.

• "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"

"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.

"I don't much care where –" said Alice.

"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.

 

"– so long as I get somewhere," Alice added as an explanation.

"Oh, you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."

.

Based on these statements by Kevin Mather -- he's the team president, or something -- the Mariners are not just happy with Jack Zduriencik; they are thrilled with him.

How do you evaluate a GM?  Dr. D has no idea, but he does have an inkling that the yearly W-L record isn't a real big part of the process.  A rich exec like Zduriencik has eleventeen critical functions, every single one of which would boggle us ordinary mortals:

 

• Public relations, face of the franchise stuff
• Hiring and firing, infrastructure
• Connectivity (outside the company) (this is massive in MLBtm)
• Inter-organizational dynamics (inside the company) 
• Legal
• Baseball scouting
• And you'd better believe it's very important whether his bosses like him
• etc

Bill James once said, "Every GM I've ever seen has a natural grace to him, an ability to charm people," or somesuch.  Dr. D doesn't know if Tony Blengino would agree with him, but Zduriencik certainly gives Dr. D this impression.  From a distance.

.

But, supposing we were to focus on W-L record, what then?

 

1.  Billy Beane just finished five (5) years of losing.  W's and L's are far, far more subject to luck than people think they are.

Ahem.

...

 

2.  My paradigm for evaluating GM's on the field ... I've never seen one better than Bill James':  "Theo makes about 12 big decisions a year.  He has a good season, or he doesn't, based on how those go."  Very loosely paraphrased.

James seemed to be marvelling at the way --- > so much effort --- > reduced to such absurdly small (or, focused) output nodes.

As most of us know, all 21st-century baseball GM's are sitting at the pinnacle of massive intel structures.  They're all (without doubt) incredibly well-informed.  No GM trades for Logan Morrison, unaware of what the WAR says about him or his "replacement level player" in AAA.

The GM makes the final call on these 12* decisions.  

....

Most of us would be surprised to learn:

• How limited these 12 choices are
• How subject to luck the outcomes are

If you took over an ML team, you might imagine that your first call would be, "which of these 40 quality starting pitchers do I want to sign."  More likely, your first call would be a lot more like, "Do I want R.A. Dickey or do I want to go with my AAA pitcher."

...

 

3.  Zduriencik's 12 Big Decisions this year were:

 

• Lloyd McClendon
• Chris Young vs Randy Wolf or Erasmo Ramirez (half joking)
• "Overpay" for Robinson Cano or not
• Who to play at SS and CF
• Stars & Scrubs
• Go with 37-year-old Fernando Rodney or not
• Delay Paxton and Taijuan, or push them forward
• He had been forced to draft Mike Zunino, when two prep players did not fall to him (but nice scouting instinct by Z, and nice promotion timeline, to forsee Zunino's impact)
• You fill in the rest

Zduriencik made 2 thunderously great (roster) calls going into the year, Cano and Rodney.  Rodney and McClendon created the bullpen that made the season possible.  Beautiful!  It worked out.

He lucked out on Chris Young -- not taking a thing away from Zduriencik for liking Chris Young.

He had positioned the roster with Stars & Scrubs fungibility, and he exploited that fungibility with gusto.  This one single factor, the roster fungibility, is what allows Billy Beane to kick the Yankee$' keisters on a yearly basis.  Beane has said as much.  And now Zduriencik and McClendon also are 100 MPH on "nine to make five."

...

 

4.  Leave us not forget the 5-year context:  The Mariners lost a ton of games under Zduriencik, and now they are cobbling a rather weak Wild Card bid.  One year.

Zduriencik's on-field record is bad.   And the Mariners are not playing well because of the 5-year plan, or because of the talent pyramid.  They're not playing well because they "stuck to the plan," because they did no such thing.

They're playing well because in 2014, the stars aligned -- miraculously -- on their pitching.

Hey, Dr. D isn't trying to widdle on Zduriencik's 2014 season.  But if the Mariners knew who Hisashi Iwakuma was, they'd have offered him more than $1.5M to sign -- and they'd have offered him more than 2/$14M the last time.

The 2014 pitching jelled beautifully, and there was a lot of skill involved in causing it to do so.  But it might have just as easily blown up.  That's the nature of the business.

 

Said All That, to Say This, dept.

Dr. D isn't quick to demonize, or angel-icize, the GM for his 12 decisions this year.  Or last year.  Or for Zduriencik's horrible luck as it pertained to Smoak, Montero, and Ackley.

Dr. D does like the WAY that Zduriencik makes decisions, his Stars & Scrubs orientation, his keen insight into baseball skill sets, his "earn your playing time" philosophy, his measured approach to the trade deadline.

.

Billy Beane recently praised MLB franchises who "allow GM's to grow into their jobs."  Spectator does a nifty job of underlining this point:  Zduriencik has gotten better at his job.  A lot better, if you ask me.

He even seems more coherent about what he wants in a Safeco player:  a "battler" who will give him an NL-style AB, not worrying about stats and glory home run trots.  That is the way with Chris Taylor, Logan Morrison, and the RF'ers.  It's the way with the Oakland A's hitters.

At the 4 positions where a choice existed, Zduriencik (and McClendon, an NL player/manager) went with batters willing to hit a pitcher's pitch:

 

• SS:  Taylor over Miller
• 1B:  LoMo over Smoak
• DH:  Kendrys over ...
• RF:  Chris Denorfia is an extreme of this approach

.

Zduriencik is a Stars & Scrubs GM, wayyyyy so.  He's great with the talent pyramid.  He's gotten pretty good at other 25-man roster decisions, it seems like.  If it were me, I'd have kept him at the helm over the next three years, too.

if K-Pax and Taijuan and DJ and stuff does ever really start producing a Tampa Bay situation, Zduriencik may wind up with a legacy.

 

My $0.02,

Jeff