That’s OK. Holding strong opinions and occasionally over-reacting is what beng a fan is all about, especially after the long disaster that this season has proved to be.

I suppose that I owe you an apology, I was doing some overreacting of my own to your post, which taken on its own smacked of a lot of the same knee-jerk reaction to lay the blame solely on Leyland and management for this season’s collapse that I see on other sites.

At the end of the day I see this season as a result of Illich telling DD that he wanted the WS sooner than later and to make it happen. Although respective performances have proved otherwise, DD had initially seemed to not only address most of the off-season needs, but also pull off a mega-deal for Cabrera.

Management perhaps assumed too much regarding the health or ongoing effectiveness of players like Sheffield, Rogers, Rodney, Willis and Zumaya. However there were enough unforeseeable setbacks for me to give a partial pass to management. If we’re willing as fans to let most of the players off the hook (is anyone seriously still angry with Cabrera’s slow start?) then I think management gets some benefit of the doubt.

As fans we made just as many expectations about this team as management did, and sometimes for the same reasons. There’s a middle ground to be had when thinking about the managers ability or even his duty to motivate the players to perform. I know its “just a game” but it is after all still the players job to, you know, play.

Again, excuse my snap judgment of a perceived snap judgment.

His Leyland hatred this season has hindered that a little bit in my opinion though.

Leyland isn’t all evil. I don’t know how you can blame him for the collapse in 2006 without giving him credit for getting 40 games over .500 in the first place. I think that has to work both ways, and advocate the same for people who think Leyland is great. It works both ways.

I don’t think he’s a good in game strategist, but I also don’t think many are.

I don’t think he’s stubborn and curmudgeonly for the most part. He changes positions, roles, lineups with regularity. Perhaps even too much.

He’s part of the problem this year, but I don’t think there are too many that escape blame. I won’t be heart broken if he isn’t back, but I don’t think a new manager will fix everything either.

It’s not over-reacting. Leyland has been mucking it up since 2006. When they hired him I had hopes, given that Trammel wasn’t quite up to the challenge, but I was never on the “Leyland is god” bandwagon, even early on in that season. The team basically collapsed in the second half if you recall, and JL played a role there as well as the players. They very well may have been lucky to play in the Series that season.

Apparently you have missed quite a bit of the “substantive” discussions here concerning JL. There has actually been quite a bit of it over this season, but last year as well. I am perhaps guilty of being more vociferous than most. Billfer, for one, is sick to death of my bitching about the old man’s management failures (with pertinent examples thereof), and I have tended to stuff my opinions in this regard lately, but even he would agree that there is some question about Leyland’s skill in that area.

As I have posted MANY times before, there are a lot of things wrong with this team, from management (i.e., DD) manner of putting together a star-studded cast of characters (but not a team), to poor individual performances, questionable medical oversight, as well as poor on-field management of the avaialble personnel and strategic in-game situations by you-know-who.

Some posters here don’t think the manager has much impact on the performance of the players and the results of games. I don’t happen to be one of them. Stengel, McGraw, Mack, etc. aren’t in the HOF because they were simply placeholders.

Sounds like you think ’06 was an accident, I mean everyone knew the Tigers were bound for the WS that year, Leyland was just along for the ride…they basically got there IN SPITE of him.

“Folly of the ‘Leyland years’”

Really? Gimme (and him) a break you troll. The Tigers were ridiculous pitcher throwing-errors away from a WS win (IMHO). How would that “Leyland year” strike you in that case? Did bad planning somehow contribute to that?

2008 a bust = correct
Leyland to blame for EVERYTHING = ridiculous

There are still reasons why a different manager in ’09 might be good. If the players really have quit on him, I don’t think there’s a remedy for that. Also who knows, maybe ANY change would work. But this nonsense of Leyland being the lone culprit in a collapse this big and this widespread is foolish and frankly something that I don’t usually expect to see here at DTW, where the discourse is usually more substantive.

The fact is, he has been manager for three years and it is unclear (to me at least) that in that entire time he has ever developed any kind of a PLAN, long-term or short-term, whether in ST or in-season during the so-called “situations beyond management’s control” when he has had to fly by the seat of his pants. Strategy (i.e. planning) is obviously beyond his ability, and isn’t that what managers are supposed to do, so what good is he?

If finishing 5th guarantees his expulsion, never to be seen, heard, or spoken of ever again, I am all for it. Admitting the folly of the “Leyland years” would perhaps be painful, but a necessary exorcism.

And by the way, Leyland DID manage the Cleveland series. That was him dressed up in a Lloyd McClendon suit. The giveaway was the cigarette smoking.

Is that a real quote? “Hanky-panky”? If for no other reason, they must retain Leyland, there’s no way somebody else can pull that phrase off with a straight face and still come across pissed.

The 2008 Detroit Tigers have come of age and come together at last, demonstrating over the weekend that they can be swept in a three-game series with or without skipper Jim Leyland.

Zach Miner, Royals specialist, will take the mound against Kansas City tonight. Kenny Rogers, Royals anti-specialist, will be on stand-by to take over should any evidence of “bizarro world” phenomena present themselves.

Whipping Boy Powers have not activated in over a month, and the autumnal equinox could be the catalyst that brings this simmering pot to a rolling boil.

The Tigers still have a chance to finish with 78 wins, which would only be 10 less than in 2007.

Jim Leyland: “One thing I can assure you as much as possible, when we go into Spring Training next year, other than maybe a health issue, there’ll be no hanky-panky going on about positions and who’s going to play here or there. That’ll all be settled. That’s one thing I can guarantee you.”

The key word here is into.

Yes. Much better.

You may be right in saying that talent alone doesn’t guarantee winning, but it helps…a lot. Coming into the season I don’t think I heard many pundits that didn’t think the Tigers were bound for the playoffs. Now most of them qualified this with pointing out a bullpen weakness, but they countered this observation with listing the Tigers’ starting rotation and lineup as two of the best in the league, which coupled with what appeared to be (Indians excepted) a very weak AL Central, meant playoffs.

You say that the goal of management is “getting talented individuals pointing in the same direction for a common goal”. Coming into the season you couldn’t fault management on a lack of effort towards winning the WS, in fact the one criticism the Tigers front office seemed to take in the months leading up to ’08 was that they had invested TOO heavily in an attempt to win now.

The acquisitions made were gambles (as player transactions always are), some were of the high risk, high reward variety (hmm…Magglio anyone?). The execution of the season obviously left something to be desired, but circumstances outside of managements control left them with limited options, and they didn’t always make the best decisions with what they had left.

Unless he’s really “lost the players”, which I have no way of knowing, I don’t have a problem with Leyland coming back next year. I know some people view his statements this year as mostly platitudes, but I honestly think that when it comes down to it, he’s a no-excuses kind of guy…and I like that about him. In any case, I’m looking forward to ’09.