Rob Neyer takes a critical look at Tony La Russa’s post-season record:

One hundred and sixteen games still isn’t a truly significant sample size, and La Russa’s .552 winning percentage in those games still doesn’t tell us much about La Russa that we didn’t know already.

One thing it does tell us, though: Tony La Russa has been far from a postseason failure. He’s won more than his fair share of postseason games, with a record perfectly in keeping with the rest of his career. The only thing that’s missing is another World’s Championship or two.

Rob compares Tony’s record to a number of other managers who worked fewer seasons and won more championships. I’ll just bring up Gene Mauch, who of course never won a World Series title, or even a post-season series. He was always considered a great manager. He lasted 26 seasons despite an overall record under .500 and overseeing one of the great collapses of all time. I have to assume that the front offices of those teams thought Gene made his teams better, even if they were not championship quality teams. Tony may be the same kind of manager, just with better teams.