This story by Ken Rosenthal is more to do with the unconfirmed rumors of John Russell’s dismissal, but within the story Rosenthal leaks out some information that hasn’t been leaked anywhere else, stating that both GM Neal Huntington and manager John Russell have been extended through 2011.
According to Rob Biertempfel, the team is set to make an official statement shortly addressing the rumors. Updates and my reaction to the news after that.
UPDATE: Jenifer Langosch tweets that the pair have indeed been extended to 2011, and Dejan Kovacevic goes so far as to say that the deal was already done this past offseason.
I’m happy with the Huntington extension. A reasonable argument could be made either way, as it’s now clear that he pretty much whiffed on the Jason Bay trade, who was arguably the only player the team could have expected to get a real return on. There’s a chance that Bryan Morris could still make the trade look good, but one out of four is generally not a good return. However, it also looks like he hit the Xavier Nady trade out of the park.
As a whole, I feel like Huntington has done yeoman’s work rebuilding this team from the minor leagues up, and honestly I feel like if Bob Nutting gave Dave Littlefield seven years to completely wreck the team, he should give Huntington a fair amount of time to rebuild it as well.
As for Russell, I’m generally indifferent on who manages the team. The players seem like they like Russell. I’m not a fan, as I feel he makes some truly boneheaded decisions, but I also don’t have the fiery hatred for him that a lot of other fans have and I feel like the team’s record is far from being his fault. A magical combination of Joe Torre, Connie Mack, Tony LaRussa, Bobby Cox, Lou Piniella, Joe Maddon and Casey Stengel rolled into one manager couldn’t get a winning record out of this team as it’s currently assembled. At some point I think Russell has to go, but he’s nothing more than a fall guy right now. If the young guys like him, I say let him stick around until the team starts to look good.
