The growing consensus is that the Cubs again misfired on a target. The Cubs thought that their next manager would be Joe Girardi. The local media hyped the probability that Girardi would leave the Yankees and come manage his beloved Cubs. Many people thought it was a done deal. But Girardi never spoke officially to the Cubs, and signed an extension before his Yankee deal expired - - - leaving the Cubs scrambling for an alternative to Girardi.
There is another growing consensus that the Cubs believe that the managerial position with the team is a "great" job. Dale Sveum and Mike Quade would probably tell you otherwise. But from a neutral observer evaluating the Cubs, there is nothing special about a team with new management that has lost 197 games in just two seasons. There is nothing to tell a candidate that the team is on the verge of a massive turnaround in the next two years. Epstein told the world that the team would not be spending in free agency this off season. The program has been to trade 40% of the starting rotation for low level prospects to stock a farm system. A farm system that has some trade publications giddy, but scouts in other organizations question whether it really has major league talent. Some of the highly regarded prospects are not those Epstein has signed, but has traded for from other organizations (Edwards, Hendricks, Ramirez, Olt, Villaneuva). The short term prospect for the Cubs remains grim. And the long term prospect is a crap shoot: it could be as good as the Oakland A's with a steady stream of minor league talent, or it could be as bad as the Royals or Mariners or Astros.
Another oddity is that it was reported that the Cubs had second interviews with two candidates (Renteria and Hinch), but then at the same time started a new round of interviews with Ausmus and Lovullo. It seems that the front office is scrambling to find a suitable candidate that the media and baseball in general will say is an "okay" hire. The first list of candidates left nothing to be desired, and having a second talk with Hinch has caused eye balls to roll as many other organizations believe he is the worst person to run a team, let alone one as bad as the Cubs.
So what are the Cubs really looking for? Another manager that they can remotely control? One of the whispers that got Sveum fired was that he did not take kindly to the reams of information the management tech teams gave him on a daily basis. The sabermetrics is the new school of baseball management, but Sveum did not take it heart. If the next manager is merely going to be another data processor of management theories, that may not turn around Castro as a fielder or Rizzo as a hitter.
Perhaps the next Cub manager needs to meet the Hollywood casting call for the Brad Pitt Moneyball Brooks Brothers suit persona. If the Cubs cannot sell actual baseball to new fans, it has to sell something else.
But in the end, no matter who the Cubs hired as the 2014 manager he will come with the tag "Not Joe Girardi." And he was will be compared to Girardi all season long, which will be another distraction for a team filled with distractions.
