August 27, 2007
Purge in Houston?
FoxSports is reporting that both Phil Garner and Tim Pupura are about to be fired.
The Astros have called a news conference at 3 p.m. ET to announce the change.
Owner Drayton McLane expected the team to contend after signing left fielder Carlos Lee to a $100 million free-agent contract and adding starting pitchers Woody Williams and Jason Jennings.
Instead, they're close to the worst record in the National League. More when the new conference is over. ESPNews is covering Michael Vick instead of this story.
Update: It is on MLB.TV.
Update: McLane is firing Tim Pupura over the team's performance over the last two years.
Update: Tal Smith takes over as GM on an interim basis. How much to you want to bet that they end up with Randy Smith as GM?
Update: Garner fired, also. McLane keeps talking about invigorating the team and getting them to play with more enthusiasm. Don't they need better pitching and hitting? Cecil Cooper gets the hire as interim manager.
Update: Was it Pupura's and Garner's fault that they had to play a poor offensive player at second base so he could reach 3000 hits?
Update: By the way, I'm a big Cecil Cooper fan from his playing days, and I'm glad to see him get a chance to manage.
Update: Cooper is talking about playing the game the right way. Does that mean the team isn't playing the game the right way? I can't see Garner letting the team getting away with that.
Posted by David Pinto at
02:59 PM
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"Cooper is talking about playing the game the right way. Does that mean the team isn't playing the game the right way? I can't see Garner letting the team getting away with that."
I thought it was Phil who was letting the players go from home to third to second to first while running the bases?
"Cooper is talking about playing the game the right way. Does that mean the team isn't playing the game the right way? I can't see Garner letting the team getting away with that."
On the next to last page of my latest version of Baseball's Unwritten Rules, a statement regarding getting back to basics and playing the game the right way is required in the introduction of any interim manager.
"How much to you want to bet that they end up with Randy Smith as GM?"
Depends on what they give the Padres in return for releasing him from their employment, I suppose...
If the Astros end up with Randy Smith as GM then they are well and truly screwed. Dave Littlefield would be preferable to Smith. That is all.
Lack of hustle is playing the game the wrong way and too often the players didn't hustle. Making mental mistakes is playing the wrong way and that happened too often.
Trading for Jennings was a mistake but keeping Jason Lane and Orlando Palmero were also mistakes. Thinking Chris Burke could play centerfield was another boo-boo.
If you check Garner's managerial record you'll see his best years were the first years and the teams kept getting worse the longer he was with the team. Past performance isn't necessarily an indicator of future performance but that's the way to invest.
Also, the Astro's have said Randy Smith will not be a candidate for GM.
playing biggio was entirely mclane's decision
that said, garner was a dreadful manager. simply DREADFUL in game strategy. he also overplatooned, constantly changed lineups, constantly moved guys all over the diamond.
no fundamentals, lots of baserunning errors
i could go on and on
as for purpura, he was limited a lot in what he could do by mclane - but he still made foolish judgements about players, was unable to sign something like 20% of the draftees this year, has had 3 dreadful drafts in a row, can't make ANY trades, can't pick up any useful players of the waiver wire, can't talk to other GMs, has trouble talking to agents
he was most definitely NOT a good GM and it wasn't about the jason jennings trade
randy smith is not going to be the GM, thank GAWD