Jim Hendry - Go or No?

to run away with the NL Central. So find me the guy who disagreed and maybe he should become the new GM. But this team looked good to everyone pre-season.

Pre-season, I thought Hendry was to be faulted for failing to get a SS/3B backup. That’s come to bite us, but it’s not a firing offense.

There were plenty who preferred one of Dunn/Ibanez/Abreu to Bradley. But I don’t think the Cubs were going to outbid the Phils on Ibanez, and they made a choice to have the better defensive player given the uncertainty they had in CF. I still think that was smart thinking at the time, although it’s not looking so good now.

I also thought it was smart to have a 75-game clause on Bradley’s 3rd year, but it looks like that has come back to bite us, with Bradley playing in a physical condition he would have sat through before.

Right now I think the team really needs a four corners guy like Aubrey Huff to give Bradley more time to sit and then hit. But saying we need that and actually being able to acquire it for the right price is difficult. It’s hard to fault Hendry at this point in the season as we wait for things to play out.

Keep in mind that I think a new owner would probably shake up things anyway. Hendry has basically been running unchecked with little interference. While this did not matter in 2007 or 2008 because the Cubs won the division, it’s come back to bite him because he’s employed the same strategy that he has been doing and that’s to throw money at the problem. Hendry pursued Bradley and missed the Peavy sweepstakes (good thing imho).

Hendry increased the payroll and did not address the problems the Cubs had in the playoffs last season. He actually made them worse. Up until the end of August 2008, the Cubs were the best team in baseball without question. Things did not look great when they started skidding in September and then crashed and burned in the playoffs. How much of that had to do with Jim Hendry? Reed Johnson and Jim Edmonds were great signings that did not cost us much. The Rich Harden deal was great last year. Those were good moves. The problem with the 2008 Cubs is the same problem with the 2009 Cubs: a lack of depth. No one noticed the lack of depth when every Cubs starter was having a career year and the whole 100 years thing created a frenzy.

People notice that lack of depth now. Hendry noticed we had problems, but rather than making the needed moves, he made the wrong moves. Hindsight definitely comes into play here for most of the moves, but not with Milton Bradley. If the Cubs needed a feared left-handed batter that could drive in a lot of runs, Adam Dunn was the guy. His defense isn’t great, but neither is Soriano’s. The bullpen issues were not entirely addressed, but no one could have predicted that Kevin Gregg would actually work out for us more than Carlos Marmol is. A lot needs to be done that you can’t fix in the middle of a season.

I’ve noticed that the FanPost turnover ratio grows exponentially as the Cubs do worse. If all of the FanPosts (mine is set at showing 10) have been published within 24 hours, the Cubs are on a slide. If all of them are within 16 hours, a sizeable losing streak is occurring. If all are within 5 hours, we’re struggling in the playoffs. Within 1 hour, we probably just got eliminated from the postseason.

It’s science.

If this team misses the postseason both might have to go. But I do think Hendry especially is wearing out his welcome.

won’t get any changes on the team that require more money. Only resolution of the ownership issue could do that.

Both the GM and Manager should go at the same time and the new GM should be given the chance to find his guy.

I don’t dislike Hendry, but I don’t want him picking and signing the next 3-4 years of manager.

Hendry needs to go…unless you like the roster of 13 pitchers and 12 second basemen..

n/t

Jim Hendry has more money locked up in horrible contracts than anyone I can think of right now.

His team is 2 games under .500, and has lost nine straight playoff games.

His farm system has been miserable at producing Major-League position players.

By any non-homer-apologist measure, he has failed and failed miserably. Only the desperation of Cubs fans used to scarcely getting a playoff berth can produce any apologetics here. It’s a big market, big system, and big payroll — and Hendry has locked this team into a bad position for this year and a couple more to come. A couple of winless playoff appearances shouldn’t suddenly make him untouchable – but it apparently has.

It doesn’t really matter right now if he stays or go. The cubs have already locked up long term contacts for soriano, zambrano, dempster, bradley, fukudome and so on. that to me is a bigger concern than hendry staying or leaving. They have a lot of money going to players who haven’t achieved that money they signed for. The biggest being soriano and bradley, where it looks like hendry was bidding against himself, hence the over paid contracts for those two.

He should be held accountable for the changes he made to the 2008 team, too much of what he relied on for 2009 was based on assumptions/projections.

Giving 30M dollars to a DH to play RF full time jettisoning an above average offensive secondbaseman in favorite of a platoon player. Ignoring Aaron Miles general inability to play Major League Baseball and Heilmans penchant for blowing leads, hiring scouts who think Tyler Colvin was a first round pick.

He has done a great job in the Lee and Ramirez trades, granted, but they were both fire sales, so he was dealing from a position of strength. But the 08 team was the most realistic shot at a title in decades, and he dismantled it all because of three games in October, when minor changes were all it really needed

…if the Cubs lose the NL Central, a lot willl depend on exactly how they lose it. Should they remain in close contention throughout the rest of the season and get edged by a game or two, I could see Hendry hanging on to his job. He may well be able to sell to ownership (assuming there is any clear ownership in place by then) that he simply had so many players underperform and suffer injuries that the season was an aberration that no one could have seen coming.

But if the Cubs truly crash and burn, finishing a significant number of games back (perhaps more than five), I think Jimbo may – and perhaps should – go. He took a number of huge risks with a 97-win lineup, precious few of which are paying any dividends. And while my feelings about Mark DeRosa are mixed – if the Cardinals end up taking the NL Central, DeRo may end up representing Hendry’s greatest folly and cost Jim his job.

At 100 votes… 53% of the people believe Hendry should go. Out of the 47% who believe Hendry should stay, 23% feel that he should only get one more shot at Chicago Cub World Series Championship.

The pressure is on Jim. Will you come through for us?

Jim Hendry has flaws and there are things I’d like to talk to him about overall team philosophy, but it seems to me that we are a whole lot more likely to end up with a worse GM than a better one if we saw him replaced.

If you hire a new GM right after this season, you’re completely screwing the new guy. All the back-loaded contracts and the ownership mess mean the new GM would have nothing to work with. If you’re gonna hire a new GM, give him a clean slate and hire him after the ownership thing gets worked out.

…it’s the right time and circumstance for change. Overall, Hendry has benefited the Cubs. He has been unsuccessful at the player development but he has shined in acquiring players (every team has some bad/poor contracts).

Overall, I’d rather see an Epstein here or a top assistant from that organization. They seem intelligent and able to win under extreme pressure and curses.