Baseball Musings
Baseball Musings
June 19, 2008
McLaren's Record
John McLaren

John McLaren
Photo: Icon SMI

John McLaren took over on July 2, 2007, less than a year ago. His 156 game stint as manager went well in the first half. The Mariners finished 43-41 under John in 2007. That's not as good as they played under Hargrove, but they won. His 2008 record of 25-47 is just awful, the worst in baseball.

The offense just didn't play well under McLaren. Among Mariners with at least 100 plate appearances playing for John, the highest OBA was .365 and the highest slugging percentage was .491, and both belong to the departed Jose Guillen. Six batters with at least 100 PA posted OBA below .300. If you want to blame Bavasi, McLaren was given poor hitters. If you want to blame McLaren, he's the guy who gave those hitters over 1600 at bats.

The pitching is more a mixed bag. Felix Hernandez thrived with McLaren at the helm. Erik Bedard didn't. No other starter has an ERA better than 4.84. With that kind of pitching and an offense that doesn't produce, a team ends up with a winning percentage under .400.

I tend to blame the GM in this case for putting a terrible team on the field. As far as I can tell, however, McLaren did nothing to get the most out of a weak squad. Maybe the new manager and GM will work better as a team to find a way to get this team winning.


Posted by David Pinto at 01:29 PM | Management | TrackBack (0)
Comments

McLaren shares a fair amount of blame for this season. His lineups were consistently a mind-boggling mess, he managed the bullpen poorly, made bizzare pinch-hitting choices, has no concept of a late game defensive substitution, and he did not hold any accountability in his clubhouse. McLaren seems like a good guy, but not a good manager. Now the M's just need to follow up with cutting a few of their players and we might be ready for a fresh start.

Posted by: Matt K at June 19, 2008 02:19 PM

Visit ussmariner.com for a breakdown of all of McLaren's horrible strategic moves, such as batting Jose Vidro, the second-worst hitter in all of baseball, in the No. 3 slot.

Posted by: Vince at June 19, 2008 04:37 PM

Two straight posts on the firing of the Mariner's manager? You're obsessing, David.

Posted by: rbj at June 19, 2008 04:39 PM
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