Comments on: Hickey’s list

By: joser

joser — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:55:58 +0000

“Pat, when I credit you, do you want me to call you a ’senior baseball executive’?”
“You always call me that. ‘Senior’ always make me sound like somebody in a white belt and shoes standing in line for the Early Bird Special at Denny’s.”
“But I’ve seen you wear a white belt. And you love Denny’s.”
“Yeah….but I don’t want people to think that. Besides, whenever you use that term everybody knows it’s me. How about you call me a ‘former GM’?”
“But you’re a current GM–”
“Sure, but I’m also a former GM. Heck, I’m a former Mariners GM. But the point is: everybody else thinks of me as current GM, so if you say ‘former’ nobody will think it’s me. Which means I can dish the real dirt.”
“Ok… well in that case, about that whole Brett Myers thing–”
“Ooops, somebody on the other line, gotta take this, see ya!”

By: DMZ

DMZ — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:39:04 +0000

Gillick’s not a former GM, though, he’s a current GM. I don’t think Hickey would describe him that way — he’d say “senior baseball executive” or something.

By: Evan

Evan — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:28:43 +0000

Hickey talks to a “former GM” who came up with eight people… I’m not sure why, exactly, the former GM would do that, and you can take your guesses at who this mystery author is

Probably Gillick. He’s always been willing to talk, he has a relationship with the Seattle press, and he’s not on the list (everyone else lists him).

By: G-Man

G-Man — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:20:16 +0000

Tony Bernazard has a leg up on all of these guys. He played for the M’s.

By: joser

joser — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 17:05:28 +0000

I would assume the dropdead date for hiring a GM is going to be driven by having him, and his hires (assistants, etc) in place in time for the winter meetings. That still gives them a good 3 months, though. Strictly from a PR standpoint, you probably want to just keep a slow drip of news going (”M’s interview Yet Another Candidate”) all summer and then have the big announcement in September. Unless you think it’s going to be controversial; then you do it in August when attention is at the minimum.

By: Jeff Nye

Jeff Nye — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:56:07 +0000

I don’t think any of us really know enough about Pelekoudas to determine that he’d be a bad choice, nor do we know enough about what the current thinking in the FO is to determine that they’re going to just rubber-stamp an organizational guy.

Really. Relax, take a deep breath.

By: irish

irish — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:27:32 +0000

and of course, there are the requisite ‘it’s time for Pelekoudas’ stories from Portland and Tacoma

That’s what scares me. For some reason, watching that press conference, I got the feeling that Lincoln and Armstrong are already planning to end up with Pelekoudas as their favorite candidate after all the “interviews” are done. They sure went out of their way to lay the groundwork for his possible hire.

By: msb

msb — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 15:06:47 +0000

national papers weigh in with articles on Avila, Gillick, and of course, there are the requisite 'it's time for Pelekoudas' stories from Portland and Tacoma

By: bigred

bigred — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 13:36:23 +0000

Quick Question.

What do you think the timeline is for hiring a replacement?

By: Steve Nelson

Steve Nelson — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 12:32:13 +0000

#12:

One reason Towers would be same-old, same-old: he’s the guy we trade with when we have nothing better to do. Witness Baek. Witness Ben Davis. So he’s more of the comfort zone this team needs to get out of.

Boy – that’s quite a leap. Following the same logic, the Mariners shouldn’t be interested in anyone from Cleveland, either, since the Mariners do deals with the Indians as well.