Fire Rick Hahn

[Tnetennba]

45 minutes ago, Bob Sacamano said:

Never let this fall off the first page.

 

47 minutes ago, hi8is said:

Sell. The. Team.

Fire. Everybody.

 

[oldsox]

On 12/6/2022 at 1:27 PM, Balta1701 said:

I was actually thinking the opposite.

If Rick Hahn had reason to think a payroll cut was possible, it is outright criminal mismanagement that he didn’t sell off last deadline.

Abreu, Cueto, Lopez, Graveman were all absolutely moveable. They needed to move McGuire, but they didn’t need to take on money in the process.

If they had traded away all those guys, they would have saved roughly $10 million last season and have a payroll $15 million lower right now. 

On top of that, those trades should have brought back like 6 players. Presumably some of them would be in the lower minors, but if you got back a Pilkington level starter, a guy who could slot into the bullpen along with Lambert with an option remaining, or a rotation player in the outfield, the funds could be targeted way more effectively. No Clevinger, one more swingman in the pen, and a backup OF somewhere and now I have $25 million free to spend on a starting LF.

This one of Balta's better posts.  Sox should get some sort of compensation for being stuck with Hahn.

[Timmy U]

Can we just merge the entire board into this thread?

[poppysox]

On 12/6/2022 at 11:50 AM, southsider2k5 said:

I would be really curious  as to how this would look.

I don't think Hahn is the GM in a traditional manner.  We have a 3-piece GM committee with JR, KW, and RH.  Rick is actually the contracts guy with KW being the talent evaluator and JR of course is the banker.  They are all in this together so can't blame any one of them.

[black jack]

They don't need to fire Rick.  

Firing Rick does nothing. 

Jerry needs to sell.  

The rest will work itself out.  

[Squirmin' for Yermin]

1 hour ago, black jack said:

They don't need to fire Rick.  

Firing Rick does nothing. 

Jerry needs to sell.  

The rest will work itself out.  

This is absolutely right. Nothing will change until there’s new ownership

[Tnetennba]

1 hour ago, black jack said:

They don't need to fire Rick.  

Firing Rick does nothing. 

Jerry needs to sell.  

The rest will work itself out.  

Firing Hahn only does so much.  It’s window dressing.  The organizational dysfunction starts at the top.  That said, Hahn still sucks and should be gone, even though he’s a mere middle management mouth piece. 

[black jack]

10 minutes ago, Tnetennba said:

Firing Hahn only does so much.  It’s window dressing.  The organizational dysfunction starts at the top.  That said, Hahn still sucks and should be gone, even though he’s a mere middle management mouth piece. 

Who knows if Hahn is really a good GM or not?  We don’t know the inner structure or workings.  We have no idea if he has the freedom to make the moves he wants or not.  All we know is Jerry runs his franchise like it’s the 80’s and it was located in Grand Rapids. 
 

I’m not saying Hahn would’ve done better, I’m saying they all have to go. 

[DirtySox]

I don't think you can absolve Hahn just because ownership is shitty and won't spend with the big boys. He is well aware of the Jerry factor at this point and it's up to him to be agile and adjust how he operates in turn. There are so many teams that do more with less. Emulate and adjust, or get fired please.

[Harold's Leg Lift]

Hahn is a huge problem.  He painted himself into a corner because he's really bad at his job. There is no way other GM's would just sit on all these s%*# players/contracts.  They would figure out a way to move them even if they had to take a step back to take two steps forward but Hahn refuses to do it beacuse he won't admit he was wrong. He had the 7th highest payroll last year and finished 11 games back in the worst division in baseball. That's almost impossible to do but Hahn figured out a way because he sucks. Hahn is his own worst enemy.  I love to see it because I want to watch him go down in flames but how people continue to give him a pass is unbelievable.    

[CaliSoxFanViaSWside]

On 12/6/2022 at 10:31 AM, ChiSox59 said:

The White Sox were 2 GB on the central and 2.5 GB on the wild card on deadline day.  There was a 0% chance they were trading any of those guys.  

Exactly where Jerry likes them to be in a weak division.

JR is like I'll show those fans what happens when you don't do white flag trades and boo my manager. There are times to retreat and regroup and pick up reinforcements. Now as usual with this team have have nothing to show for those players.

Tampa Bay may not win World Series with their way of doing it but at least they are a franchise that knows who they are and acts accordingly.

If JR wants to win by creating a perfect balance of payroll and player peaks without investing in player development or play in the murky waters of Int'l. signees he also knows he's handicapping Hahn from the get go which is probably why he won't fire him. It's hard to find puppets.

It's really amazing that concept actually worked once in 2005

[nitetrain8601]

I think a GM needs to know how to operate with the confinements given to them by those up top. It happens in everyday life, and in all organizations. Your boss wants you to make something happen, but makes it a little bit more difficult than it needs to be due to certain constraints out of your control. So you either make it happen or find an organization that better fits how you need to operate. 

With that stated, it's long enough to realize that one of the following is true: Hahn is bad at his job or Hahn sucks at working within the rules his bosses want him to play. Regardless of reason, he's shown enough that he needs to be put through that door.

In my mind, I think he's just flat out bad at his job. I appreciate that he breaks the 4th wall and gets upset like we do and shows it. I was happy enough with him blowing up the team a few years ago and getting some major players like Eloy. But, IMO, whether it was due to payroll, or teams overvaluing their players, or him just not having a plan, it's clear that he doesn't know how to do anything other than blow up a team for the Chicago White Sox.  

His forecasting has sucked when it comes to players wanting more money (Machado fiasco), his use of assets made available to him such as trade chips or money has sucked (that bullpen, Leury, etc.), he has allowed his players to become depreciating assets (Grandal, Kimbrel, Hendriks, etc.), his answer to filling starting voids on the team is to have players way out of position or to fulfill with backup minor league options.

IMO, I can't put that on Jerry. If Jerry told him that they were going to roll back on payroll, that's understandable because they sucked in the worst division in baseball. Hahn should've sold off the team at the deadline, especially Abreu. He didn't even do that. So now we are stuck with the exact same team again and expecting to do 12-15 games better based upon hopes and dreams.

[supernuke]

18 minutes ago, nitetrain8601 said:

 

IMO, I can't put that on Jerry. If Jerry told him that they were going to roll back on payroll, that's understandable because they sucked in the worst division in baseball. Hahn should've sold off the team at the deadline, especially Abreu. He didn't even do that. So now we are stuck with the exact same team again and expecting to do 12-15 games better based upon hopes and dreams.

Do you think JR would have approved another white flag? 

This is not a defense of Rick Hahn but I would guess that the reason he hasn't been fired is because JR doesn't have any issue with the job he is doing.

What other GM is going to come in and try to operate with little to no ability to sign a long term big money contract and also with little investment in scouting and player development. 

I'm all for showing Hahn the door, but I doubt anything changes if they do.

[bear_brian]

For my money it is still on Reinsdorf. This guy led the group that bought the White Sox in 1981 for $19 million; today the franchise is valued at $1.8 billion. And yet he continues to cry poor and act as if he is in Kansas City rather than the third largest city in America. He blackmailed the state into building him a new stadium (where attendance the first 3 years averaged 2.7 million), then led the lockout in 1994, which antagonized all of the fans and probably cost the White Sox a chance at both the pennant and World Series. He then wondered why attendance fell off for the next 10 years, until the 2005 world champs. This year, for all his supposed crying about attendance, the mediocre ball club drew over 2 million people, the first time they hit that number since 2011.

 

This is the guy who let Dave Dombrowski walk in favor of Hawk Harrelson. It is the guy who fired Larry Himes, who only drafted Jack McDowell, Robin Ventura, Frank Thomas and Alex Fernandez in consecutive years, as well as trading for Wilson Alvarez and Sammy Sosa. Reinsdorf is the same guy who put Hahn in a can't win situation by keeping Kenny Williams around. And then, the brilliant move of overriding his GM by bringing La Russa in.

 

Hahn is not a good GM, but the problem is Reinsdorf. Forty years of him is the same penance White Sox fans had to endure between the 1919 Black Sox and the 1959 AL champs. Sell the team!!!

[bmags]

Unless Jerry appointed Hostetler to be his new scouting director going into a massive rebuild I don’t want to hear it.

[Soxfest]

Hahn saying seeing things from fresh eyes is comical, while he, KW and JR still make all the decisions 

[South Side Hit Men]

8 minutes ago, Soxfest said:

Hahn saying seeing things from fresh eyes is comical, while he, KW and JR still make all the decisions 

Beyond max profits, it’s all a joke to Jerry, has been since 1981.

Quote

“It’s so much more important than winning a baseball game, which is good because we don’t win that many,” 

- Jerry Reinsdorf 12/7/22

A date which will live in infamy.

 

[hi8is]

TalkingInCircles.com

[nitetrain8601]

57 minutes ago, supernuke said:

Do you think JR would have approved another white flag? 

This is not a defense of Rick Hahn but I would guess that the reason he hasn't been fired is because JR doesn't have any issue with the job he is doing.

What other GM is going to come in and try to operate with little to no ability to sign a long term big money contract and also with little investment in scouting and player development. 

I'm all for showing Hahn the door, but I doubt anything changes if they do.

I don't think JR thinks that deeply on it to be honest. I think he is loyal and entrusts who he has in front of him to make all of the decisions. The only constraint I see him put forth is that of money, which is frustrating, but also understandable.

With that stated, I don't forsee JR being happy about saying "We need to rebuild all over again". And that's not what I'm suggesting. I'm suggesting a retool. Roster is good and young enough for that. We all knew at least one of Abreu, Vaughn, Eloy, Grandal, or Sheets could not be here going forward. We knew this bullpen was way too expensive. We also knew this team was injury prone all of last year from the gate. We didn't buy, nor sell which is the worst thing you could do.

Hahn did have the ability to sign someone to a big contract. He chose to get cute with it (well if Machado hit the incentives, then he would've received more per annual, blah blah blah). You don't do stupid ish like that to a generational 3B like Machado. It's a slap in the face. Then saying, "Well, now we can take those dollars and invest elsewhere", which is true, but then signing Joe Kelly, getting Liam (good player, but no way is a bullpen arm worth that much short of Mo Rivera), Leury's deal, etc. The best deal Hahn has made in his tenure is that of Cueto and that was arguably by stupid blink necessity and luck.

[ShoeLessRob]

4 hours ago, poppysox said:

I don't think Hahn is the GM in a traditional manner.  We have a 3-piece GM committee with JR, KW, and RH.  Rick is actually the contracts guy with KW being the talent evaluator and JR of course is the banker.  They are all in this together so can't blame any one of them.

I can blame all three of them equally for sucking at their respective jobs.

[mmmmmbeeer]

I'm a White Sox, Bulls, and Titans fan for the big three sports.  2 of my 3 favorite teams are owned by Jerry Reinsdorf and both of those franchises have had enormous, unmitigated FO issues.

When Jon Robinson came onboard as GM for my Titans, we were in a really bad place.  He worked wonders by flipping the roster, hiring Mike Vrabel, nailed some late draft picks.  He literally turned the franchise around.  This was only 7 years ago.  Last season we were the number one seed in the AFC.  

He was fired earlier this week, despite the Titans being 7-5 and first in their division.  To outsiders, it made little sense.  To fans, it made a ton of sense.  There are holes all over the roster, FA pickups have been disasters, busted draft picks left and right, worst OL in football (even worse than the Bears), etc.  The record is smoke and mirrors.

His firing, and Amy Adams-Strunk's comments concerning the firing, REALLY opened my eyes to just how bad of an owner JR is and how embarrassing it is that Rick Hahn still has a job.  She demands excellence and improvement, JR demands loyalty.  Hahn and KW are so far up JR's ass it's ridiculous.  No GM in their right mind would sit idly by while his "masterpiece" of a rebuild was about to be driven off a cliff by Tony LaRussa.  But Rick remains.  Ridiculous.

 

[Chicago White Sox]

Bump

[EloyJenkins]

5 minutes ago, Chicago White Sox said:

Bump

why? that horse is beat to s%*#. 

[GreenSox]

This winter, Rick Hahn has had "a place at the table" and  Jeremey Haber has had "good conversations" with other clubs.   If the results don't flow from this righteous effort,  we can all take comfort knowing that  no one will be more disappointed than Rick.

[Highland]

At this point, the whole franchise has no credibility. I am not waiting for Hahn to make any significant moves.