It’s always a tough task to rate the performances of general managers, but just as sportswriters rate a player, they can’t let the performance of the men who build these teams go ungraded.
Somebody has to be held accountable for these failures, particularly in the case of the Indians organization. Sportswriters can’t give high marks to what Mark Shapiro has done with the franchise.
That’s not my opinion alone; poor marks are the judgment of a media with a lot more national credibility than I have.
On its website, Sports Illustrated ran an article that rated general managers, and out of 30 GMs in Major League Baseball, Shapiro ranked No. 22.
“He has to be the most overrated executive of the last few years,” SI writer Tim Marchman said. “His Indians were widely praised as one of the best-run clubs in baseball for years, but despite immense reservoirs of talent they’ve had two winning seasons in his eight years at the helm.”
I’m not sure about the reservoirs of talent that Marchman referred to. Having covered the Indians as a beat writer for about five years, I didn’t see that deep pool of talent. Sure, good ballplayers came through the organization, but few came here in the draft, an abject failure of the Shapiro regime.
- The B-List: 9/22 (1.000)
- The B-List: 9/23 (1.000)
- The B-List: 9/24 (CLE) (1.000)
- The B-List: 9/25 - 9/27 (CLE) (1.000)
- The B-List: 9/28 (CLE) (1.000)
