Milwaukee Weather
Ned Yost, Dale Sveum. | Photos: AP/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel Melvin: Yost Fired To "Jump Start The Club"By By Jay SorgiAfter discerning several options to try and change the fortunes of a Brewers team that has lost seven of its last 10 games and the outright lead in the National League wildcard race, Brewers General Manager Doug Melvin and owner Mark Attanasio came to a decision with just two weeks left in the season. "In the end, (we) thought about a managerial change: would that jump start the club?" said Melvin on Newsradio 620 WTMJ's "Wisconsin's Morning News." "In the end, that's what we did." Read more below this series of links: New Audio: 9/15/06 Audio: So they chose to fire Ned Yost with 12 games to play and the team tied with the Philadelphia Phillies for the NL wildcard, and move coach Dale Sveum into Yost's old job for the remainder of the chase for the playoffs. "It's somewhat of a surprise. I know there's people that were critics of Ned, but from my standpoint, it's a solid baseball guy who has gotten us to the point of where we're at right now. "There's a lot of organizations that try to do things to try to get things turned around like we have in the past few years and Ned is a huge part of that. "In the end, Mark Attanasio talk on a daily basis, on a regular basis, and disappointment in the last two weeks brought about a discussion as to what can be done. "Coaching changes, player moves. It's too late to make trades, People want the lineups switched around, it was switched around a couple days on the weekend and it didn't necessarily help." Cause of the Problem? Mainly Hitting, Not Decision Making Many pundits, both in the media and on the radio talk show beat, blame Yost's in-game decision making for many Brewers losses, and in some cases, that blame was deserved. But Melvin states that wasn't the cause of upper management's decision to remove the manager," explained Melvin. "I don't think there was any particular (managing) move. It was the overall performance of the ball club. We didn't score runs. "There wasn't any one particular move. It was just the overall lack of offensive performance as much as anything. "Why (couldn't) a team that has the ability to hit, that's fifth in the league in runs scored, even come close to scoring some runs to help this club get a lead early and ride our pitching out? "It's the combination of all those things." What To Expect from Sveum? "I Don't Know" Melvin admitted he doesn't necessarily have a clue what Sveum's managerial style will be in these final 12 critical contests. "I think we'll find out over the 12 games. I don't know myself what we'll find out. "Dale's the most familiar with the team, with the players, and I think he indicated yesterday he's not sure how he's going to manage until the situation comes up in the games. "He's been a bench coach for Ned, he's coached 3rd base, he's managed in the minor leagues. "He knows our personnel. He'll do a few things differently." One thing Yost tried differently in the final games of his regime in Philadelphia was a lineup shakeup that, as the results prove, didn't work. Could that be something Sveum does? To Melvin, it doesn't even matter. What the batters do when they're at the plate matters. "Whatever he does, it doesn't matter where you hit in the lineup, it's how you hit when you're in the batters box." Why Not Simmons? The Brewers chose Ted Simmons to play the role of bench coach for the 2008 season. In the beginning of that campaign, many prognosticators thought Simmons would become an obvious choice of replacement manager should Yost lose his job. Melvin explained that Sveum has more experience, and more of a manager's personality, fitting the role better. "Dale knows this ball club. He's been here a couple years. Teddy Simmons has only been here for one year. "Teddy was a bench coach for Ned. He wasn't as active as maybe bench coaches could be in that regard. We viewed Ted as a guy who could help our players, talk to them individually, bringing that senior advisory role, mentorship to the locker room and to the dugout. "Dale's a solid baseball guy. He's a hard worker. He gets frustrated like Ned does, like anyone does when you're not playing well. He was the best choice for us over the past 12 games." Now, It's On The Players Though Melvin and Attanasio's decision certainly bears the thought that Yost held the responsibility for the team's recent collapse, he won't say that Sveum will bear the final weight of the final 12 games. That, Melvin says, belongs to the guys on the field. "We have to have all 25 players be on the same page and moving forward with our manager for these last 12 games," states Melvin. "The players have the responsibility and now the responsibility will be put on them. Nobody likes to push responsibility on anyone because it is a team effort, but for 12 games, the players will have the responsibility to play their best baseball and see if we can get this to postseason." Melvin also saw the same reflected in words his players said about Yost's firing. "I was somewhat pleased in reading some of the articles today, that J.J. Hardy and some of them really stood up and said Ned was not at fault with this. "There's the old philosophy that goes far back as Connie Mack and Casey Stengel and Branch Rickey. You've heard it before: 'Eight players like the manager, eight don't like him, and there's eight that aren't sure which side of the fence to get on. "That always happens to any manager in any position like that, but there weren't any players pushing for this. We never heard that." |
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