This will be debated in the off-season. Most everyone I know believes this. I think Joe was being Joe, and sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't.
I think Joe manages by psychology and pattern he sees of his players in realtime than by statistics and traditional baseball mythology. Not instead of, but he orders the psychology of the player
now above all. Also, the more experienced the player, and success the player has had, in pressure situations, the more of a leash he is willing to give him.
"Never tell me the odds" - Hans Solo
Joe Maddon 'choked' and nearly cost his Cubs the World Series
New York Daily News
Andy Martino23 hrs ago
When Joe Maddon shoved aside baseball lifer Rick Renteria two years ago to become manager of the Chicago Cubs, a hungry fan base rejoiced, believing that their team had found a genius to lead it to a championship.
But today, as a drowsy America celebrates the Cubs’ World Series win, an odd realization cuts through our case of the warm-and-fuzzies: Maddon, far from delivering the victory, nearly cost his team its chance at history.
“It’s amazing to say, but they won despite him, not because of him,” said one rival scout Thursday morning, echoing an opinion that bounced around baseball all Wednesday night and into the morning. “He choked.”
To the general public, this is a nitpick. The Cubbies broke their curse! But to those of us who derive pleasure from scrutinizing the X’s and O’s of this beautiful game, Maddon’s moves provided a fascinating handbook on how to give away a World Series - made all the more interesting by his well-deserved reputation as an innovator, and one of the game’s bright lights.
Maddon has always been an ebullient, even inspiring, man of ideas. He is unafraid to view the game in an original way, and delighted to talk about it. As Terry Collins’ bench coach in Anaheim in the late 1990s, Maddon made use of spray charts to suggest shifting his defense to the right side of the field against lefty slugger Ken Griffey Jr. Nearly two decades later, the trend toward defensive shifting has revolutionized the game.
Maddon has also proven himself a brilliant communicator, and helped to change the culture of the once-moribund Tampa Bay Rays during his tenure as skipper of that team.
Many in baseball’s rank-and-file cringed in 2014, when Maddon took the Cubs job from Renteria, who was under contract and had waited a lifetime for the opportunity. It was a gross violation of protocol and basic decency, but the Cubs reasoned that since Maddon was special, the opportunity was worth its human cost.
One cannot argue with the results achieved under Maddon the past two seasons, as Theo Epstein and Jed Hoyer’s stacked rosters advanced to the NLCS in 2015, and brought home the team’s first title in 108 years last night. But the manager’s shocking litany of bad decisions this week nearly cost him his reputation. There but for the grace of Ben Zobrist went the genius label forever....
http://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/mlb...rly-cost-his-cubs-the-world-series/ar-AAjRr2K
