Distinguished Senators, the Washington Nationals Blog That Is Great

Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Tenure? Rickey's got 15, 20 year

The returns are in, and the guy who traded Sammy Sosa has defeated the guy whose favorite player is Manny Ortiz for the right to throw out the first pitch at RFK in April. I'm surprised they went to all that trouble just to decide that.

First a general manager,
now a field manager. It's almost like we have a real team or something.
Bowden said Frank Robinson will remain the team's manager during the transition period.

"I don't think it's fair to make any drastic changes in personnel when you'd be bringing someone in that may be re-evaluated in three months or four months or whenever the new ownership people are in place," Bowden said. "Frank's done a decent job with this club."
"Decent job"? Way to damn Robby with faint praise. I haven't heard much good about Robinson as a manager. My main concern is that he's reputed to have a laissez-faire attitude towards pitchers' arms. Capitol Punishment points ou at that the indestructible Livan Hernandez was the only Expo to throw more than 150 innings last year, but I'd add that only Hernandez started more than 19 games. Regardless, I have a hard time getting too worked up about the manager either way as long as Bobby Cox isn't going anywhere.

Jim Bowden (pronounced BOE-den) knows he won't be around long.
"One of the things that was intriguing to me is that it was a short-term commitment," said Bowden, who is taking a leave of absence from his job as an ESPN commentator.
Just remember what Chris Kahrl said, Jim: No need to get ambitious. Here's my advice: the first year is going to be a complete mess, and we'll be lucky to win 70 games. There won't be much money, and even if you want to make some trades, there's not much to work with. So Bowden's primary goal should be to entertain me, Ryan. Who's the most entertaining living baseball player? Rickey! Rickey Henderson is out there, and Rickey wants to play. Rickey will work for cheap, and Rickey might teach some of these guys to take a walk (Rickey's looking at you, Endy). Plus, Rickey is one of the greatest players ever to lace up the spikes and/or insult Lou Brock while he's standing right there, and I know I'd be thrilled if Rickey retired in a Washington uniform. Also get Jose Lima. That guy's nuts.

ESPN.com is having a poll on the name of the Washington team (here, in the lower right corner). "Senators" is winning with 44.8% of the vote right now, beating the hell out of the other contenders. "Grays," sadly, is coming in fourth in a field of four, behind the execrable "Nationals." It's obvious that Senators is the popular favorite, and I wish they'd just get it over with.

3 comments:

Olivier said...

Rickey Henderson?

That's the neatest, coolest Idea I heard. Too bad they didn't just bit the whole bullett and hired him as a Player-Coach.

That being said, Robinson is a tad better than Jeff "The Mangler" Torborg. And he's got Randy St-Claire, who looked mighty good from where I stood the last two years. Well, maybe if he had been that good Vasquez would've lobbyed harder to get him in pinstripes...

Chris Needham said...

Nah. He wasn't gonna be wearing pinstripes as long as St. Mel was there to eff up everyone's mechancics.

Ryan said...

I'm still bitter about the proclamation that DC was dead. It's a tone thing more than anything else. I find this report entirely plausible, though I'm not sure it means that they've necessarily selected it as the name.