Tuesday,
January 4, 2011
Change or No Change?
On Monday afternoon, the Vikings suprised absolutely no one when they named Leslie Frazier
as their eighth head coach. Another coaching change for a team that has had
three head coaches in the past six years.
On January 4, 2002, the Minnesota Twins named
their 3B coach Ron Gardenhire as their new
manager. He replaced Tom Kelly who had been manager since he replaced Ray
Miller as Twins manager during the 1986 season. Kelly had been the Twins
3B coach prior to that.
On January 10, 2002, the Minnesota
Vikings named Mike Tice their full time head coach. He
had taking over the reigns from Denny Green a
few weeks earlier. Tice's contract ran out after the 2005 season, and
Brad Childress was brought in from outside the organization in
January of 2006. As well all know, Mr. Childress
was relieved of his duties six weeks ago. Frazier became the interim head
coach and as had been anticipated for about the last year, he was named the
team's head coach on Monday.
The Vikings have had three head coaches
in the last six years and four head coaches in the past ten seasons. In
the last decade the Vikings have made the playoffs three times.
The Twins, on the other hand, have had two managers over the past 25
seasons. In the last decade, the Twins have been to the playoffs six
times.
This blog is not to say that one
ownership methodology is better than the other. The Twins practice and
preach continuity and with it, they have remained an annual contender and
playoff team in the AL Central. The Vikings have made several changes
in the past decade. They have just three playoff berths, but their
run to the NFC Championship game earlier this year was sure fun
to watch.
The Twins ownership was known as
frugal for a lot of years in the Metrodome, and
rightfully so due to very low revenue streams. With the arrival of Target
Field, the Twins have spent on payroll, increasing their payroll
from just $65 million a few years ago to about $100 million in 2009 and
upwards of $120 million in 2010. The Vikings have spent at least the
salary cap in most of the years. In 2010, Zygi Wilf went way beyond the salary cap (in an un-capped
season) in an attempt to "go for it." How did that go?
Will a new coach change the fortunes for the
Vikings after one of the most disappointing seasons in the Vikings
history? Brad Childress had lost his players completely. If there is
one thing that will never happen, it is Twins players quitting on Ron
Gardenhire.
There are a lot of similarities between the
Vikings and the Twins. Some positive traits. Some
negative traits. It will always be amazing for me that the Twins have been
the much more successful team the past decade and yet this remains
such a Vikings state and region.
Here's to Leslie Frazier being the right
guy to take the Vikings back to the playoffs, and to Ron Gardenhire for hopefully being the guy able to take the
Twins to that next level. All I know if 94 wins in the regular season is a
pretty good place to be. Is one management philosophy better
than the other? What has firing and re-hiring done for the Vikings? What
has continuity done for the Twins?
Everyone can have a different opinion, and no
one is right, and no one is wrong. What do you think? Feel free to e-mail
me or leave
your comments here.