Brian McTaggart's new blog post details how the first round of interviews goes:
The Astros will try to interview two candidates per day beginning Wednesday and hope to finish the first round of interviews by later this week. Wade, president of baseball operations Tal Smith, assistant general managers Ricky Bennett, David Gottfried and Bobby Heck and special assistant to the general manager Enos Cabell will be involved in the first round of interviews. Owner Drayton McLane is scheduled to get involved later in the process.
Note that, should they take four days for interviews, at two candidates a day, equals eight managerial candidates.
Wade:
"We'll have very specific questions about how he goes about organizing Spring Training, how he interacts with coaches and the authority he gives to coaches and things of that nature - basically walking through what one would expect a manager's responsibilities to be. And we'll ask some direct questions about how they go about things in each of those areas."
One question I'd like to be a part of the interview process, before Drayton gets involved:
"Let's say that Nick Johnson is up to bat. And Hanley Ramirez is on deck..."
Well, you just finish that up.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
