approached Jeter the offseason after Joe Torre’s dismissal, Jeter said he wasn’t aware of the problem. (which is a column in itself. How can Jeter be counted on to know when to change positions or when to hang it up if he wasn’t aware his defense truly stunk?) Cashman said, “He wasn’t aware because nobody had told him. My staff told me they were confronting him on it. They weren’t. Clearly I was being lied to by my field staff.”

While I hesitate to indict Mattingly with such thin evidence (Larry Bowa is the sensible choice for the majority of the blame), everyone on Torre’s staff becomes accountable when management is lied to and orders go unfulfilled.

The Yankees are late entrants into the fray of improved scouting and varying tools of assessment. All managerial applicants will need to be aware of what it takes to manage a team in the 21st century, whether they are Don Mattingly or a minor league lifer with hopes of moving up to the big league office one day. Mattingly may very well be a fine manager one day, but his apparent ignorance of now basic statistical analysis and consistent strategic methodology may doom his first campaign even before he starts.