Von Hayes Steps Down As Manager Of The Pericos de Puebla

May 3rd, 2015

Von Hayes, ex Philadelphia Phillie and, until today, Manager of the Pericos de Puebla in the Liga Mexicana de Beisbol has resigned his position as manager effective immediately.

Hayes was hired by the Puebla team on December 8th of 2014.

Hayes began his coaching career with the South Bend Silverhawks in 2003. He was named the Manager of the Year in the California League with the Modesto Nuts in 2004. Leading the Midland Rockhounds in 2005, Hayes was again chosen as the Manager of the Year, this time in the Texas League.


The Lancaster Barnstormers named Hayes as their Manager for 2008 where he stayed until taking the same position with the Camden Riversharks in 2010. Hayes remained in Camden until he signed on to manage the Alexandria Aces of the ULB in 2013.

The Pericos de Puebla had hired Hayes to manage their team in 2015 after the Pericos lost the Liga Mexicana Beisbol Championship to the Diablos Rojos del Mexico in 2014.

Von Hayes "resigned" following an 11-5 loss to the Leones de Yucatan on Sunday. The Pericos lost 2 of 3 and gave up 31 runs on 46 hits during the series.

Let's dig and see if there is a reason a manager would resign after 25 games of a 113 game season.Puebla management essentially thanked Hayes for his effort  in a statement on their web page and said that Hayes made the decision "...as a result of poor results".

Through 25 games the Pericos were  12-14, 3.5 games out of 1st place in the Sur Division of the Liga Mexicana de Beisbol. There are two aspects to the game of baseball. First, Pitching and second, Hitting. The statistics for these games show two entirely different Pericos teams.

Hitting

At the time of his resignation the Pericos were:
4th in the league in batting average  .307
T2nd in Home runs  32
4th in runs scored  156
3rd in RBIs  148
1st in hits  291

Pitching
The Pericos were:
11th in the league in ERA  5.17
14th in saves  2
15th in runs allowed  155  (a +1 against runs scored)
13th in Home runs allowed  24
11th in walks allowed  91

The differences are obvious. The team can hit, the pitchers can't pitch. Hayes was a hitter, and a good one. His players look like they are hitters. But even Tommy Lasorda would be unable to win with pitching stats like these. The league did not have fielding statistics available when this article was written so I don't know if fielding played into the record.

Good luck to you Mr. Hayes, in whatever you do next. Your team was exciting to watch at bat but torture on the mound. If you read this, contact me so that I might get some more information to better understand this "resignation".  

Phillies Trade Jimmy Rollins to Dodgers

ESPN and Yahoo Sports are reporting that the Philadelphia Phillies have traded shortstop Jimmy Rollins to the Los Angeles Dodgers. There is no mention of who the Phillies will get in return for Rollins.

Here is the Yahoo Sports article.

Phillies Trying to Dump Big Salaries?

Craig Calcaterra, writing for hardballtalk.com, has posted a tweet by Howard Eskin, Sports Director for WTFX in Philadelphia, in which Eskin calls Marlon Byrd, Jonathan papalbin and Cliff Lee bad locker room guys. Eskin opines that for this reason, the Phillies want to get rid of these, and other players. Calcaterra's contention is that the Phillies are really about setting low expectations for the fans when Philly gets low return on any deals.

I agree with Craig. the Phillies are old, overpaid and under performing. Ruben Amaro Jr. has not used a forward thinking mindset when signing players to long term deals or trading for older players. The result is that Philadelphia has given up young talent for a projected short term gain that has not materialized.

Read Calcaterra's short article here.