The Reds announced this morning that they’ve fired manager Bryan Price and pitching coach Mack Jenkins. Bench coach Jim Riggleman will assume managerial duties on an interim basis, while Triple-A skipper Pat Kelly will take over Riggleman’s duties as bench coach. Double-A pitching coach Danny Darwin has been added to the Major League coaching staff as well. The Reds will conduct a search for a permanent managerial replacement “later in the year,” the team added.
Entering the season, Price was widely speculated to be on the hot seat. The 55-year-old former Reds pitching coach was entering his fifth season as manager in Cincinnati, but the Reds had opted only to exercise his 2018 club option rather than extend him to a longer team deal.
That decision came on the heels of four consecutive losing seasons, and while one can hardly blame the manager for not piling up wins on a clearly rebuilding club, Cincinnati also didn’t seem to demonstrably improve under Price’s watch. The Reds won 76 games in his first season as skipper back in 2014, and since that time they’ve won 64, 68 and 68 games in the respective seasons to follow.
This year’s Reds have been all the more disastrous, opening the year with a 3-15 record with a -46 run differential that easily ranks as the worst in the Majors. The Cincinnati front office clearly felt it was time for a new voice to guide the club, though it’s fair to question why that decision wasn’t simply made before exercising Price’s option, as not much has changed since last September. It’s also worth pointing out that Cincinnati hired former Red Sox and Blue Jays manager John Farrell in a scouting capacity this past offseason, and he’ll almost certainly join the list of managerial candidates when the Reds begin searching (if he doesn’t already top their list).
As for Jenkins, he took over for former pitching coach Mark Riggins back in July 2016, but Reds hurlers haven’t improved much, if any, under his tutelage. The Reds, to be sure, have had their share of meaningful injuries in recent seasons — perhaps none more notable than Anthony DeSclafani, who has not pitched since 2016 — but that doesn’t explain the general lack of development among the team’s more promising young arms. As MLBTR’s Jeff Todd wrote last September:
By measure of fWAR, at least, the 2016-17 Reds hurlers have turned in a two-year stretch of futility that is orders of magnitude worse than any other organization of the past two decades, falling well shy of the dreadful 2004-05 Royals and 2002-03 Devil Rays units.
The 2018 Reds staff hasn’t done anything to correct that tailspin. Cincinnati’s 5.42 ERA, 4.64 xFIP and 4.91 SIERA marks all rank second-worst in the Majors, while their 5.26 FIP as a collective unit is the highest mark of any team in baseball. Cincinnati pitchers rank near the bottom of the league in strikeout percentage and have also posted one of the highest walk percentages of any team in baseball this season.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
that is long overdue
No disagreement, but the timing is odd. The team is bad, as expected. And in doing so, they have created instability throughout the system. Coaches that were presumably in place to develop talent are no longer in place.
Riggleman getting another chance is a surprise too. How many managers can quit on a team mid-season and eventually land another managers job? Albeit he does have the interim label.
In his defense, the nats did kind of screw Jim by not picking up his option.
Riggleman quit on his team during the middle of the season b/c he didn’t get his way. He’s a QUITTER
No he’s a guy who cared about his future and being treated right.
That’s the point of an option – flexibility.
If Jim didn’t like the option, maybe he shouldn’t have signed a contract with an option.
Riggleman is a good coach, I’m happy he’s getting another chance.
This team should have been way better than last year not worse
Henderson by the fact that the ration is actually doing way better than last year and the offensive is the exact opposite considering it was supposed to be their strength
Riggleman’s just warming the seat for the manager they want to hire unless the Reds begin playing .600 baseball moving forward.
Price was doomed from the start! How could he have been successful in the middle of this horrible “rebuild” the Reds have been going threw?
The firings had to happen, but the jackasses that has made their trades over the last 3 years or so should be tarred and feathered. The pitching they’ve gotten back IS horrible. And they will never be good.
Never be good lol. I mean that seems like an intense statement.
how can have the roads been under price anyway not really good so I don’t understand why they kept on this long
sorry I meant how could the Reds keep her nice long
Ah, that clarifies it.
Haha !
lmao
Autocorrect is a wonderful thing.
Quote by Price after finding out he was fired: “!%@ &@(! &@^#! *!^@ %@$#!”
Or………Thank God!! They give me a pile of s**t to manage and expect it to win.
Or “thanks for picking up that option before getting rid of me”
Cash me on da golf course, howbowdah?
Price does like to channel his inner Lee Elia.
oh hoops that went twice because my thing then send the first time. That’s my bad. Oh by the way I read somewhere that the Fred’s 3 and 15 so far
stop.
Hahahaha!
I’m just glad you came back to clarify your last clarification.
Please continue to update us as I always enjoy LMFAO while reading your posts.
No joke I really do enjoy it!
It’s kinda like solving a puzzle or a riddle. Maybe 1 day you can provide us with a cipher and we can all decode these messages together. That would be great fun. A+
I’m laughing so hard but I’m not even sure why.
Yes! Maybe when the govt. finally releases him from Area 51, we will get some clarification !
Huh? Did I have a stroke this morning or what?
I think he’s a good guy who understood how to use a bullpen but he wasn’t a motivator and his in-game decisions seemed very panicky at times. The only guy who ever developed and got better was Sal Romano and that’s only been his last few starts. I think the guy could be a great bullpen coach or a pitching coach but he is not a manager.
Agreed. I thought he was excellent as Reds pitching coach.
He was a great pitching coach, and I’m sure he will find another job as a pitching coach in the future, if he wants it. I’m not sure if he will ever get another chance to manage, and unless he gets a chance to manage a good team, I don’t think we will ever really know if he’s a good or bad manager.
Agreed, which is also why John Farrel should NOT be the answer
He was good as the Mariners pitching coach long ago.
Long overdue, indeed. Never liked the hire in the first place. It’s pretty sad when the best news of the year to come from our team is that Price was fired. The upside is that we should only go up from here. At least we have some guys with experience in managing within the organization. Price always struck me as a guy that had not accepted the fact that our pitching is horrible, at best. As a former successful pitching coach, one would think….Anyway, turning the page now. Finally.
I’m glad he is gone I thought he should have been canned when he went off on a local beat reporter C Trent, two years ago with that epic F bomb rant. His managing strategies 1. batting Billy first 2. Playing 30 plus YO journey men over prospects during a year you’re not going to compete 3. Using some pitchers in your pen 1 every like 7 days e.g. Stephenson last season and Garrett at times this season. Also I felt like he has a general auro of just accepting losing honestly.
John Farrell is an ex pitching coach and manager who works for the Reds. Seems like a good fit there in either role.
You can’t blame the Reds’ lousy play on Price. They simply haven’t had enough talent to compete. That said, you don’t want to maintain a culture of accepting failure. I wish Price the best and feel that he will be valuable elsewhere.
Eh, they had plenty of young top pitching prospects bomb under Price. Can’t not give him any blame either.
There are some jobs where the primary duty is to manage the talent that you already have, there are other jobs where the primary duty is to develop prospects into talent.
Clearly the reds need a guy who can develop talent
I hear Dusty is looking for a job
Dusty works for the Giants
He works in the Giants front office now.
What a poorly operated team. They’ve completely failed in their rebuild, misusing their previous assets like Frazier, Bruce, Cozart, and havent drafted or developed particularly well either.
Now they are firing the manager in April instead of in October, and none of this really addresses the above mismanagement attributable to the front office.
Haven’t drafted well? I totally disagree….Hunter Greene? Nick Senzel? There’s A LOT of talent on this club. We did, however, not get back NEARLY enough in some of the trades.
The main problem is that we held onto some of our best assets way too long, got desperate, and got poor returns for guys like Bruce and Cueto.
Price should’ve been fired 2 or 3 years ago (along with Marvin Lewis!)
Not defending Price, but the timing shows that the organization doesn’t really know what it’s doing or have any real plan.
It’s looking more and more likely that the Reds are going to have to rebuild their rebuild. Or they are going to have to buy pitching like the Cubs did. Bit of a revenue difference between Cincy and Chicago, though.
I totally agree. When they say they’ll think about a permanent manager maybe later on in the year, that’s like wow.
Telling the fans in the city they’re going to burn a year is a kick in the gut.
but come on down to the game and enjoy $15 pints on our new Budweiser party patio. I swear they’re obsessed with peripherals and not on winning, GABP is like a shopping mall. They keep pocketing and don’t reinvest
Never saw a FO that wasn’t prepared to blame the on-field management for their own failures.
Rebuild the rebuild …… they have never left the rebuild LOL its just continuous.
Was always a lame duck coming into the season. What a waste of his time though. Why not fire him last season?
It isn’t Price fault!!! It’s Robert Castellini and Dick Williams fault, they’re the one that should be fired! Heck with the Williams partial ownership! They’re the ones making the bad trades like Chapman, Cueto and others! Bringing in washed up veterans like David Hernandez, Jared Hughes and Yovani Gallardo! Why didn’t they fire the hitting coach as he’s the fault of the team not hitting! Castellini said he isn’t money then how the heck can he afford to buy a tennis court down in Goodyear Arizona then he builds a resort, why didn’t he use that money on the team!!!! Castellini needs to fire Willians and his scouting departments for bad trades!!! BOYCOTT REDS!!!
Fire the Hitting coach? You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken sh&t. It’s funny how Reds fans were in so much of hurry to run a guy out of town that GOT them to playoffs, even though hey came up short. NOW they continually lose 100+ games a year since. KARMA
Yes, their continual streak of losing 100 games which started in 1983 and ended in…..1983. Only time that ever happened in team history, man. They should’ve torn the roster down when they got rid of Dusty instead of trying to hold on to a flawed roster on the downside
this has been my opinion since that point, the FO should’ve been up front and said it was starting from scratch and traded every piece in the 13-14 offseason
I believe most of those trades were with Jocketty at the helm and not Williams. Ill give you Hernandez, Hughes, and Gallardo signings thats on Williams but frankly what else is out there thats much better. This teams in rebuilding you dont spend money on high end bullpen arms during a rebuild. Clearly the bullpen answers were not already here either.
Also you do realize that an owners other business investments dont connect to each other right. He has a budget for the Reds and his personal budget are totally different.
I agree, everyone is saying that it wasn’t Price fault! As Ken Rosenthal and John Hart said on MLB Central this morning that this is upper management failure! Bad trades, not developing pitchers and paying Votto, Bailey and Mesoraco almost $60 million for this year! They should have gotten better players in trades involving Chapman, Cueto, Leak, Frazier and others! They scouted poorly on Jose Peraza and Dillon Herrera! As Ken Rosenthal stated this is an organization failure not manager and pitching coach!
I partly agree with what you are saying but on the other hand those trades (beside Bruce) were completed by Jocketty who isnt the GM. Williams has only had a year so far. Now i was not a huge fan of the hiring of him. The issue, i believe is with ownership more then anything. See Im not a huge fan of owners being super involved in the baseball side of things, this goes for all sports. Both Cincinnati pro teams have big issues with ownership being way to involved. This causes them to hire friends or keep things within the organization. Sometimes you need to just hire from outside to breath fresh air into everything.
Why the manager gets the blame for the mistakes that the upper level management makes has always baffled me. The manager only has the players that the front office gives him. The Reds just do not have a lot of talent to work with. I am a Cubs fan and my favorite team seems to have the opposite problem….a lot of talent that isn’t producing. Is it the fault of Maddon, the players, the weather or all of the above? Whoever has played this game at the MLB level can answer that. However, the manager of the Reds didn’t have a lot of talent, or input into the acquisition of the players he had to manage. Why fire him and not just clean house in scouting and upper management?
You were a Cubs fan, so you know exactly how it feels to stink for multiple years in a row.
Years? Try decades.
Yup, Cubby, come on over and join us Red Sox fans. It was decades and decades and decades.
Feels like you are missing his point. The FO strips the team of all its talent and then blames the manager and coaches for the catastrophic results. Anybody who has watched or been a part of such a thing recognizes this as a classic corporate response to failure. The board of directors never fires itself for making bad decisions, they axe a bunch of employees for their mistake of riding on a leaky ship that somebody else commands.
because the upper management isnt going to fire themselves
Are the owners of the Reds unable to clean out upper management or just not interested or understanding of the moves by the front office?
I could buy that if some of the younger pitchers got better under Jenkins/Price. All of them struggle with pitch economy because they have no control and have no “out” pitch.
I think this was the only move in the short term. Bryan Price was an excellent pitching coach under Dusty, but never should’ve been given the manager job when they wanted to change things.. They should’ve made an outside hire then, and honestly if they hire inside and it’s not John Farrell or Barry Larkin I’m still going to be peeved.
I think what is being looked over is the fact that the front office management brought up younger players after injuries (Blandino) after Suarez got hurt and Bryan Price played Cliff Pennington 90% of the time instead of allowing the young guy to get at bats. Sticking with Billy Hamilton too long has also cost the Reds. Sure, the team doesn’t have the talent to compete and are rebuilding but when you rebuild you are supposed to give the young guys playing time to see what you have.
On the pitching side they have and it has been a disaster but on the hitting side playing guys like Cliff Pennington and Phil Gossellin made absolutely no sense over someone like Blandino or anyone else younger for that matter. Pennington and Gossellin have been terrible all year and are not worthy of everyday at bats on even the worst team in the league. I have a feeling that sticking with them over younger guys is what ultimately cost them…the front office knew the Reds weren’t seriously competing this year but this start was absolutely unwatchable and historically bad.
Very well said
I agree on many of your points. As a 40+ yr Reds fan I have seen a lot of ups and downs, I always thought the Price hiring was a reaction to NOT wanting to lose a pitching coach, who had some success with us, to Seattle, I think it was them that wanted to interview him. Im tired of the Gosselin’s and Pennington’s of the world, they are NEVER going to be a part of the long term process. My God, we have kids in the minors Im sure with limited range defensively that can hit under .200 and Billy Hamilton CANNOT hit. I could deal with that but the fact that he REFUSES to change his approach sickens me and I think kills Chris Welsh a little inside every time he pops up. He shouldn’t be allowed to do anything in batting practice until he lays down 25 successful bunts. Im ready for an everyday outfield of Duvall, Schebler and Winker. Put them in, leave them alone, and let them PLAY. Schebler isnt a perfect centerfielder but I KNOW he will work his ass off to get better there. Put out a stable line-up, especially when Suarez gets back, try Senzel at short, because Peraza CANNOT hit or take a walk and his defense is surprisingly average at short, and this team will at least score runs. Good grief we were good offensively last year having Hamilton’s .300 OBP at the top. Winker will be on a lot more than that. Peraza also played a lot for Cozart and we were still a very formidable line-up. Trading out Hamilton and Peraza for Winker and Senzel would make this a VERY scary line-up. The Desclafini injury just sucks because if healthy, he and Castillo are very good young pitchers, Bailey has looked better and then you try to find some other starters amongst all those youngsters. Hughes and Hernandez WILL help this bullpen and Iglesias is great. My point is that these are changes that are not hard to make, and they have a proven track record of working with the exception of Senzel. Watching Hamilton and Peraza piss away another 450 at bats does nothing good for this organization. I dont know who should manage, but change WAS necessary!
Also Garrett should be starting, or at least should’ve gotten the ball over Cody Reed.
Blandino and Winker need at-bats. Burning up your bench in a tie ballgame in Philly and using your pitcher to hit in the 10th inning probably didn’t help his cause.
FWIW, I think Garrett has found his niche in the bullpen and Price gets credit for that.
Cliff Pennington has no business being in the majors. Can’t hit and can’t field.
At least Bryan can sleep in today with no worries about getting packed for St Louis, and no worries about trying to keep the score close tomorrow night.
I thought DeShields was the AAA manager. Liked watching him in Louisville last year
Right decision, but very wrong time. This may cause organizational issues they will regret for a while, all to correct a mistake they made just a few months ago in committing to keep him for another season
It’s hard to manage a team in the majors when that team resembles a Double-A team. For the most part, it’s the manager who pays the price for tightwad ownership.
There are 25 guys on that Roster that are NOT producing at ALL … this organization NEEDS a wake up call from the top down !
They shouldnt have brought him back this year. He had 5 years to show what he could do and there has been no progress.
Price was hired before the current GM was in the job. The manager almost always takes the fall before the GM does. They’ll let this GM bring in their own manager and if the team shows no improvement after that the GM will get canned.
Two words: Joe Girardi
drskidd I don’t think girardi would want to manage the unsaveable reds. After he’s with mlb network, but he probably has a lot of time on his hands outside the studio. I also heard a rumor about girardi being hired about midseason by the o’s if they fire schowalter, but that’s more than likely not going to happen.
One cam wish… The Reds are not good, but they aren’t 3-15 bad. Plus the farm system has some decent pieces, a high draft pick this year and the way things are looking next year too. Not as bad as it appears.
Barry Larkin or John Farrell
bring price back to Seattle as assistant pitching coach!
*all
Reds might have a problem with player development too. If there is one thing I would spend money on as a small market team its that. The Reds have some very good natural talent throughout the organization but they just don’t seem to be able to coach them to reach their potential. Examples: Hamilton, Lorenzen, Garrett, Reed, R. Stephenson, Blandino. Past players: Cingrani, A. Hernandez. And probably a lot more.
Okay, great. Manager is gone.
Now what about this front office, player development team and scouts? I vote clean house. Changing the managing isn’t going to do much change at this point
this team needs a change of OWNERSHIP. The Castellinis pocket and pocket some more and don’t reinvest
They definitely need to replace their training and conditioning staff. Year after year it’s the same players with the exact same injuries over and over again. Especially the pitching staff. The Red’s “so called” rebuild should also include the complete staff if they ever want to improve.
I never saw Price as anything more than a placeholder for the lean years. I felt the Reds would cash him out when the team started improving and hire a manager to take them to the next level (going off the HOU model). The fact that they’re going to work on getting a permanent manager “later in the season” is disturbing to hear. It makes it sound like the thought to fire Price never crossed the mind of anyone in the front office until yesterday. Might as well just say, “Eh, we’re still in tank mode, so there’s no rush.” Prospective interviewees should be prepared for the “we wanna do more with less” speech which is always code for “we’re budgeted to keep the utilities on, and that’s about it.”
Excellent post good sir
cheers
Hire Wally Backman
Sorry to read this. Price is a good guy, and no worse then most managers in the league with a job. This is a terrible team. Nearly every pitcher he runs out there is mediocre to bad. He starts every game knowing he has no depth, a make shift defense, zero bullpen, and no help on the way. This team on paper is exactly where it is supposed to be, dead last, unwatchable, and no one steering it with a plan to make it better……..just more tearing down. Only upside is that management is so inept that they will have tons of top prospect picks for years and years to come that they will probably make huge misses on.
I’m confused… There are folks calling Price a scape goat, and saying he wasn’t the problem but upper management is???
So, it’s Williams who told Price to keep Hamilton in the line-up every day?
Is it Williams who told price to pull a pitcher in the 6th having only given up 2 runs?
Perhaps it’s Williams who thought it best for Reed to throw one inning each outing?
Maybe it was Williams who instructs Hamilton to continue switch-hitting?
It’s absolutely the upper management who says it’s okay to jog to first on an inevitable ground out rather than trying to beat the throw or rush the defender?
It must have been the owners who told the players it’s okay to walk off the field between innings because they’re the ones who say it’s okay to drop the F-Bomb for all to hear after striking out by swinging at a bad pitch?
I remember back when Jocketty was here, he told Brandon Phillips to go from 1st to 3rd in the NLDS at home and Phillips was subsequently thrown out at 3rd by about 15 feet. I remember that specifically because the next batter got a hit which would have scored Phillips from 2nd with the go-ahead run. Yeah, I was there watching him signal.
He was the same guy who insisted Drew Stubbs would get better before the team got worse.
My point is that you can have all the talent in the world, but if there’s no discipline, no instruction, no continuity, and no consequence; the chance of success is slim.
If you think that a Clint Hurdle, Bruce Bochy, Joe Maddon, Terry Francona, or any other successful manager wouldn’t have done better than Price, I’d wager you’re wrong.
Not gonna suggest that Price is a great manager or anything, but he was hardly the biggest problem in Cincy. That front office has botched their rebuild every step of the way.
I was hoping for 1 more 77 Fbomb interview before he left , but oh well.
Look who’s getting another shot at managing, at least on an interim basis! Unfortunately, Jim Riggleman chances are slim to none for duplicating his only season of managing a postseason team in 2018. He accomplished that feat once when he skippered the Cubs to a wild card birth in 1998 before they were eliminated by the Braves in three straight games.
The timing is odd. Has anyone ever been fired three weeks into the season before?
The 1988 Cubs fired Cal Ripken Sr. after 6 games. Phil Garner was fired after 7 games with Detroit in 2002. Yogi Berra was fired after 16 games with the Yanks in 85. Jeff Torborg was close, being fired after 38 games with the Marlins in 2003.
And Eddie Sawyer quit as Phillies manager one game into the 1960 season.The press asked him what was the reason.His Phillies were a very bad team.He said that the reason was that he was 50 years old and he wanted to live to be 51!
it was the ’88 Orioles who fired Ripken Sr. my friend
Oops. Sorry.
Thanks. I forgot about Phil Garner.
This should have happened a lot sooner than it did.
If it walks like a duck
Ah, never mind !
The only manager worse than dusty Baker is jim Riggleman. Lol
Too bad Pete Rose won’t get a call to manage the reds……….
He wouldn’t be allowed, being on baseball’s permanently ineligible list.
Rose is a gambler and a pedaphile. The gambling is no longer the issue.
Try spelling problems for one.
Somewhere, in his office at home after being told he’s goneburger, Price is still trying to figure out the Reds bullpen.
I don’t think anyone can win with that awful collection of pitchers over there. Basically all 5th starters and the bullpen is pretty much awful too.
The brewers have all 3rd and 4th starters. Their most dominant reliever in 15 years is out 3 months or so. They aren’t horrible like the reds with their bullpen. They are pretty close.
I really hope for vottos sake they trade him. Maybe to Anaheim. He can play 1st when Pujols is DH and when otani starts. Then he can share 1st and play there 5 times a week when otani is DH. They are slowing weaving Pujols out. He’s 43 years old. With roughly just over 3 years left.
Anaheim has zero prospects. So it would be hard to make a deal.
It is kind of weird timing. What did they expect was going to happen when taking the same exact team with the same exact manager out again?
And they somehow became worse when Jim Riggleman was hired. Lol.