90-day notice

As I write this, there are 90 days remaining before the start of Frontier League spring training.

And the Wild Things still don't have a manager.

I've been told by the Wild Things that they'll have a decision on their manager by the end of this week. You can take that with as many grains of salt as you wish. I was told in early December that a manager could be hired before the end of 2009. Then, in early January, the Wild Things were saying a manager would likely be named by mid-January.

The question is, does anyone want to be the manager?

Some have jokingly suggested that the team's lack of a manager be tied into a promotion. For example, one fan is named manager for the night, and if the Wild Things win he/she returns to manage the next home game. I thought that was both funny and interesting.

Others have said that not having a manager this late into the offseason is a bad thing and has put the Wild Things behind schedule in putting their team together. I don't agree with that assessment. The players you sign during the fall and winter are almost always the holdovers from your previous season or guys who have little chance to make the club in May. There have been a few exceptions (Grant Psomas comes to mind) to this with the Wild Things, but the impact newcomers are the players released in late March from minor-league spring training. Whether you have a manager or not in early February doesn't impact your ability to sign minor-league releases in April.

As for potential managers, you likely can rule out former Wild Things shortstop and hitting coach John Cahill. If Cahill is going to be the manager, then why didn't they hire him in December? Two other names have surfaced on this blog: Pete Rose Jr., and Darin Everson. Rose spent the last five years as a player in the independent Atlantic League – the league new Wild Things managing director Todd Marlin came from. Everson was a manager in the Florida Marlins' system for the last three seasons and has crossed paths with some former Wild Things. He managed Ernie Banks and Kedrick Martin in 2008 at Jamestown of the New York-Penn League.