For the first time since they won 116 games in 2001, the Seattle Mariners will return their manager and complete coaching staff – ending years of finding one scapegoat or another.
Eric Wedge’s complete staff will be back in 2012: bench coach Robbie Thompson, pitching coach Carl Willis, hitting coach Chris Chambliss, third base coach Jeff Datz, first base coach Mike Brumley and bullpen coach Jaime Navarro.
That wouldn’t be news with some franchises. The Mariners?
The last time they brought the manager and staff back intact was after Lou Piniella’s ’01 season.
Since the end of the 2002 season, Seattle has had seven managers – five who were fired, one who quit midseason and Wedge.
After each season since ’02, the Mariners have jettisoned coaches if not managers, rolling through more than a dozen firings. Even after the Mariners won a surprising 85 games in 2009, they fired third base coach Bruce Hines.
MCCOURT GETS BREAK
Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt won an extra month to prepare for a court battle with commissioner Bud Selig over control of the team when a Dover, Del., judge rescheduled the hearing from Monday to Nov. 29.
U.S. Bankruptcy Court Judge Kevin Gross also ordered MLB and News Corp.’s Fox Sports to turn over to the Dodgers any emails they exchanged about the team before it filed bankruptcy in June. Lawyers for the Dodgers claim the documents will help them show during the November hearing that Selig is unfairly trying to force McCourt to sell the team.
At the hearing, scheduled to last through Dec. 2, McCourt and the Dodgers will seek approval to sell the team’s future television rights in order to raise enough money to pay creditors in full and exit bankruptcy.
SHORT HOPS
The Padres and Cubs announced that Jed Hoyer and Jason McLeod are leaving San Diego to accept the positions of general manager and senior vice president of scouting and player development, respectively, in Chicago’s front office. The Cubs agreed to send the Padres a player to be named as compensation. The Padres named Josh Byrnes to be Hoyer’s successor as general manager. … Dodgers pitcher Hong-Chih Kuo will undergo arthroscopic surgery on his left elbow Friday in Los Angeles.
McClatchy new services contributed to this report.
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