The timing seems odd. And the front office firings and re-assignments the Cubs announced yesterday may be as effective as re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
The Sun-Times reported that the players and Cub front office personnel posed for the annual team photograph. But by the next morning, four members of that photo had lost their jobs.
On Tuesday, Cubs players and front-office personnel posed for the annual team photo.
Oneri Fleita, the longtime vice president of
player personnel and protege of former Cub GM Jim Hendry, was dismissed just days after a
shuffle of the scouting and player development department that saw
Jeron Madison hired from the San Diego Padres to become amateur scouting
director. Amateur scouting director Tim Wilken was then promoted to a special
assistant.
Chuck Wasserstrom, who was manager of baseball information was also fired as his position was eliminated by Epstein.
Ari Kaplan, who was in charge of statistical
analysis, was let go as an employee but hired as a team consultant for Tom Ricketts. Why does Tom Ricketts need a baseball stat guy? In the organizational flow chart, Ricketts had separated the business operations under Crane Kenney and the baseball operations under Theo Epstein. But there has been a dual feudal system in place during the Tribune ownership tenure, with Kenney pushing himself into baseball decision making under the guise of being team president. Is Ricketts creating a shadow general managership in his office?
Also, Director of baseball operations, Scott
Nelson, will be offered another position in the organization as well. Longtime Hendry assistant general manager Randy Bush is now a special consultant to Epstein. The creation of special consultants are merely posts to keep people (and secrets/strategies) off the job market.
It is strange that Fleita got fired so abruptly. At the end of last season before Epstein was hired, the Tigers were interested in hiring Fleita. But after an interview, Ricketts on his own gave Fleita a four-year contract. Fleita had been instrumental in getting Ricketts to build an expensive Dominican training camp and beef up the Latin American scouting department. His efforts have resulted in the scouting and signing of players like Castro, Soler, and Concepcion.
The firing of Fleita came 10 months into Epstein’s
tenure, with The Sun Times reporting that Epstein says the timing of the termination had to do with the coming end of
the minor-league seasons and the review period for minor-league players
before the start of Arizona Fall League play.
Epstein said Fleita was free to go and join another organization right away, but in reality there are no job openings to after the season. Those teams who were interested in him when his contract was up last year filled those positions already. This limits the potential landing spots for him.
The Cubs used to have a very small front office by league standards. Epstein's hiring threw a whole new layer over the top of the retained Tribune-Hendry staff. But these firings and shuffling of old staff by Epstein shows a power shift on the baseball side of the organization. Clearly, the firing of Fleita is Epstein telling Ricketts that he was wrong to retain Fleita. Clearly, the Cubs organization structure seems as dysfunctional as when Ricketts purchased the club.
It also shows the oddity of Ricketts himself who set a personal record of approving moves that have him paying huge amounts of money to people who no longer work for the Cubs.
