Thrifty Bowden Baffling Pundits in Washington

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun

Jim Bowden is exactly the sort of executive baseball needs far more of. Pushing no particular ideology, completely unconcerned with what anyone thinks of his moves, and utterly brazen, the new GM of the Washington Nationals is a genuine operator. Bowden has already baffled the baseball punditry this offseason with his seemingly random moves, but Washington fans shouldn’t be too worried about them. He knows exactly what he’s doing.


In 1992, the Cincinnati Reds made Bowden, fresh off several years of apprenticeship with the Pirates and Yankees, the youngest general manager in baseball history. Despite the pressure of working for Marge Schott and then Carl Lindner, two of the most miserly owners in the game, he spent the decade holding a team together around Barry Larkin, armed with little more than his own cleverness and a willingness to mercilessly fleece the rest of the league. Those traits will be more than useful as he labors under even stingier ownership: MLB.


Bowden’s signature move with the Reds was to sign a player off the scrap heap, milk a good year out of him, and trade him off elsewhere at the height of his value. Reliever Jeff Shaw, for instance, was signed to a minor-league deal in 1996, turned into a serviceable closer, and then dangled in front of the Dodgers in 1998. Convinced he needed a closer, temporary GM Tommy Lasorda inexplicably dealt Paul Konerko, at the time maybe the best hitting prospect in the game, for Shaw. Bowden kept Konerko around for a while, and then flipped him to the White Sox for Mike Cameron, who after contributing mightily to the Reds’ surprising 1999, was traded for Ken Griffey Jr. Other players who left Bowden’s Reds far more coveted than they had been when they arrived include Bret Boone, David Wells, and Ron Gant.


The operating principles here are right out of the pages of “The Hustler’s Handbook,” Bill Veeck’s great work on the principles of baseball management. Veeck was a master promoter and cheerful rogue who understood the trader’s art (and the art of winning on a budget) as well as anyone ever has. Renting players, signing injured veterans, flipping prospects like baseball cards – these are all hallmarks of the Veeck style, as laid out in chapters with titles like “Snake Oil For Sale.”


The great man would have heartily approved the spectacle Bowden created in 1998, when, upon announcing his implausible acquisition of 50-homer man Greg Vaughn from the pennant-winning Padres, he held up a cheaply lettered sign shilling the Reds’ season-ticket phone line. He would also have applauded Bowden’s simultaneous announcements in 2000 of a contract extension for Larkin and a boost in ticket prices. Shamelessness can be a virtue.


So it’s a bit of a mystery how the imaginative and canny Bowden ended up signing Cristian Guzman, a utility man masquerading as a shortstop, to a silly four-year, $17 million contract. It’s similarly easy to question the need to sign 37-year-old third baseman/Coors Field illusion Vinny Castilla to a two-year deal. One has to admire Bowden’s chutzpah, though. Announcing the deals, he told reporters that, “We couldn’t wait for other people to move,” as if clubs were clamoring to sign the thoroughly mediocre Guzman and the overrated Castilla.


It’s important to understand, though, that Bowden has not stepped into a normal situation. The smart move anywhere else would be to play scrubs at shortstop and third base and try to put the money into better players elsewhere. But the Nationals, ruined by the crippling constrictions put on former GM Omar Minaya, don’t have scrubs at hand. They don’t even really have set players at most positions. Here’s some classic, and unfortunately accurate, Bowden doublespeak, given to www.mlb.com this week:


“It’s a possibility that [Termel] Sledge ends up in left and [Brad] Wilkerson ends up at first. It may be Nick Johnson at first, Wilkerson in left and [Endy] Chavez in center. It may be Wilkerson in center, Sledge in left and Johnson at first. But I think going in, the way we are set up right now, Guillen will be in right, Chavez will be in center, Wilkerson will be in left, Johnson at first and Sledge will get enough at-bats.”


Given this level of uncertainty, players like Guzman and Castilla – who for whatever their flaws can be counted to take the field every day and play at a major-league level at a specific position – are quite a bit more valuable to Washington than to almost any other team. The 40-man roster has huge holes – there is exactly one catcher on it, for instance – and so you can expect to see Bowden overpay a bit for role players.


It’s much harder to explain Bowden’s biggest move thus far, the trade of outfielder Juan Rivera and shortstop Maicer Izturis for Jose Guillen, an enormously talented right fielder last seen flinging equipment at the universally respected Angels skipper, Mike Sciosia. (Claims Bowden: “I trust him with my children. He has gone through anger management classes.”) Since Rivera is a younger and more collected version of Guillen – at less than a tenth the salary – and Izturis is comparable to Guzman, the deal looked like evidence that Bowden has no clue what he’s doing.


Again, though, these are not normal circumstances. The Nationals have less credibility than many minor-league franchises. In theory, the players Bowden has shipped away could stand in for the ones he’s acquired; in reality, Rivera is a platoon player of sketchy potential, and Izturis hit .206 in the National League last year at 24.


What Bowden has done is stabilize the starting lineup at an acceptable cost. With Johnson, Wilkerson, Guillen, and Jose Vidro, the Nationals sport a perfectly respectable middle of the order, and this should actually be one of the better defensive teams in the league.


This work done, it’s time for Bowden to start in on the margins. Anyone who doubts what he can do should remember how Jeff Shaw ended up turning into Ken Griffey Jr. Fans in Washington have a lot to worry about, from their bland name to the shady machinations behind their new stadium, but the man steering the ship isn’t one of them.


The New York Sun

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