Only in the Cubbiest of dreams is Girardi interested in returning to Chgo

Joe Girardi is an area guy who reached the baseball glory of the New York Yankees

Seeing the New York Yankees dismiss their field manager of the past 10 seasons makes me wonder how many Chicago Cubs fans wish circumstances were different so that they could pounce on him.

Another 'local boy' who got Yankees glory

There are those Cubs fans who honestly believe that Joe Girardi has long desired the fantasy job of being their team’s manager – that he’d eagerly give up any other job in baseball for the chance to put on the jersey bearing a baby blue bear.

WHAT MAKES IT ridiculous to think that way are two factors; one being that Girardi’s time in professional baseball has come to be associated with the Yankees (as their catcher on championship teams of the 1990s, as a mid-2000s team broadcaster and as their manager since 2008 – with 2009 being a World Series-winning year).

Stops in Peoria, Ill., hometown ...

His ties to Yankees pinstripes make it unlikely that the career baseball guy really had any desire to return to the ballclub that originally signed him, and for which he first played in the early 1990s.

Besides, the Cubs made their move to get a big-name manager some three seasons ago when they managed to acquire Joe Maddon from his long-time post with the Tampa Bay Rays (where he had won an American League pennant).

... and Pittsfield, Mass., ...

All three of those seasons with the Cubs have been the ones that the team’s fans boast have been playoff-bound; and include the 2016 version of the team that won a World Series championship.

MADDON, DESPITE THE fact some people observing baseball think he’s too much of a self-centered egomaniac, has achieved the ultimate goal. He won.

Which is a particularly big deal since it was the Cubs, the team that hadn’t won the ultimate prize for 108 seasons prior to last year.

... before making it to 'big club' in '89

Has that World Series win managed to make Cubbie fans relax enough to enjoy their success? The sad part is that there are those who are now wishing that they could somehow come up with circumstances that could allow them to dump Maddon and replace him with Girardi.

I’ve even read one scenario in which people think Maddon ought to be on probation of sorts, and if he slips up even the slightest during 2018, he could be replaced.

BECAUSE IN THEIR minds, Girardi is so anxious to be a Chicago Cub again that he’ll gladly sit out 2018 and wait for 2019 to come about – where he could be rehired as their manager.

Cubs not likely to dump Maddon

I even heard one person try to put out speculation that the Chicago White Sox could dump their manager, Rick Renteria, so they could replace him with Girardi. Just about every White Sox fan I’ve heard from thinks that’s a stupid idea.

Although it would have its ironies in that Renteria used to be the Chicago Cubs manager who was supposed to oversee the rebuild into a championship team, then got dumped when Maddon became available.

Would the White Sox give Renteria-type treatment to Rick Renteria? Would he get dumped on a second time?

It would be absurd to 'Renteria' Rick for Girardi

PERSONALLY, I’M GLAD such actions are not likely, because I think it would be the perfect vengeance for Renteria if he’s the White Sox manager who oversees a championship ballclub in coming years as part of that team’s rebuild effort.

Girardi not only mgr. fired despite success

Let the Cubbie fans engage in ridiculous managerial mechanizations with their choice of a favorite ball club.

I do realize that Girardi is the Peoria native and Northwestern University graduate (he played Big 10 baseball) who came up through the Cubs minor league system. But he’s also the guy who has moved far beyond his Cubbie origins, and for the better. He may be headed to a job with the Washington Nationals – depending on how cheaply he’s willing to work in baseball.

I don’t know firsthand what Girardi plans to do, or what the Yankees’ motivations were in cutting him loose just days after they came within one game of an American League championship themselves – although Girardi’s dismissal would be in character with Yankees history. This being the ballclub that fired Casey Stengel as manager when his 1960 ballclub lost the World Series to Pittsburgh.

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