It would be a colossal understatement to say the Marlins’ oft-ridiculed decision to move GM Dan Jennings from the front office to the dugout last spring turned out poorly. On Wednesday, charmless team president David Samson announced they’d be moving in fences in next season (“the thought of a left fielder jumping in the Clevelander is sort of awesome to me”) along with admitting that perhaps a person with no coaching experience above the high school level was the wrong man to manage an MLB club. From the Sun-Sentinel’s Craig Davis :
“Do I regret doing what we did? I think it’s hard to say that I don’t because it did not have the desired result on the field, it did not accomplish what we expected it to accomplish,” Samson said. “So, do I regret coming to that conclusion? Yes, I do. I regret everything that doesn’t work.
As to why Jennings didn’t succeed in turning the season around, Samson said: “I think there were a lot of factors. I think the fact he was coming from the front office, the fact it had never been done, the fact that he came in the middle of the season, the fact he was responsible for both putting players on the field and then what he did with them on the field — it’s why you don’t see a general manager/manager combination because that’s very difficult.
“All this stuff that is being talked about isn’t the case,” Samson said. “There is no power struggle, there is no division, there is nobody angling to take the general manager title away from Dan.
“Everything is the same. Dan has no authority to make decisions, and I would say that Mike Hill doesn’t and I don’t. Jeffrey [Loria] as the owner has all the power, but Jeffrey hears from his group and decisions are made. That’s how it’s always been.”