Seems there won't be tampering either.



Statement from #Cubs Theo Epstein on the firing of Rick Renteria:

Today we made the difficult decision to replace Rick Renteria as manager of the Chicago Cubs. On behalf of Tom Ricketts and Jed Hoyer, I thank Rick for his dedication and commitment, and for making the Cubs a better organization.

Rick’s sterling reputation should only be enhanced by his season as Cubs manager. We challenged Rick to create an environment in which our young players could develop and thrive at the big league level, and he succeeded. Working with the youngest team in the league and an imperfect roster, Rick had the club playing hard and improving throughout the season. His passion, character, optimism and work ethic showed up every single day.

Rick deserved to come back for another season as Cubs manager, and we said as much when we announced that he would be returning in 2015. We met with Rick two weeks ago for a long end-of-season evaluation and discussed plans for next season. We praised Rick to the media and to our season ticket holders. These actions were made in good faith.

Last Thursday, we learned that Joe Maddon – who may be as well suited as anyone in the industry to manage the challenges that lie ahead of us – had become a free agent. We confirmed the news with Major League Baseball, and it became public knowledge the next day. We saw it as a unique opportunity and faced a clear dilemma: be loyal to Rick or be loyal to the organization. In this business of trying to win a world championship for the first time in 107 years, the organization has priority over any one individual. We decided to pursue Joe.

While there was no clear playbook for how to handle this type of situation, we knew we had to be transparent with Rick before engaging with Joe. Jed flew to San Diego last Friday and told Rick in person of our intention to talk to Joe about the managerial job. Subsequently, Jed and I provided updates to Rick via telephone and today informed him that we will indeed make a change.

We offered Rick a choice of other positions with the Cubs, but he is of course free to leave the organization and pursue opportunities elsewhere. Armed with the experience of a successful season and all the qualities that made him our choice a year ago, Rick will no doubt make an excellent major league manager when given his next chance.

Rick often said he was the beneficiary of the hard work of others who came before him. Now, in the young players he helped, we reap the benefits of his hard work as we move forward. He deserved better and we wish him nothing but the best.

We have clung to two important ideals during our three years in Chicago. The first is to always be loyal to our mission of building the Cubs into a championship organization that can sustain success. The second is to be transparent with our fans. As painful as the last week was at times, we believe we stayed true to these two ideals in handling a sensitive situation. To our fans: we hope you understand, and we appreciate your continued support of the Cubs.

Ricky, obviously, also declined another position with the Cubs.

Bob Nightengale @BNightengale · 2m 2 minutes ago
The #Cubs offered Renteria another job in the organization, and he declined. Theo Epstein said they decided Maddon was too good to pass up.

Well, I remain excited. I was before and am more so afterwards.

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Hawaii (fuck) You

To steal a quote from Animal House:

"Oh boy is this great!"

That about sums up the entire organzation

Of course this means it is a done deal but it would be weird to do this before the ink is on Joe's contract.

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Elections have consequences.

Not for Chicago sports teams....

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Hawaii (fuck) You

Too....wordy. You fired the guy for someone better. End it at that. That long of a statement feels like they are trying to justify a wrong that isn't there and appease the Pasta's of the world.

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Team Cutler.

They specifically mention him in the release. It's done, they are just doing it step by step.

Apparently he did not see "Moneyball".

Would have been interesting had the Cubs overachieved last year ( just like a Maddon Rays team!) and maybe snuck into the 2nd wildcard spot if they still make this move.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

If Ricky took them from 90+ losses to the post season with that bag of shit, he would have won Manager of the Year. No way he would get fired.

I dunno I think he still gets whacked for the consensus "best manager in the game"

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

The question Good Dolphin would be asking is "would Maddon have opted out had Ricky taken the Cubs to the post season last year?"

I remember when Bernsie went faux Sandusky because they didn't give Brenly a courtesy interview even though they had no interest in him. This is cool though.

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Soccer 1,2,3
Spanish Honor Society 1,2,3,4
Forensics 1,2,3,4

"Smiles with Nostrils"

"...no Hmong, go find some blacks"

This just stinks!

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I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

No need for apologies Theo.

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how do you get that out of the too long; didn't read statement

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

JORR and good dolphin, please take your victory lap.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

Transparent with our fans:

(one year ago) put all the pressure you possibly can on your elected officials because we cannot spend money without a new scoreboard.

(now) we cannot spend money until a tv deal gets made in 2019

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

It wasn't going to be pretty but we were prepared for a war of attrition.

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.

Late on a holiday friday....

My rebuttal to Theo:


You are the biggest asshole in baseball,congrats!


Eventually,I'll be happy with Maddon but it was a shitty thing to do. Men don't treat other men like that. Renteria was humbled and humiliated in front of the baseball world. For what? Like I said earlier,who's to say that right now Renteria isn't better than Maddon going forward?

Still,other teams with managers on shaky ground (ie: White Sox) chose to look the other way because they had a man they made promises to. The saddest part of Theo's statement is saying they kept in touch with Rickey during the Maddon negotiations. That really sounds like Renteria needs to take a look in the mirror and man up.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

When a thief whacks you on the head and takes your wallet, that's just business too.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Matthew, Tulsi, and Don

Except this was a whack on the head and he gave him millions of dollars.

What was Ricky's contract?

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2018
#ExtendLafleur
10 More Wins

3 managers in 3 years. I guess if you throw enough shit at the wall some is bound to stick.

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

Don't ever change. Just a treat this is. You're an asshole! You did something I'll love, but you're an asshole!

Say, the day the Maddon news came out the fired Ricky immediately. Would that have been better? How could they have handled this to not upset you? Also, sure it's possible that Renteria may someday be a better manager, but why not go with the known commodity

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Team Cutler.

Epstein’s timeline of how things unfolded would seem to contradict the Sun-Times headline from four days ago that “Rick Renteria hasn’t heard anything from Cubs while Joe Maddon rumors swirl”. I remember some of what the Sun-Times reported last year about the Joe Girardi-Cubs story turned out to be inaccurate as well.

Isn't that patently obvious?

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O judgment! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason.