Lou is angry at Steve Phillips for stating the obvious

[westofyou]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/chi-03-cubs-bits-chicagomar03,0,1666194.story


MESA, Ariz. — ESPN baseball analyst Steve Phillips might want to steer clear of Lou Piniella when the Cubs play Milwaukee on an April 12 ESPN telecast.

Piniella was fuming over a remark Phillips made recently on Chet Coppock's WMVP-AM 1000 radio show. Asked about Kosuke Fukudome's rookie season, Phillips criticized Piniella's handling of the Japanese outfielder.

"My view is Lou doesn't have a great deal of patience for assimilation into culture, assimilation into the team," Phillips said. "He is just not the most patient guy around, and he tends to verbalize his frustrations in an angry way. I think that may have affected Fukudome a little bit."

Piniella played Fukudome in 150 games and gave him 501 at-bats, sticking with the right fielder despite his struggles before sitting him for a brief stretch in September. Fukudome then started the first two playoff games before Piniella sat him in Game 3.

"I don't have much respect for Steve Phillips," Piniella said after hearing the comment Monday. "Let him be around a little more and see what transpires before he makes assumptions. I've lost total respect for this guy. If he had something to say, let him say it to me."

[Chip R]

Lou, impatient? Not Lou.

[Roy Tucker]

"My view is Lou doesn't have a great deal of patience..."



Also, the sun rises in the east.

[RollyInRaleigh]

501 at bats is not really impatient. I'd have to side with Lou on this one.

[Blitz Dorsey]

My view is that my 2-year-old daughter knows more about baseball than Steve Phillips. Good for Lou. If anything, he stuck with the extremely overpaid Fukudome too long (as proven by the amount of at-bats). And when Lou was yelling at Fukudome, Fukudome probably couldn't understand him anyway. Fukudome can speak Japanese and a little bit of English, but he doesn't understand a word of French. ;-)

[nate]

My view is that my 2-year-old daughter knows more about baseball than Steve Phillips. Good for Lou. If anything, he stuck with the extremely overpaid Fukudome too long (as proven by the amount of at-bats). And when Lou was yelling at Fukudome, Fukudome probably couldn't understand him anyway. Fukudome can speak Japanese and a little bit of English, but he doesn't understand a word of French. ;-)

Heh, good one.

[LincolnparkRed]

Not sure how the GM the helmed some of the truly awful and miscast teams of the last decade can complain about how anyone is used. If anything they gave Fukudome too much time. He was already fading around the all-star game from what I recall

[Marc D]

ESPN on air talent says something that stirs up a controversy. Go figure.

Anyone think maybe, just maybe, they do that on purpose at that place? I know its crazy but I hear their parent company knows a thing or two about marketing so I'm always a little suspicious.

[red-in-la]

Are you saying the media would actually make something up in order to cause controversy? Say it ain't so mama.......say it ain't so......

[MartyFan]

This just in...water is wet

[princeton]

a guy goes way out of his way to show patience and understanding, then gets accused of showing no patience and understanding?

managing a ball team is a lot like fatherhood.

[M2]

There's a difference between playing/benching a player and handling a player. Piniella could have played Fukudome less and handled him better. Phillips' point seems to be that Fukudome was suffering culture shock and that Piniella's incendiary style contributed to it.

I don't know if that's right or not. I'm sure Piniella tried to settle the player even if he did it poorly. Fukudome's larger problem might be that he's not very good, but I'm sure it's a lot harder for a Japanese player to settle into Chicago than Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego. It's a more alien atmosphere. Add in a manager who's a bit alien himself (and that can be a good thing) and you've got what might be a bad fit of player and team.

[membengal]

Lou Pinella said:


If he had something to say, let him say it to me.

Setting aside whether what Phillips said was accurate or not, Pinella doesn't seem to grasp how a talking head media position like Phillips has works. Phillips is paid to provide his opinion. It's not really a "say it to me" kind of gig. He says it to everyone.

[hebroncougar]

I'd like to see Pinella treat Phillips withing camera shot, of how he treated Rob Dibble. :)

[Blitz Dorsey]

Fukudome was a very interesting case in 2008 (his "rookie" year). He started off like gangbusters and if you would have asked me in May of '08, I would have said the Cubs found themselves a stud. He could hit, had a great approach at the plate and was a good defensive outfielder.

Then he completely fell off the map. He went into an extreme slump and Lou tried to stay with him. Now, maybe Lou was losing his mind behind closed doors, but Fukudome continued to start until the very end of the season. Now the Cubs have a very expensive .257 hitter on their hands. And he's going to be 32 in April. That's why they went out and overpaid for Milton Bradley this offseason. Bradley and Fukudome will start together some games, but if Fukudome lived up to expectations last year, they never would have gone out and signed Bradley.

[Chip R]

There's a difference between playing/benching a player and handling a player. Piniella could have played Fukudome less and handled him better. Phillips' point seems to be that Fukudome was suffering culture shock and that Piniella's incendiary style contributed to it.

I don't know if that's right or not. I'm sure Piniella tried to settle the player even if he did it poorly. Fukudome's larger problem might be that he's not very good, but I'm sure it's a lot harder for a Japanese player to settle into Chicago than Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego. It's a more alien atmosphere. Add in a manager who's a bit alien himself (and that can be a good thing) and you've got what might be a bad fit of player and team.


He played pretty well the first half of the year then fell off a cliff in the last part and the playoffs. I don't know if it was just because the league caught up to him or what.

[Marc D]

a guy goes way out of his way to show patience and understanding, then gets accused of showing no patience and understanding?

managing a ball team is a lot like fatherhood.

Good analogy.

Now I'm expecting to see Phillips go Goth and read a poem on air about how much he hates Lou, hates his life and wishes he was never born.

[westofyou]

Good analogy.

Now I'm expecting to see Phillips go Goth and read a poem on air about how much he hates Lou, hates his life and wishes he was never born.

They're way more Goth in Bristol than the Northside.

http://musicsnobbery.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8345160c569e2010534b2202a970b-320wi

[Crosley68]

Lou gets mad and rants at someone for saying he gets mad and rants?

[M2]

He played pretty well the first half of the year then fell off a cliff in the last part and the playoffs. I don't know if it was just because the league caught up to him or what.

I suspect it was a combination of things, but he sure looked a lot more So Taguchi than Ichiro Suzuki to me, even when he was ostensibly playing well.

[GAC]

I'd like to see Pinella treat Phillips withing camera shot, of how he treated Rob Dibble. :)

Or how he treated 1st base

http://images.bleedcubbieblue.com/images/admin/basetoss.jpg

[cincinnati chili]

There's a difference between playing/benching a player and handling a player. Piniella could have played Fukudome less and handled him better. Phillips' point seems to be that Fukudome was suffering culture shock and that Piniella's incendiary style contributed to it.

I don't know if that's right or not. I'm sure Piniella tried to settle the player even if he did it poorly. Fukudome's larger problem might be that he's not very good, but I'm sure it's a lot harder for a Japanese player to settle into Chicago than Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego. It's a more alien atmosphere. Add in a manager who's a bit alien himself (and that can be a good thing) and you've got what might be a bad fit of player and team.

Good points, and as you state, we can't really know if Lou's handling was positive or not.

Most people don't know about the looney toon that managed Fukodome in Japan - Senichi Hoshino. To my knowledge, Lou doesn't physically assault his players when they underperform. Hoshino has been known to do that. So perhaps getting yelled at in a foreign language wasn't that big a dead to Fukudome.

[WebScorpion]

Maybe it would have helped if Lou didn't call him by the first four letters of his last name all the time. http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/smiley-scared007.gif (http://www.freesmileys.org)