Ned Yost fired!

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

Just getting an AP crawl... the Brewers have axed Ned Yost.

Guess owners didn't like that Phillies double-header sweep any more than we did.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

w-O-w.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Wow indeed! Tied for a playoff spot, and with only two weeks remaining in the season?

That's not something you see very often, if at all. (Oh, how I wish the Mets had fired Willie Randolph after the Phillies swept them at Shea last year!)

Worst case scenario: This sparks the Brewers to a hot two weeks and both the Phillies AND Brewers finish better than the Mets.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Really the coulda done it before the Phillies series.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I'm not finding any confirmation though. The latest thing on Google News is speculation, from about an hour ago, that he's likely to be fired after the season ends.

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

How dare they do it in the middle of the day and on the road like that! Where's the outrage?

[Guest metsguyinmichigan]

URGENT �
Brewers fire manager Ned Yost �
Eds: APNewsNow. �
�� MILWAUKEE (AP) � The Milwaukee Brewers have fired manager Ned Yost in the midst of a late-season slump that has jeopardized the team�s chances of making the playoffs for the first time since 1982.
�� Third-base coach Dale Sveum will become interim manager for the remainder of the season.
�� The Brewers have lost seven of their last 10, and share the NL wild-card lead with Philadelphia.
�� �

[stevejrogers]

metsguyinmichigan wrote: How dare they do it in the middle of the day and on the road like that! Where's the outrage?

And he was on Bobby Cox's knee for all those years, how dare they fire someone with a winning heritage like that!

[Benjamin Grimm]

Bold. Unorthodox. And a little bit panicky too. But a chance worth taking, I think.

If the Mets had a more comfortable lead over the Phillies I'd say that I hope it works. But given my rooting interest lies in the Mets getting to the playoffs, I have to hope that it's too little too late.

They should've hired Willie Randolph. He's a former Brewer, and I think they were among the many teams to have interviewed him and decided he wasn't qualified to be a manager.

[seawolf17]

Hiring Willie would be a fascinating story.

As it is, this is really surprising. I can't remember a managerial move like this -- with the playoffs on the line -- so late in the season. Did he piss on Doug Melvin's cat? Weird.

Ted Simmons is out too.

http://milwaukee.brewers.mlb.com/news/press_releases/press_release.jsp?ymd=20080915&content_id=3480423&vkey=pr_mil&fext=.jsp&c_id=mil

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Ode to the new skipper:

http://humbug.baseballtoaster.com/archives/331.html

[HahnSolo]

Red Sox Nation collectively giggles at the thought of Dale Sveum managing a ball club.

Lou Lamoriello has done this with the Devils a couple of times, incidentally.

[Valadius]

Seems ridiculously panicky to me. And Dale Sveum? Seriously?

[metirish]

Stunning , so stunning it might work.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of.

[metirish]

Brewers fans at this board seem happy.

http://brewersfandemonium.yuku.com/topic/15618

[smg58]

It's possible he's made some decisions recently that the front office felt were really bad. I know he's been juggling the lineup lately to find something that would work, but I can't see that by itself as being grounds for firing. Unless Yost did something obviously wrong and obviously costly, this looks like a big-time panic move. Or, perhaps, it's his fault that the Brewers have an even worse pen than the Mets?

[Benjamin Grimm]

I'm guessing they want to give the team a jolt and hope for that "new manager" bump that sometimes happens.

I don't normally like these two-week interim manager things. I'd rather see the guy finish the season, like Art Howe did, then end up with 7 games of Mike Cubbage, like we had in 1991.

But this is a case where a short-term interim manager is managing very important games. Very unusual. And if it works, fiendishly clever.

[bmfc1]

This reminds me of 1989 when the New York Rangers fired Michel Bergeron (I had to look that up) and replaced him with Phil Esposito with two games left in the season.

[Frayed Knot]

Me in yesterday's IGT: "Now why is Brewer mgr Ned Yost leaving (LOOGY) Brian Shouse in to face Burrell and then Victorino?"

Guess Brewer ownership was asking the same questions.

[metirish]

IIRC there were rumblings earlier in the season about him being fired.

[G-Fafif]

Saw two Brewers fans at Miller Park last September wearing jerseys that said, when read together:

NED YOST WORLD'S
BIGGEST CUBS FAN

[batmagadanleadoff]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: They should've hired Willie Randolph. He's a former Brewer, and I think they were among the many teams to have interviewed him and decided he wasn't qualified to be a manager.

The Wilpons are even dumber than Bud Selig.

[Frayed Knot]

I suppose the biggest difference between this and the Willie situation is that Yost's contract was up at the end of the season and they probably had already decided to cash in those chips anyway - as opposed to Willie who had been granted an extension prior to that same season.

Both do/would smell of panic moves but, if you're Milwaukee, it's probably a good time to panic.

Sveum is the only guy I can remember from a non-NY team that drove me to say; 'Damn that guy's a lousy 3rd base coach"!
Most coaches you just don't see enough of to make those kinds of judgements but Sveum packed a lot of bad decisions into a short span for me.

[Frayed Knot]

OMG, I knew Yost had allowed the LOOGY Shouse to pitch to Burrell, but I didn't realize that he intentionally walked the lefty Howard just to get the Shouse/Burrell matchup.

Baseball Prospectus says it may have been overdue.

The Brews' other problem has been the inability to win the big game.
They're 23-11 recently but only if you take out the [u:83c3b9bfe7]0-11[/u:83c3b9bfe7] in games to the Cubs, Mets & Phils

[metirish]

WOW that's crazy, bullpen management it seems is a thorny issue for a lot of teams.

Good article .

[Benjamin Grimm]

Brewers announce that they'll be looking for a new manager.

Sveum is out.

[Guest AG/DC]

What I think they will do: Hire Kevin Kennedy.

What I think they should do: Steal Ken Oberkfell from the Mets.

What I think would be most interesting for them to: Hire Cecil Fielder.

[Guest AG/DC]

Willie in the mix, according to one Journal-Sentinal writer.

[metirish]

AG/DC wrote: Willie in the mix, according to one Journal-Sentinal writer.

Hardly a ringing endorsement form the Sentinel , if that means anything.

] 4. Willie Randolph Randolph probably will be interviewed, primarily because of the minority hiring rules in baseball. He was considered for the Brewers' job in 2000 that went to Davey Lopes, and in retrospect would have been a better hire. Randolph managed the Mets to the NL East title in 2006 but they lost in the NLCS to St. Louis. They had a historic gag at the end of the '07 season and Randolph was fired midway through this season when the team couldn't get going. Those failures don't work in his favor. Randolph is very unstated and sometimes comes off as smug or aloof with the media. He was not a great communicator in the clubhouse with the Mets.

Snooze this morning has him being high on the list of candidates , one reason given is that Brewers owner Mark Attanasio grew up a Yankees fan.