Dusty Baker is facing the Cincinnati Reds for the first time since he took over the helm of the Washington Nationals.
For the Reds, the team’s front office and their fans, the return of Baker completes a nightmarish sequence of events that have turned the Reds from a perennial contender in the NL Central to one of the worst teams in all of baseball.
Baker was unceremoniously fired after the Reds lost their 2013 NL Wild Card game. He had won the third-most games by any manager in franchise history (509), trailing only Hall of Fame managers Sparky Anderson and Bill McKechnie. The rationale for firing Baker was that he couldn’t guide the team to success in the postseason.
The Reds’ front office and ownership led by general manager Walt Jocketty then decided to hand over the team to Reds’ pitching coach Bryan Price, who in three years has become one of the worst managers in franchise history in terms of winning percentage.
Price is currently battling it out with Buck Herzog for the second-worst winning percentage all-time among Reds’ managers who have managed at least as many games as Price. His .421 record all but guarantees that Price is gone by the end of the final year of his contract this year or sooner.
Price started on a track to pick up in 2014 where Baker left off in 2013. Price guided the Reds to a solid first half of the year. The Reds were seven games over .500 and second in the NL Central by 1-1/2 games.
But the epic failure for Price started in the second half of the 2014 season and has spiraled out of control into a play-by-play horror show ever since.
Now, it’s come full circle as Price prepares to face off against Baker and the Nationals for a three-game set in Cincinnati. Baker’s team is World Series relevant and Price’s Reds are just awful.
Robb Hoff writes about the Cincinnati Reds for OutsidePitch MLB. You can follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
The post Dusty Baker back to haunt the Cincinnati Reds appeared first on OutsidePitchMLB.