Tracy: day 2

OK, day 2 of the Tracy analyzing is complete. After day one I felt cautiously optimistic. After day two I'd say that I just feel cautious. It certainly seems like the communication from the manager's office to the players will improve. This can only be a good thing. I remember Matt Lawton saying last June he hadn't spoken to McClendon yet. Of course I also remember Matt Lawton saying Lloyd McClendon was the best manager he ever played for about a month later. I also remember thinking when we traded Lawton for Gerut that we lost a guy with a mental handicap for a guy with a physical one, and that given the way Lawton played for us, it was probably a good thing. And I'm not the least bit worried about the Tracy/DePodesta fall out. I've said it already, Tracy and Littlefield think similarly and get along, that's why Tracy was hired. We don't need to worry about Littlefield wanting Eldred in the games and Tracy playing **insert random offseason acquisition here**. We need to worry about Littlefield telling Tracy to bench Eldred (but THAT is a different story). I think that our new coaching staff will be able to help our young pitchers development, something that our old coaches never seemed to grasp. I like to hear Tracy say he thinks he can help Kip Wells.

Still, the oft cited article from earlier today scares the bejeebers out of me. I'm not anti-small ball. I'll certainly agree that a well-timed stolen base or hit and run can be extremely productive. I'm anti-stupid ball. Has anyone watched the White Sox in the first two games of the ALCS? That's stupid ball. How many outs has Ozzie gotten himself into? And only to be praised by the two Fox morons (McCarver and Buck) when a needless bunt set up a run that would've scored anyways tonight. I'm anti hitting and running just because it's a "hit and run situation." That was one of my problems with McClendon. Leadoff hitter on base? Must be time for a steal, bunt, or at least a hit and run. If I know it's coming, that means so does the other team. And I won't lie, if I was reading that article about Tracy today with the names removed, I probably would have guessed that McClendon was responsible for those quotes about the Cardinals. That's what scares me.

So the bottom line is that there are some things that I think will be positives and some things that would appear to be negatives. I'm not ready to condemn or praise a guy based on two days of soundbites and biased stories (from both sides) from his previous area of work. Unless something happens to change my mind, I'll go into the spring cautious. Not optimisitic mind you, but I'm not ready to be negative yet, either. I just want to see the guy in action before I make any real judgements.