The Dismissal of Jim Hendry

The Jim Hendry era has come to an end. It is bittersweet that after 9 years as General Manager and 17 years in the organization Jim Hendry was let go in the middle of the season. The timing made no sense. The Cubs should have let him go before the draft so Tim Wilken who has a good reputation as a scouting director around the league can be left alone to do his league. Tom Rickets has also gone on the record that he also like Wilken a lot and wants him to continue to stay with the organization through the next regime (which I agree with) so why not fire Hendry before the draft because the draft is the scouting director’s job after the first round pick or two. Even the first pick or two is with the General Manager, but if your going to fire the GM do you want his input and him affecting the organization and prospects for another year? I also don’t understand why the Cubs fired Hendry, but then asked him to keep it a secret until after the trade deadline. The time they realized they were going to let him go they should have cut him loose. As Hendry said, he didn’t want to make trades at the deadline such as unloading Ramirez, Pena, Byrd, Marmol, who all should have been tradable and possibly give you good trade chips in return, but he felt it should be the next GM making those decision’s. So by not making a quick decision it actually hurt the organization, because if the new GM wants to move these players, the Cubs probably would have received better value at the trade deadline than in the off season. When Andy McPhail took over as GM of the Cubs in the early 90’s from his predecessor Ed Lynch, he kept him on as a special advisor to the GM (McPhail) for several year and was even on the payroll for many of the Hendry years I believe.

It seems like the Ricketts were trying to send a message to all Cubs fans by firing Hendry when they did instead of waiting until after the season, but like some of the other decisions they have made, or lack their of since they over the team, has it helped the team more than it hurt?