Off With Their Heads! - Durham Bulls Skipper John Tamargo Walks the Plank for Tampa Bay

MAJOR BLOGS - 09.10.06 - The baseball guillotine fell yesterday as Durham Bulls Manager John Tamargo, Pitching Coach Joe Coleman, Hitting Coach Richie Hebner and Trainer Tom Tisdale (See: "Did Bad Boy Bulls Derail Durham Coaching Staff?" MLN - The Raw Feed, Saturday, September 9, 2006) all lost their heads and their jobs when the Tampa Bay Devil Rays cleaned house in Durham.

It's been a tough year in what is normally rock-solid Durham. Absent former Bulls skipper and spoiled child wrangler Bill Evers, pet problem children like Delmon Young and B.J. Upton were the headliners in an all-star cast of Baseball Survivor where every man was out for themselves, and everything from assault and battery on the field to racially charged remarks in the clubhouse appeared to infect the club. 

One could argue that, if you're the skipper of a ship that was aimed at Tampa Bay and somehow ended up in Hell, that might be an appropriate end to your tenure.

Or, you could equally make the case that if you have a crew of pirates and brigands, if you were headed for Tampa Bay and ended up in Barbados, that's just where the winds and fortune carried you.

Tampa Bay stocked the ship with the crew.  No one there wants to take any personal accountability for the mess of spoiled superstars that has become the Durham clubhouse, so the easiest remedy is "off with their heads."

The sad part is that hitting coach Hebner has been a great minor league manager.  Sweeping the decks of the HMS Durham  is bull... The captain goes down with the ship, so Tamargo is an unfortunate fatality, but the organization has talent that can heal and fix problems now are gone.

Steve Irwin is not the only one fatally stung by a ray this month. Durham Bulls fans are going to have to watch what changes this move brings.  Unless they bring back Evers, which would have been a smart PR move rather than making the coaching staff walk the plank, or someone of Evers stature, then the problems remain with the D-Rays picks, and not with the management of them. Durham goes from being a championship organization run by exceptional coaches to being just another club putting their fortunes for 2007 together from scratch.

Of course, as in all political executions, the last laugh is on those with their hand on the rope.  The Bad Boy Bulls are moving on from Durham to Tampa Bay.  Does anyone really believe that playing in the vacuum that exists on the high pedestals of the major league will actually make Delmon Young's temper more controlled?  BJ Upton more consistent?

Devil Rays may take on a whole new meaning in Tampa.

Comments

[A Gonzalez]

Where is JT now that the Tampa Bay organization let him go?

[A Gonzalez]

I've kept tabs on John for a long time, since our little league days