5:29pm: In addition to Acta, former Reds/Cubs/Giants manager Dusty Baker is a “strong candidate” in the Marlins’ hunt for a manager, tweets MLB.com’s Joe Frisaro. In a followup tweet, Frisaro reports that the team has “engaged in discussions” with Baker, though he’s unsure specifically when those talks began. In a third tweet, he notes that it’s still not a sure thing that Jennings will return as GM.
5:11pm: It’s been previously reported that Dan Jennings will be asked to relinquish his role as Marlins manager in 2016, and Enrique Rojas of ESPN Deportes now reports (via Twitter) that the team has interviewed Manny Acta for the position. Interestingly, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reports (also via Twitter) that Jennings has been officially notified that he will not return as manager in 2016 despite the fact that he now wants to return to the role. Jon Heyman of CBS Sports tweets that when asked, Jennings was unaware of any talks with Acta.
Acta, 46, has served as manager of both the Nationals and Indians, each for parts of three seasons. Acta has a career record of just 372-518 as a big league manager, though he was placed given the reins on clubs that carried low expectations at the time of his hiring. As Jackson further tweets, the Marlins consider the fact that Acta is bilingual to be a factor in their interest.
Reports have indicated that the Marlins have offered Jennings the opportunity to return to the front office this offseason, but it’s unclear exactly how similar his role would be. Assistant GM Mike Berger has assumed a great deal of Jennings’ duties since the change and is said to have the ear of owner Jeffrey Loria. The Marlins have also reassigned one of Jennings’ lieutenants (former VP of player personnel Craig Weissman) and fired another (former pro scout Mickey White). Jennings, in turn, has been linked to other GM openings, most notably the Mariners and Phillies (though the latter of the two was seemingly speculative in nature).
I don’t think there’s a single regular commenter here who wouldn’t pick the Marlins as the most realistic landing spot for Dusty Baker. The sad thing is, that still shouldn’t mean he should ever manage at the major league level again.
It’s really the only way things could get more comically tragic down there
Nah, Baker is one step up from Bobby Valentine
Valentine will make everyone hate him but that season with the Red Sox was never all on him. They were still hungover from the worst fall in baseball history. I’d take Valentine over Baker anyday. Nothing Valentine did in 2012 really haunts us but Bakers use of young pitchers could be a gift that keeps on giving.
In Dusty we Trusty. Fernandez = Wood; Kolek = Prior – lets see the magic happen!
RIP Jose Fernandez
Yeah because he has just been the picture of great health thus far in his career.
And Dusty Baker is going to help him tremendously with this
It’s not a manager’s job to help him have good health. That is the trainer’s job, the doctor’s job, and the surgeon’s job. It’s a manager’s job to win ball games and that is what Dusty does.
Its like the “FINISH HIM” sequence in Mortal Combat.
Dusty Baker…. now that would be just so typical Marlins, wouldn’t it?
Not really. Dusty is a winning manager. Definitely not typical Marlins.
except every team he’s been with in the past decade has gone no where in the post season even when loaded with talent and he’s terrible at managing pitching staffs and developing young players
but yeah, he’s a big name so the Marlins can keep pretending they wanna win….
Except every franchise he’s been with in the past decade has MADE the postseason multiple times. There are 20 teams each year that doesn’t do that and he took three different franchises to the playoffs. He is a three time NL manager of the year and a three time runner up for NL manager of the year. But I’m sure you would make much better manager than him.
Oh good, just what a young Marlins staff needs – Dusty “I Ruin Pitcher’s Careers” Baker.
Dusty takes so much garbage for ruining pitchers, but what he doesn’t get nearly enough credit for is managing winning baseball teams. The Giants were horrid when he took over and he took them to the WS. Do we even need to talk about how bad the Cubs were? He built them into a perennial contender and was just a Steve Bartman away from being the savior of the Cubs. He also built the Reds into the best team in the NL for a couple of seasons. I’m sure there are Marlins fans that would love to have a winning ball club for more than one season at a time. Dusty can do that. I’d take him over Walt Weiss on the Rockies right this second.
Dusty was more responsible for that loss than Bartman ever was. The team was clearly rattled after that play and Dusty did nothing but chew on his toothpick as they collapsed.
HE had nothing to do with building either of the teams you mentioned… the respective GMs built them up and then brought Baker in to ‘put them over the top’… and he failed to do it.
He’s a big name and a big personality… but as a manager he’s simply outclassed by most everyone else in the game these days. he can’t manage a pitching staff and he’s frankly terrible at in-game decision making. Trust me, i’m a Cubs fan so i’ve seen him at work up close.
The fact that in 2015 you are still blaming that loss on Steve Bartman is shocking.
I wasn’t seriously blaming Bartman. I thought that was obvious, but it seems my subtle humor needs a bit of polish. It’s easy to knock Dusty, but the record of his teams speaks for itself. The GM might put the team together, but the manager makes them gel. I’m not saying Dusty is perfect, but he is a good manager. I’m not a Reds fan, but I am in the Reds television area so I saw quite a few of their games (and a lot of Cubs games too before WGN flaked). Dusty is much better than Bryan Price.
The Marlins are in the bottom 5 of the league for the second straight year. If I was a Marlins fan, a division title and a postseason series loss is much better than what they have now. But to each their own, everybody doesn’t have to agree on who is or is not a good manager. That’s why there are 30 different teams, because there are at least that many different opinions on how to build a winning ball club.
This is such a Marlins move. Dan Jennings manages the team at Loria’s request/demand to cut costs, but they don’t want to even consider him for the permanent job. Supposedly he was going to return to the GM’s position, but he’s not involved in choosing the new manager. Now the GM’s position may be filled, but he is invited back to some undecided roll in the front office; all the while Loria has denied Jennings the opportunity to interview for other GM positions on the grounds that he’s still the Marlin’s GM.
Good luck to anyone stuck working in that organization. Seems like the kind of place you’d take a demotion to get away from.