Nice, thoughtful piece. I remember the 70s, but somehow I don't remember feeling as frustrated as I do now. Maybe I was, and those feeling have just faded with the success of the last 25 years or so. I do remember, "there is always next year" in those days. I'm not so optimistic about next year these days. In 1980, Gussie Busch made a bold move in hiring Whitey Herzog and giving him a free rein. Uncharacteristic for Busch in those days. Whitey made some bold controversial moves, but it paid off. Maybe the Cards are in a similar place they were in 1980.
I divide the DeWitt ownership into three periods Old School, the Team of Rivals, and the Mo Show. The Team of Rivals period includes your part of your Jockerty/TLR era and all of your Mozeliak/TLR era. I see DeWitt's hiring of Jeff Luhnow as the start of the Team of Rivals period. During that period there were factions within the Cardinals that had differences of opinion about how things should be and they didn't like each other. Jockerty (and later TLR) seemed to the senior person among the traditionalists, Luhnow was the champion of analytics and change, and both were sort of independent power centers. They couldn't fire each other, and ultimately Bill DeWitt wanted them both with the team. It was Mo's job to make it work. He was able to balance the creative tension between those factions to make organization was greater than the sum of its parts. Personally, I think Mo did an outstanding job during that period. Then in 2011 that creative tension disappeared with the departure of TLR and Luhnow and Mo was the guy left at the head of baseball operations.
This is a great piece, maybe some of your most thoroughly researched and carefully analyzed work. I expect some significant changes, but my biggest concern is that there is no roster base to build on. As a casual observer, I see "start over" everywhere.
Nice, thoughtful piece. I remember the 70s, but somehow I don't remember feeling as frustrated as I do now. Maybe I was, and those feeling have just faded with the success of the last 25 years or so. I do remember, "there is always next year" in those days. I'm not so optimistic about next year these days. In 1980, Gussie Busch made a bold move in hiring Whitey Herzog and giving him a free rein. Uncharacteristic for Busch in those days. Whitey made some bold controversial moves, but it paid off. Maybe the Cards are in a similar place they were in 1980.
I divide the DeWitt ownership into three periods Old School, the Team of Rivals, and the Mo Show. The Team of Rivals period includes your part of your Jockerty/TLR era and all of your Mozeliak/TLR era. I see DeWitt's hiring of Jeff Luhnow as the start of the Team of Rivals period. During that period there were factions within the Cardinals that had differences of opinion about how things should be and they didn't like each other. Jockerty (and later TLR) seemed to the senior person among the traditionalists, Luhnow was the champion of analytics and change, and both were sort of independent power centers. They couldn't fire each other, and ultimately Bill DeWitt wanted them both with the team. It was Mo's job to make it work. He was able to balance the creative tension between those factions to make organization was greater than the sum of its parts. Personally, I think Mo did an outstanding job during that period. Then in 2011 that creative tension disappeared with the departure of TLR and Luhnow and Mo was the guy left at the head of baseball operations.
That's a very good point and indeed, Mo was hired because he could be that bridge between the old school and new school and both sides respected him.
This is a great piece, maybe some of your most thoroughly researched and carefully analyzed work. I expect some significant changes, but my biggest concern is that there is no roster base to build on. As a casual observer, I see "start over" everywhere.
Thanks for your insight!