Bowden: Duquette deal done

[SammyBirdland]

Some facts about Dan Duquette:

Players Duquette acquired on Boston's 2004 championship team:

Pedro Martinez

Manny Ramirez

Jason Varitek

Johnny Damon

Tim Wakefield

Derek Lowe

Kevin Youkilis

He also drafted:

Nomar Garciaparra

Jon Lester

Carl Pavano

David Eckstein

Freddy Sanchez

Mark Teixeira (didn't sign)

International signings he made with the Expos and Red Sox include:

Vladimir Guerrero

Orlando Cabrera

Anibal Sanchez

[wildcard]

Duquette may do a good job, but I've got to say that the reactions in this thread show signs of Stockholm Syndrome to me. The last four weeks have been a complete cluster. We were turned down by a 50+ year old dude who has been an assistant GM for 12 years and works behind a guy in his mid-30s. Think about how bad he must have thought this opportunity to be to have a firm offer and choose to stay in a spot where he will NEVER be the top guy. One guy withdrew in the middle of the process prior to an offer because we dicked around too much. Many others just smiled and said "no thanks". We ended up hiring a guy that we thought so much of that he wasn't even in the first "long list", let alone the first round of interviews. The guy we hired hasn't been so much as near MLB since 2002. I don't care what you think about the way the game works, there is a reason that nobody would touch him for years.

Now, the comments I see are "well, at least that is over" and "it could be worse" and "at least it will be exciting". Goodness. BTW, the folks who are saying "at least it will be exciting" are saying that because Duquette has a reputation as being hard headed and full of himself and he is working for a guy who is the same way and with a guy who is the same way (I can't say he is the boss of Buck, it just isn't so regardless of titles). When was the last time three inflexible egomaniacs worked well together? That's right. Never. This will explode. It is just a matter of time.

I'll watch because, like the rest of you poor fools, I'm addicted to this stupid crack pipe (kudos to the apt analogy Roy), but I'm self aware enough to know that I'm addicted to something that is really bad for me.

A very accurate assessment. Duke has either mellowed with age or he will implode at some point. He accepted keeping the personnel that PA wants and AM could not get rid of. The younger Duke would not have. The question is can he work and improve the team under that condition. The same with Buck's expanded powers. Will Duke and Buck bump heads hard or find a way to work together? No answers, only questions.

[JohnD]

This organization has become the Cincinnati Bengals of baseball, but without any of the success.

[DrungoHazewood]

Duquette may do a good job, but I've got to say that the reactions in this thread show signs of Stockholm Syndrome to me. The last four weeks have been a complete cluster. We were turned down by a 50+ year old dude who has been an assistant GM for 12 years and works behind a guy in his mid-30s. Think about how bad he must have thought this opportunity to be to have a firm offer and choose to stay in a spot where he will NEVER be the top guy. One guy withdrew in the middle of the process prior to an offer because we dicked around too much. Many others just smiled and said "no thanks". We ended up hiring a guy that we thought so much of that he wasn't even in the first "long list", let alone the first round of interviews. The guy we hired hasn't been so much as near MLB since 2002. I don't care what you think about the way the game works, there is a reason that nobody would touch him for years.

Now, the comments I see are "well, at least that is over" and "it could be worse" and "at least it will be exciting". Goodness. BTW, the folks who are saying "at least it will be exciting" are saying that because Duquette has a reputation as being hard headed and full of himself and he is working for a guy who is the same way and with a guy who is the same way (I can't say he is the boss of Buck, it just isn't so regardless of titles). When was the last time three inflexible egomaniacs worked well together? That's right. Never. This will explode. It is just a matter of time.

I'll watch because, like the rest of you poor fools, I'm addicted to this stupid crack pipe (kudos to the apt analogy Roy), but I'm self aware enough to know that I'm addicted to something that is really bad for me.

Palmer, Weaver, and, umm.... I got nothing.

I'm right with you. I think this is a better situation than, say, hiring Stockstill, but it's still miles from the situation they wanted to be in, and just serves to highlight the rank incompetence of the team's upper management. There's overwhelming odds that this won't work well, that they'll try to jump the process and win in the short term with a an organization so full of holes it's hard to know where to start patching. Duquette isn't a complete idiot, so he'll have his successes. But it'll be a huge upset if Buck, Angelos, and he can get on the same page and actually decide to do things mostly right.

I'm resigned to accepting ironic success for the forseeable future. Let's see how outrageous things can get, see how many 1000:1 shots they can bet the rent and grocery money on, how many times they can flabbergast The Hardball Times or BP or Rob Neyer. At least it's not the same old stuff.

[Frobby]

Some facts about Dan Duquette:

...

He also drafted:

Nomar Garciaparra

Jon Lester

Carl Pavano

David Eckstein

Freddy Sanchez

Mark Teixeira (didn't sign)

He didn't draft Lester. Duquette was fired in March 2002 and Lester was drafted later that year. Other players he did draft and sign include Adam Everett, Kelly Shoppach and Justin Duchscherer.

I'm not giving him credit for drafting Teixeira, since he didn't sign him. If you're giving credit for that, there are a ton of good players the Orioles drafted but never signed, like David Winfield, Cliff Lee, Michael Young and Jaime Garcia, to name a few.

[NewMarketSean]

Someone actually took the job from outside the organization. That is the only bonus you can take away from this. In the end we got another old-school GM who has been out the game for 10 years. He may actually do some good, but let's face it, the chance that he does anything is remote.

[Roll Tide]

Someone actually took the job from outside the organization. That is the only bonus you can take away from this. In the end we got another old-school GM who has been out the game for 10 years. He may actually do some good, ****but let's face it, the chance that he does anything is remote.

I disagree with every part of this statement except the 1st sentence. The Angels thought enough to interview him.

*****The chances of him doing something good is more determned by Angelos letting him do the job & giving what he needs to get it done****.

[Tony-OH]

Decent hiring.

Bottom line, like many of us have said all offseason so far, is it doesn't matter hwo the GM is.

Thus, I wish DD well and lets move on to improving the team now.

I think this is the best take really. I would have been very happy with Dipoto or Lacava, but they turned us down. Considering the alternatives, Duquette was a solid hire in my opinion. At the end of the day, I think anyone is going to have a hard time working for Angelos so I'll remain skeptical, especially since we know what circumstances Duquette has to work under. It will also be very interestign to see how he can work with Showalter over the long term.

The best thing is Duquette can get started now. I'm interested in seeing what he does, but I'll remain skeptical that anyone can operate successfully under Angelos.

[Fan4Life]

We probably should have pulled for a Stockstill hiring as he may have actually been able to move some unmovable parts should they continue to be road blocks to success. Having one of the "protected's" neck on the line may have been the best way to get real change. It may have gotten really ugly for awhile before the real change started, but is there really much difference between 5 warts on your face and 10?

[24fps]

We probably should have pulled for a Stockstill hiring as he may have actually been able to move some unmovable parts should they continue to be road blocks to success. Having one of the "protected's" neck on the line may have been the best way to get real change. It may have gotten really ugly for awhile before the real change started, but is there really much difference between 5 warts on your face and 10?

I think Flanny's experience as co-GM and later full GM makes your Stockstill argument unlikely. We all remember how Flanagan was sandbagged by MacPhail's hiring. Working successfully with Peter Angelos remains a riddle. Two strong individuals working in concert under Angelos hasn't been tried for a while, why not try it again? Last time we had a little success.

[PaulFolk]

Duquette may do a good job, but I've got to say that the reactions in this thread show signs of Stockholm Syndrome to me. The last four weeks have been a complete cluster. We were turned down by a 50+ year old dude who has been an assistant GM for 12 years and works behind a guy in his mid-30s. Think about how bad he must have thought this opportunity to be to have a firm offer and choose to stay in a spot where he will NEVER be the top guy. One guy withdrew in the middle of the process prior to an offer because we dicked around too much. Many others just smiled and said "no thanks". We ended up hiring a guy that we thought so much of that he wasn't even in the first "long list", let alone the first round of interviews. The guy we hired hasn't been so much as near MLB since 2002. I don't care what you think about the way the game works, there is a reason that nobody would touch him for years.

Now, the comments I see are "well, at least that is over" and "it could be worse" and "at least it will be exciting". Goodness. BTW, the folks who are saying "at least it will be exciting" are saying that because Duquette has a reputation as being hard headed and full of himself and he is working for a guy who is the same way and with a guy who is the same way (I can't say he is the boss of Buck, it just isn't so regardless of titles). When was the last time three inflexible egomaniacs worked well together? That's right. Never. This will explode. It is just a matter of time.

I'll watch because, like the rest of you poor fools, I'm addicted to this stupid crack pipe (kudos to the apt analogy Roy), but I'm self aware enough to know that I'm addicted to something that is really bad for me.

You nailed it, vatech.

At the beginning of the offseason, if you had told me that Dan Duquette would be the next O's GM, I would've laughed and assumed you were joking. "What, Bob Watson wasn't available? Or Roland Hemond? Hahaha!"

With all the quality GM candidates that were available-- Dipoto, LaCava, etc.-- to end up with a guy who hasn't been in the MLB for nearly a decade is just a depressing example of business as usual for the Orioles. The organization is such a disaster that nobody would take the job except a desperate guy who had nowhere else to go.

Even though Duquette has had some successes in the past, you can't help but be concerned that the guy couldn't find any kind of job in any organization since 2002. And the things we're hearing about his personality don't exactly fill me with confidence.

At this point we're basically trying to talk ourselves into liking Duquette because at least he's not the worst GM we could've hired. You call it Stockholm Syndrome-- I'd call it Stockstill Syndrome.

[Fan4Life]

You nailed it, vatech.

At the beginning of the offseason, if you had told me that Dan Duquette would be the next O's GM, I would've laughed and assumed you were joking. "What, Bob Watson wasn't available? Or Roland Hemond? Hahaha!"

With all the quality GM candidates that were available-- Dipoto, LaCava, etc.-- to end up with a guy who hasn't been in the MLB for nearly a decade is just a depressing example of business as usual for the Orioles. The organization is such a disaster that nobody would take the job except a desperate guy who had nowhere else to go.

Even though Duquette has had some successes in the past, you can't help but be concerned that the guy couldn't find any kind of job in any organization since 2002. And the things we're hearing about his personality don't exactly fill me with confidence.

At this point we're basically trying to talk ourselves into liking Duquette because at least he's not the worst GM we could've hired. You call it Stockholm Syndrome-- I'd call it Stockstill Syndrome.

I saw on MLBTR.com a quote by Guthrie that essentially welcomed Dan onboard and proceeded to say we're lucky to have him. That could be read several different ways... considering the context that VaTech outlined above... we are lucky...

[Austin]

Anyone know what time the press conference is? Will it be broadcast anywhere? I checked Orioles.com but didn't see anything. I guess we won't hear anything important today but I'm a sucker for these things.

[Dipper9]

Anyone know what time the press conference is? Will it be broadcast anywhere? I checked Orioles.com but didn't see anything. I guess we won't hear anything important today but I'm a sucker for these things.

You mean THIS won't happen...

DD: "Hello, my name is Dan Duquette, and this man here is named Albert Pujols...YOUR new first baseman for the Baltimore Orioles!"

[scOtt]

Anyone know what time the press conference is? Will it be broadcast anywhere? I checked Orioles.com but didn't see anything. I guess we won't hear anything important today but I'm a sucker for these things.

Roch said tomorrow morning. No time, just morning.