In a haughty article on Fox Sports, Dayn Perry brings the heat about how great the American League is, because they have all the money. And all the intelligent GMs. Logic would lead us to assume that there is not an intelligent GM in the National League, or at least the good ones are screwed over by their respective owners.
As for the NL, you have an unfortunate number of hapless and semi-hapless operators who also happen to run the high-revenue clubs. In Chicago, Jim Hendry needs to be fired yesterday. In Philadelphia, Ruben Amaro has made several questionable moves since taking over for Pat Gillick.
Mets GM Omar Minaya might be in the midst of saving his job (though the grassroots Howard Megdal campaign continues to build momentum), but his leadership has been inconsistent and unfocused at best. Ditto for Ned Colletti in L.A. and Brian Sabean in San Fran, whose teams seem to tread water and occasionally succeed in spite of the front offices.
In Florida, you find the opposite problem -- Larry Beinfest, one of the most gifted execs in sports, is hamstrung by Jeff Loria, one of the worst owners in sports. And, of course, there's no excuse for the continued employ of Astros GM Ed Wade.
Of course.
We didn't come out here to play tiddlywinks, son.
-Hal Smith
