Bob Melvin\u2019s return to the East Village means important truths must be pointed out.<\/p>\n
The biggest one is this:<\/p>\n
Melvin\u2019s replacement as Padres manager, Mike Shildt, has been a much better fit with Padres president of baseball operations A.J. Preller.<\/p>\n
If Preller and Shildt were a dubious coupling, we\u2019d know it by now. The two have been together almost two years, about the same amount of time Melvin spent in San Diego.<\/p>\n
Unless he\u2019s the best actor in baseball, Shildt seems a good match with Preller.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wouldn\u2019t trade him, pun intended, for any general manager in baseball,\u201d Shildt said last month, one day before baseball\u2019s trade deadline. \u201cHe\u2019s really brilliant.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shildt also said: \u201cI love the way we work together. I manage the club that he gives us and I know that he\u2019s always working hard to give us the best club he can with the parameters he\u2019s been given.\u201d<\/p>\n
The apparent harmony between Preller and Shildt doesn\u2019t mean Shildt is a better manager than Melvin, who took over the Giants two Octobers ago after his two-year Padres run ended in disappointment.<\/p>\n
But he\u2019s been a better fit for nearly two seasons, at minimum. And a much-needed one.<\/p>\n
When it came to managers, Preller has appeared in MLB divorce court almost as often as Elizabeth Taylor appeared in real divorce court.<\/p>\n
Five managers \u2014 that\u2019s how many Preller had moved on from following his own hiring in August 2014.<\/p>\n
To be fair, Bud Black \u2014 the first of the five \u2014 may have been extra tough to retain. Padres ownership inherited Black in August 2012, and owners tend to want their own guy at some point.<\/p>\n
Pat Murphy, hired by Preller when Black was fired, got the interim label and managed 96 games. Then came Andy Green, Jayce Tingler and Melvin. (For the sake of this exercise, we won\u2019t count Dave Roberts\u2019 one game as acting manager in 2015 and Rod Barajas\u2019 eight games at the end of the 2019 season.)<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve got to get this one right,\u201d Preller said more than once as he searched for Melvin\u2019s replacement.<\/p>\n
It appears he did.<\/p>\n
The Padres have won 57% of their games under Shildt. That ranks eighth of 30 teams in Major League Baseball during that stretch. Melvin\u2019s Giants have won 48% of their games, 21st in baseball, during the same timespan.<\/p>\n
Disclaimer: Shildt had the more talented team in both years.<\/p>\n
Beyond the urgency for Preller to find a suitable replacement, another large factor portended a better outcome.<\/p>\n
Preller knew Shildt much better than he knew Melvin when Melvin \u2013 supported by late Padres chairman Peter Seilder \u2013 was hired as Tingler\u2019s replacement.<\/p>\n
Shildt and Preller had spent the previous two seasons working together, with Shildt serving as a senior adviser to Preller. That gig schooled Shildt on Preller\u2019s management style and exposed the former St. Louis Cardinals manager, scout and minor-league instructor to Padres prospects. One was his future center fielder, Jackson Merrill. Many others would become trade currency, bringing big-leaguers to Shildt\u2019s Padres teams.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s tricky to evaluate any manager.<\/p>\n
Shildt appears to have commanded enduring respect from Manny Machado. That\u2019s not to say Machado and Melvin were at odds.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s notable that Joe Musgrove, formerly with the World Series champion Astros and Pirates, said Shildt and staff are the best he\u2019s been around at preparing players and nailing the nitty-gritty baseball details.<\/p>\n
Melvin seemed to stabilize the \u201922 Padres in his first year on the job.<\/p>\n
In finding extra rest for pitcher Yu Darvish late in that year\u2019s wild-card race, Melvin made an underappreciated, somewhat risky choice that paid off. Darvish pitched very well in the postseason and the Padres reached their first National League Championship Series since 1998.<\/p>\n
Job security among most manager is fragile. For now, Shildt, 57, seems longer for his current team than Melvin, 63.<\/p>\n
Shildt lasted four seasons with the Cardinals, winning 56% of his games and going to three postseasons. In November, Preller extended Shildt\u2019s contract through 2027.<\/p>\n
That meant Preller saw more value to Shildt\u2019s first team winning a wild-card playoff berth and a playoff series against the Braves than the Division Series loss to the Dodgers, who went on to win the World Series.<\/p>\n
Melvin\u2019s option for 2026 was picked up last month by Giants GM Buster Posey.<\/p>\n
Last week\u2019s shoddy performance by Melvin\u2019s Giants didn\u2019t reflect well on anyone in the franchise. Shildt\u2019s Padres won by scores of 4-1, 5-1 and 11-1.<\/p>\n
A noncompetitive series in front of home fans, against a divisional rival, tends to get noticed by a team\u2019s owners. As the Padres try to track down the Dodgers again, they\u2019ll be eager to win more games against Melvin\u2019s club.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bob Melvin\u2019s return to the East Village means important truths must be pointed out. The biggest one is…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":157268,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5134],"tags":[5229,1582,276,1370,1266,3549,1306,7264,62,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-157267","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-latest-headlines","12":"tag-mlb","13":"tag-san-diego","14":"tag-san-diego-padres","15":"tag-sandiego","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115053055618169039","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157267","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}