John Strubel: - Collins Role With Mets



With Permission

 Last Saturday, just a few hours before the news leaked that Terry Collins would be named manager of the New York Mets, Kennesaw State University professor and author Dr. J.C. Bradbury presented his research findings at Session 13B during the Southern Economic Association conference in Atlanta.

The topic: Sports Economics, and Bradbury’s research paper — Hired to Be Fired: The Publicity Value of Managers — revealed changing baseball managers “rarely make a difference for a team.” He arrived at the conclusion after sampling the records of 134 new managers over the last three decades. On his blog Sabernomics.com, Bradbury added: I don’t think managers contribute too much to the game … I don’t believe that managers are totally benign, just overrated.

By the time the conference ended in Georgia, back in New York the Mets PR department were scrambling to schedule a press conference that would officially introduce Collins as the team’s new manager.
Less than 24 hours later Collins was being peppered with questions about players, perception and his past. His hiring was strategic in nature. If the message that change is on the way wasn’t evident when the organization hired Sandy Alderson as general manager, it sure is now.
Collins arrival marks a change in culture. He replaces Jerry Manuel, which may come as a culture “shock” to some players. Unlike Manuel, the new Mets manager is high-energy, with a heavy dose of motivation through discipline.

Motivation is Priority One, not just for Collins and the Mets, for every organization. The new Mets manager will be responsible for motivating his talent to exceed expectations and discipline the lesser to overachieve. He’s been tasked with the responsibility of igniting and exciting a sagging fan base. Collins needs to be Dr. Phil and Don Draper, Tony Robbins and Tony Dungy – inspiring, exciting, engaging.

There is no way to measure motivation as it relates to performance. It is an intangible. Did the 2000 Mets win with National League title because Bobby Valentine was a genius with a lineup card or was he a master at motivating average baseball players?

Sabermatrician Bill James did the math: a baseball manager must select nine players out of 25 each night. This can arranged 741 billion different ways. He wrote, managerial effectiveness is decided by how many different lineups a manager uses, how often he platoons hitters, how many times he goes to the bullpen, intentionally walks a hitter, puts in a pinch hitter or runner or a defensive substitute, or attempts a stolen base, a pitch-out, a hit and run or a sacrifice bunt … Then, James confessed some managerial capability, lies outside of a measurable terrain.

There is no computation that reveals if, or how, motivation affects a team’s win-loss record. Look no further than the last decade of Mets history.
Collins is the fifth Mets manager in the 21st century. The previous four managerial changes have provided mixed results. In 2009, Manuel’s first full season as manager, the Mets won 70 games, 19 fewer than the year before under Willie Randolph and Manuel.
When Randolph succeeded Art Howe in 2005, the Mets improved, winning 83 games, 12 more than the teams 71-91 mark the year before. Howe only lasted two seasons, long enough to hold the infamous title of managing the Mets to the worst record (66-95) of the decade in 2003. He actually lost 10 more games than the manager he replaced — Bobby Valentine – a year earlier. Valentine’s last team won 76 games in 2002.

Valentine assumed control from Dallas Green in September 1996, to which Green ironically replied, “He’s going to sell Bobby Valentine. Most everyone in baseball does not like and does not respect Bobby Valentine.”
In just over six seasons in New York (1996-2002), Valentine’s Mets compiled a 536-467 (.534), including four consecutive winning seasons that culminated with a World Series appearance in 2000 against the New York Yankees. He is second winningest manager in team history.
Chris Jaffe, author of the book Evaluating Baseball Manager’s wrote, the top insult one can hurl at a skipper is that given the talent on hand, they should’ve won more games than they did.

You couldn’t say that about Valentine’s teams in New York. He won with Timo Perez, Benny Agbayani, Bubba Trammell, Joe McEwing, Matt Franco and Todd Pratt.

The Mets have had 19 managers in 48 seasons. Davey Johnson is, on paper, the most successful manager in New York Mets team history, compiling a 595-417 (.595) win-loss record. He is the last Mets manager to win a World Series (1986).

Under Johnson, from 1984-1989, the Mets finished first twice and second three times, winning two division titles and 100-plus games twice. In fact, the Mets won 90 or more games the first five seasons with Johnson as manager. Over the five-year span from 1984-89 the Mets won 488 games, an average of 97.6 wins per season.

He adopted Darryl Strawberry, Dwight Gooden and was visited regularly by Santa Claus in a bow tie and seersucker suit, delivering Gary Carter, Ron Darling, Bobby Ojeda and Keith Hernandez. They were expected to win and, in hindsight, underachieved.

Johnson was loved by players. The league hated him, his attitude and his team’s cavalier style.

The list goes on between managerial style and success throughout team history.

Gil Hodges managed nine major league seasons between the Washington Senators and Mets. In four years in New York (1968-71) Hodges compiled a 339-303 (.523) career record, including a World Series win in his second season. The Mets had a winning record in three of the four years he managed, finishing third in back-to-back seasons after the ’69 Series.

Bud Harrelson is sandwiched between Bobby Valentine and Gil Hodges as the fourth winningest manager in team history. In two seasons as manager (1990-1991), Harrelson was 145-129 (.529). When you run down the short list of great Mets managers somehow Harrelson does not role off the tongue as easily as Hodges. Great shortstops in team history? That’s a different story.

Harrelson’s managerial run is about as memorable as Salty Parker’s. Who? That’s right, Salty Parker. He managed the Mets for 11 games during the 1967 season, winning four.

Parker is part of Mets history, similar to Mike Cubbage, who is remembered (ever so shortly) as the shortest tenured manager in team history. Cubbage, who played for New York a decade earlier in 1981, eked out seven games, cleaning up after Harrelson exited late in the 1991 season.

According to Tyler Kepner at the New York Times, the modern-day Mets are perceived as “undisciplined,” a label that has damaged the brand. The brand? There’s a word that doesn’t come up often in managerial change discussions, but sounds like a reading assignment for Professor Alderson’s business class.

Terry Collins was hired to restore fan confidence and, in doing so, reenergizing “the brand,” a decision that is equally important to public relations, marketing, corporate culture, perception and selling tickets, as it is winning baseball games. In fact, according to Jaffe’s research, hiring Collins should net an increase in tickets sales of roughly 1,000 fans per game.

Time has changed the role of the baseball manager. The job description is more than wins and losses; but also sales, marketing and public relations. At 61, Collins is the “new” face (and voice) of the Mets. While he may not manage to add wins or loses in the standings, Collins will contribute as team manager in other ways to Mets immediate future.