Rank the GMs

[Timberwolf]

I did a poll for ESPN.com about ranking GMs thanks to help of my good friends at WSI. I always love to talk about this topic. Give me your top five GMs and awful GMs. I will give you my rankings on these GMs.

To me, the best GM in baseball is Terry Ryan. Look what he has do with Carl every year. It was a tough decision. I like Dave Dombrowski. I think he is great too. I went with Terry because he has rebuilt this team every year. There is a reason why he was the Executive of the Year by the Sports News. As for the worst GM in baseball, I went will Bill Bavasi of Seattle. Mariners farm system blows and they have nothing exciting. Also, from the rankings that I wrote, there are so many bad GMs. For all the attention that Theo Epstein and Brian Cashman has undeserving got, they are not that good without the big budgets. Epstein's magic has clearly gone.

Here are my rankings:
1) Ryan
2) Dombrowski
3) Schuerholz
4) Beinfest
5) Shapiro
6) Williams
7) Jocketty
8) Beane
9) Towers
10) Minaya
11) Gillick
12) Prupura
13) Stoneman
14) Colleti
15) Riccardi
16) Melvin
17) Krivsky
18) Sabean
19) Littlefield
20) Moore
21) Daniels
22) Hendry
23) O'Dowd
24) Epstein
25) Bowden
26) Flanagan
27) Brynes
28) Cashman
29) Friedman
30) Bavasi

[berneree]

Good to see your list isn't biased in any way.

[thewave84]

What is your criteria for a good GM vs a bad GM? Is having a big budget a drawback?

[dt35456884]

Originally Posted by Timberwolf

Here are my rankings:
18) Sabean
.
.
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29) Friedman

[Yoda]

I'll be different and admit that I don't have a clue how to rank GM's. I don't have to means to evaluate all of their farms systems, determine whether or not weaknesses are the result of injuries or just poor jedgement/scouting, I don't know what kinds of budgets most of them might have, I don't know how much interference many of them may have had by teams' owners, etc. There are just too many unknowns. Analyzing GM's is the most boring and pointless part of baseball to me. It's just not something that I feel I can do with any type of accuracy whatsoever.

[slim pickens]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I'll be different and admit that I don't have a clue how to rank GM's. I don't have to means to evaluate all of their farms systems, determine whether or not weaknesses are the result of injuries or just poor jedgement/scouting, I don't know what kinds of budgets most of them might have, I don't know how much interference many of them may have had by teams' owners, etc. There are just too many unknowns. Analyzing GM's is the most boring and pointless part of baseball to me. It's just not something that I feel I can do with any type of accuracy whatsoever.

I'm with you on this one.

[Yoda]

Originally Posted by Timberwolf

1) Ryan

I will say that Ryan was a bit lucky this year. He had two of the best pitchers in the game and two legit MVP candidates. He didn't really have to "build" the team this year. He was quite lucky that the youngsters that were brought up played incredibly well, probably overacieving to a large degree. Though a lot of the same things can be said for Dombrowski as well. It's all part of a GM's job, but I don't know that I'd say Ryan is the best.

[tiger337]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I'll be different and admit that I don't have a clue how to rank GM's. I don't have to means to evaluate all of their farms systems, determine whether or not weaknesses are the result of injuries or just poor jedgement/scouting, I don't know what kinds of budgets most of them might have, I don't know how much interference many of them may have had by teams' owners, etc. There are just too many unknowns. Analyzing GM's is the most boring and pointless part of baseball to me. It's just not something that I feel I can do with any type of accuracy whatsoever.

I agree it's very difficult to rank GMs. There is too much going on behind the scenes to do it accurately. I think that DD is good. I think that Ryan is good. I think that Schuerholz is good. I'm not sure how I'd rank them or anybody else though.

Managers are very tough to judge too because most of it depends on the players.

[Yoda]

I think the best way to do it would be to find out which owner loves his GM the most. They all have different duties. Cashman is good because he does whatever George wants him to do. That's his job. I think Dombrowski might be the most beloved GM in the game, but others could be on the same level. Beane probably is over in Oakland. I'm just not sure about the rest really.

[Corky]

Couldn't you rank Bavasi a little lower? On a scale of 1-30 I'd give him a 41.

[DrWho17]

Cashman and Epstein belong way higher up on the list. Cashman and Epstein run great organizations, and even with their low drafts they both keep bringing along the prospects. Don't discount them because of their big budgets at the major league level, organization wise they do a good job. I mean come on Jim Hendry's work alone this year rates him way below Cashman and Epstein.

[zachcadillac]

You're seriously overrating Sabean and Colletti, two of the worst general managers in the game.

[GartenSpartan]

Originally Posted by zachcadillac

You're seriously overrating Sabean and Colletti, two of the worst general managers in the game.

I agree about Sabean, who knows what the heck he is doing in San Francisco. Coletti however has such a short body of work I don't know how you can already make claim that he's one of the worst. I'm not saying he's great, Juan Pierre was a horrible signing, but they have a decent team.

[Just Some Dude]

Funny thing is I have only heard of half of those guys :)

[Timberwolf]

Originally Posted by thewave84

What is your criteria for a good GM vs a bad GM? Is having a big budget a drawback?

For me, good GMs find a way to make it work with small budgets year in and year out which is why I rank those guys from small market teams. Dave Dombrowski is one of them too which is why I respect him. I got a problem with Theo Epstein not knowing what to do with the resources he work with. Omar Minaya at least gets it. He did not go overpay for Barry Zito never mind the Mets really need an ace this year.

[Cult of Guillen]

Detroit is not a small market team, both in regards to market size and player payroll.

[estrepe1]

Originally Posted by Timberwolf

For me, good GMs find a way to make it work with small budgets year in and year out which is why I rank those guys from small market teams. Dave Dombrowski is one of them too which is why I respect him. I got a problem with Theo Epstein not knowing what to do with the resources he work with. Omar Minaya at least gets it. He did not go overpay for Barry Zito never mind the Mets really need an ace this year.

The Tigers are more of a mid-market team than a small market. Also Dombrowski really hasn't won with a small payroll in the past. Even the Marlins had a large payroll the year he won the WS there and last year the Tigers were at 80 million+.

Also you shouldn't have more than one GM between Sabean and last place. He has a good record with the Giants. But the Tigers would have had a good record with Randy Smith teams if they had Barry Bonds in LF.

[T.O. Tiger Fan]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I think the best way to do it would be to find out which owner loves his GM the most.

This means that Millen is the #1 GM in the NFL since Ford loves him so much...

[Oblong]

This discussion got noticed.

[tiger337]

Originally Posted by Timberwolf

For me, good GMs find a way to make it work with small budgets year in and year out which is why I rank those guys from small market teams. Dave Dombrowski is one of them too which is why I respect him. I got a problem with Theo Epstein not knowing what to do with the resources he work with. Omar Minaya at least gets it. He did not go overpay for Barry Zito never mind the Mets really need an ace this year.

Epstein seems like he should be a lot higher than #24. He made some nice moves a couple of years ago which helped them win a World Series. I believe he has gotten a lot of interfertence from Lucchino though. I don't think Epstein made the moves last winter. This is one the reasons it's hard to rank GMs. Fans don't know enough about what happens behind the scenes.

[tigergalore]

There's interseting research here on the subject of GMs and their trades using stat analysis on beane, epstein and others. I've been following it, he's suppose to do more but I guess he got sidetracked.