Thoughts on firing Bob Melvin

Another big move by Buster Posey

Two things were noticeable when the Giants announced — at 9:32 Monday morning — that Bob Melvin was out as manager.

First, wow that was quick. On the first sunrise after the last game of the season? The finale ended at 2:30 and the press release was out, what, nineteen hours later?

Which, actually, is probably better for everyone. If Melvin was out, what’s the point of a week of “evaluating our options?”

The will-BoMel-stay-or-will-he-go stories were already piling up in the media universe. Everyone who ever went to a game, watched on TV or overheard the score at a bus stop had an opinion.

This is clean, definitive and about as painless as it could be for Melvin and his family.

Second, Buster Posey clearly didn’t take the President of Baseball Ops job for the free sandwiches. He’s stepping into this like it was a waist-high fastball.

For a franchise that has made a narrative of whiffing on the big, tent-pole star players, Posey had everyone excited when pulled in high-energy shortstop Willy Adamas in December. Considering the deal was for seven years and an un-Giantlike $182 million, it was widely viewed as “the blockbuster” trade of the season.

Except that in June he stunned sports punditry-world by picking up Rafi Devers.

Devers does strike out a lot. But he’s the big, ferocious, must-watch slugger Giants fans have been missing. The home runs have been majestic. Devers sometimes stands at the plate so long after he hits one you wonder if he’s debating if he has to go to the trouble of running around the bases.

You always hate a guy like that.

Unless he’s on your team.

So — established — Buster is taking the big swings. And so far they are working. I’m going to say it again, if the Giants had made the playoffs, you’d have to consider Posey for Executive of the Year.

And now he’s fired Melvin, a three-time Manager of the Year. So we have to consider that.

I don’t sense this was a burn-at-the-stake moment among the faithful. This isn’t a bottom-of-the-barrel, OMG this team stinks, something has to be done.

The Lads made some noise, had some rocky moments and finished at 81-81, just out of the playoffs. An optimist would see a group that seemed to enjoy each other, played hard and had some very real moments where they looked like contenders.

As for Melvin, even a casual observer sees him as the consummate nice guy. Stoic in the face of adversity, rarely critical of players and generally upbeat.

Nobody likes to see a good guy lose his job.

Now Gabe Kapler, Melvin’s predecessor, had really worked up some negative energy by the time he was shown the gate. Remember this example of positive manager-player interaction?

I think most fans will shrug at this. I don’t think they feel Melvin did anything wrong. Firing the manager is kind of what you do in this situation. BoMel’s swell, but time for a change.

I guess that’s a reason.

Presumably there will be complaints that Melvin wasn’t firey enough. Didn’t yell at umpires or bark at players.

I don’t buy that.

First, it’s as dated as flannel pants. Monday a KNBR caller was rhapsodizing about the time Giants manager Alvin Dark threw a stool at a wall in the clubhouse. Great. Try that now and we’ll be making you an appointment with HR and an anger management consultant.

Besides, I’ll bet the umpires don’t think Melvin as Silent Bob. He has famously been thrown out of games 68 times, which ranks him among the 15 most-tossed managers in history. Last year he got thrown out BEFORE the game started.

Naw, I don’t think lack of combustibility is it. If they’d made the playoffs we’d be praising his stoicism and calm.

I figure Buster had other considerations.

First, no playoffs. Hanging some postseason bunting would have meant a lot to this franchise. The fans are coming back — 2.9 million this year, the most since 2018 — and the team wants to keep the momentum going.

So making a change presumably signals that you are serious. Melvin just happened to be the guy who was standing on the trapdoor.

The bigger question is, seriously, how much can a manager do that affects the outcome of games?

You know the standard answers. Manage the pitching staff. Don’t wear out the bullpen, keep a close eye on your starters to get them through the season. Send hitters to the plate who have had success against certain pitchers.

And frankly, although that generates enough talk radio and podcast fodder to power a media industry, I disagree.

I think there’s more to it.

I think baseball is a game of vibes. A whole, months-long, 162-game season stretches out before you in the spring.

Players get one day a week away from the ballpark if they’re lucky. The travel — yes, even with a private plane — is brutal. You’re crisscrossing the country constantly.

And almost every day there is a result. A win, a defeat, a bonehead play, a miracle catch. It’s a lot.

And this year’s Giants’ team had no trouble establishing a vibe. They established all kinds of them, some in direct opposition to each other. Consider these numbers:

On June 13 they were 12 games over .500. And, they were in first place in the National League West.

A little more than two months later they were seven games under .500.

After all that they finished at exactly .500.

They twice ripped off seven-game winning streaks, one in March and one in June. Then they slumped to a seven-game losing streak in August. August was also the month when they lost 15 of 16 games at home.

They had a stirring 38 comeback wins — shoutout to Patrick Bailey walkoff home runs, twice.

And they gave back precisely the same number of blown leads — 38.

I dunno. You figure it out. How does a team cram all that in one season? And how do you manage that?

Of course, the worst thing you can say about a team is that they quit caring. You have to admit Melvin’s team never did.

In fact, they likely cared too much. There was a stretch where it seemed obvious they were falling all over themselves trying to make the extra play.

I wrote about the idea back in July and around that time players and coaches admitted they felt it.

“Sometimes less is more,” Melvin told The Standard. “I think we’re backing off a little bit as far as the batting practice goes and just trying to give a little different look and maybe a breath.”

Everybody was stressing. Adames and Devers clearly wanted to make a splash with their big contracts and new team and predictably got off to slow starts. Younger guys, including the revolving door at second base, were pressing.

Everyday guys, like Jung Hoo Lee, played so many days that they began to wear down. Stalwart Matt Chapman injured ligaments in his hand, which bothered him the rest of the season.

And just generally, for a team that had three hitting coaches, they didn’t do much hitting, They ranked 26th in total hits in MLB.

Also, as Andrew Baggarly wrote in The Athletic:

“How could Posey justify placing the blame on Melvin for missing the playoffs when the front office sold at the trade deadline, trading relievers Tyler Rogers and Camilo Doval as well as right fielder Mike Yastrzemski, and then watching their bullpen collapse down the stretch?”

I’m not sure what else Melvin could have done. This looks like a team that needs to settle in, find itself and begin to capitalize on the obvious talent on the roster.

I think Melvin could have done that. His management style is to stick with his guys, leaving pitchers in to work out of jams and promoting confidence to struggling hitters.

Granted, that doesn’t always work out. He may leave a pitcher in too long and a struggling hitter may just not be that good. But I’d guess players would rather have that than Kapler’s famous quick hook.

(Although, we have to say, the players must have had a say in this. Posey clearly talked to them. Either they didn’t make the case to keep him or they said they’d be OK with moving on.)

In the end, firing Melvin had a odd inevitability about it. If they’d won those three or four critical games and made the playoffs there’d be no discussion about it. Of course he’d be back.

Instead, they missed and I guess he had to go. Not sure that’s a game changer, but we will see.

We wouldn’t be surprised if Posey goes for one of the young guy baseball guys that are all the rage. For all baseball’s hide-bound traditions, when it comes to managers the sport is willing and ready to go outside the box.

All those minor league managers toil away in small towns and cramped clubhouses, hoping for a shot. But instead teams go for someone like Dusty Baker, an affable guy with baseball in his bones.

In 2019 Stephen Vogt was a catcher for the Giants. He retired in 2022 and spent a year as a coach in Seattle.

Two years ago, Vogt got the job with the Cleveland Guardians. Today he is celebrating an AL Central Division Title for the second year in a row. He was manager of the year in 2023.

You have to love Vogt. He didn’t have a lick of managerial experience before he got this job. But he’s got that vibe.

As Vogt liked to say when he was a Giant, “Winning creates chemistry and chemistry creates winning.”

Melvin’s teams had the chemistry and from here it looked like they were headed in the right direction for the winning.

But, as we are seeing, Buster Posey is not a wait and see kinda guy.

Still sorry to see Melvin go.

Contact C.W. Nevius at cwnevius@gmail.com. Twitter and Threads: @cwnevius