Trying Tracy might be a bad choice for Bucs

Tuesday was a rather big day for the Pittsburgh Pirates. General manager Dave Littlefield… Tuesday was a rather big day for the Pittsburgh Pirates. General manager Dave Littlefield officially named former Los Angeles Dodgers skipper Jim Tracy as the new manager of the franchise.

Tracy, who signed a contract to manage the team through 2008, was chosen over former Oakland manager Ken Macha and Atlanta Braves coach Fredi Gonzalez. Tracy takes over for interim manager Pete Mackanin, who stepped in late in the season when Lloyd McClendon was fired.

But Tracy’s hiring may go deeper than mere credentials. On a logical basis, Macha seemed to be the no-brainer. The Pirates passed on him in 2000 in favor of McClendon. In his last three seasons, Macha led the A’s to a 275-211 record, three consecutive winning seasons, and a playoff berth in 2003.

Macha also played for the University of Pittsburgh before being drafted in the sixth round by the Pirates in 1972, and currently lives in nearby Murrysville in the off-season.

However, Littlefield had connections with Tracy that go back to the mid-1990s. The two worked together at Montreal before splitting in 1998, Littlefield heading to the Marlins and Tracy to the Dodgers. Littlefield was the director of player development at Montreal, while Tracy worked as bench coach under manager Felipe Alou.

Tracy has managed the Dodgers to four winning seasons in the last five years, including a National League West title in 2004. However, the Dodgers went 71-91 this season, despite a surprising start including an early eight-game winning streak. The source of the Dodgers’ problems, as speculated in the off-season, was plain and clear. Between ’04 and ’05, Los Angeles lost Alex Cora, Shawn Green, Steve Finley and National League MVP runner-up Adrian Beltre, leaving the team without playoff-caliber talent, much like that of the Pirates.

Macha and the A’s were nearly in the same situation, only with pitching. A’s general manager Billy Beane dealt two of Oakland’s top-three aces, Mark Mulder and Tim Hudson, leaving 27-year-old Barry Zito to anchor the brand new rotation.

As the season progressed, the young arms of Oakland’s Rich Harden, Danny Haren, Kirk Saarloos and Joe Blanton developed to nearly sneak the A’s into the American League wild-card position, and they likely would have gotten it had it not been for a late injury to Harden.

The fact of the matter is that Macha worked three years with a small market team, winning each season. The Pirates, with the 28th-highest payroll in the MLB, as compared to the A’s 21st, would have been a good fit.

But the Pirates went with Tracy, despite his going 20 games under .500 with the 11th-highest payroll in the bigs, just over $80 million. The Pirates’ front offices can’t even count that high.

They can count to 13, however. That is the number of consecutive losing seasons the Pirates have gathered, including this year’s 67-95 record, the third time they’ve failed to win 70 games since 2000.

The record for consecutive losing seasons is 16, set by the Philadelphia Phillies from 1933-1948. If Tracy fails to lead the Pirates to one winning season during his three-year contract, they will tie that record.

At this point, the Pirates really can’t go anywhere but up. Finishing 33 games out of first place in the division, St. Louis or no St. Louis, doesn’t exactly say, “Well, things could have been worse.”

With the hiring of Tracy, Littlefield’s incompetent reputation with player/manager movement with the Pirates will be put to the test again, a test that he has failed many more times than he has passed.

Pirate fans can only hope this move doesn’t replicate the deals of Aramis Ramirez or Jason Schmidt, and Jim Tracy doesn’t turn out to be Armando Rios, Tony Hernandez or Derrick Bell, in a managerial sense.

The Pirates passed on Macha once and got burned. I believe it was George W. Bush who said, “Fool me once, shame on you-“

Well, you get the idea.

Pat Mitsch is a staff writer for The Pitt News. E-mail him at prm17@pitt.edu.