Mike DeBartolo is campaigning hard for the Washington Nationals GM job

Since getting the interim GM job, Mike DeBartolo has treated this like a job interview. He has publicly made his case about how he is a different man from his predecessor Mike Rizzo. DeBartolo has made his analytical approach known at every turn, but should Nationals fans buy it?

Well, it is clear that DeBartolo is a very different man from his long time boss, but he should still be met with a healthy level of skepticism. DeBartolo has only worked in the Nationals organization during his career. 

That does not inspire confidence. Even if he is a smart guy, he does not have experience working in an organization that has successfully implemented the data he talks about so much. He talks so much about implementing data, but does he know what it takes to use the data to build a winner?

However, this is not a simple discussion. There are positives that Mike DeBartolo brings to the table, as well as plenty of unknowns. We will walk through that and see whether the Nats interim GM has what it takes.

The Positives of Mike DeBartolo

There are a number of pros and cons to Mike DeBartolo. I am going to walk through both and discuss what the team should do with the interim GM. First, I want to talk about the positives.

The biggest one is that he seems to be aware of where the modern game is heading. As DeBartolo is so eager to point out, he comes from an analytics background. Unlike Mike Rizzo, who is a son of a long time scout, DeBartolo is more of an outsider. He went to Tufts and worked in the cut throat business world for years. 

At Tufts, he was  friends with Marlins GM Peter Bendix, who is one of the more forward thinking executives in the game. Bendix had quite nice things to say about his old buddy in a Washington Post profile by Spencer Nusbaum. The thing that stuck out to me was when he said that DeBartolo viewed the game in a similar way to him. That is something I like to hear because baseball has been moving away from the Mike Rizzo types and towards executives like Bendix.

That is the biggest selling point for DeBartolo. In an organization that desperately needs to use analytics more, DeBartolo would be more than willing to do that. When Nusbaum talked to me, he mentioned that a lot of the analytical tools are there, but they need to be integrated into the process more. DeBartolo would be happy to do that. Whenever he gets a chance to talk, he will tell you about how he will implement data into his decision making process.

However, DeBartolo is far from a perfect candidate and fans should be aware of that. There is a push from the organization to make DeBartolo look good. There is nothing wrong with doing that, but fans should remember to hold a healthy degree of skepticism. 

Why Fans Should be Skeptical of DeBartolo:

As we have discussed, Mike DeBartolo is clearly a smart guy with a data first approach. However, as we mentioned at the top, fans need to be aware that he is far from a perfect candidate. While this is an overly simplistic assessment, DeBartolo has been the analytics guy for one of the least analytically inclined teams in baseball. 

While he is a smart guy, DeBartolo has only ever worked in the Nationals organization. The Nats have not exactly been at the cutting edge of the game in recent years. DeBartolo does not have that first hand exposure of what it is like to be part of an elite organization. At least, he has not in a while. The Nationals used to be a highly competent organization, but they have not been that in a long time.

DeBartolo seemed like an impressive figure in his profile, but there was one part of it that scared me. Nusbaum mentioned that DeBartolo had done research that has helped guide the Nationals draft strategy. Well, over the past decade or so, the Nationals have been one of, if not the worst drafting team in baseball.

Obviously, that does not fall  squarely on DeBartolo’s shoulders. In fact, he is pretty far down the list when it comes to the blame game. However, hearing that he has been involved in the process does not fill me with confidence. 

The biggest drawback DeBartolo has for me is simply his affiliation with this organization. If this season has taught us one thing, it is that everything needs to change in this organization. The building became too complacent after the World Series and ended up falling behind the rest of the league. Even if DeBartolo was pushing for more analytics, he was inside that building and part of the stagnation. We need a new voice that can transform the organization, specifically when it comes to player development.

We are seeing with Kyle Finnegan’s transformation that the Nationals are still so far behind the curve. The Tigers immediately cut Finnegan’s fastball usage and he instantly became a new pitcher. It is not just that he has not given up a run. His strikeout rate has also exploded. 

Nationals pitchers have been over reliant on fastballs all season long, and that has not changed under DeBartolo’s leadership. If he helped clean up things like that, I would be more optimistic, but he has not. That is not to say he has not shown new things to the organization. His management of the 40-man roster and bullpen has been quite impressive. However, there is still so much the Nats need to improve.

The sight of DeBartolo campaigning for the job in the MASN booth while the Nats are in the midst of yet another losing streak was an interesting look. Everything about the play on the field suggests that the Nats need to clean house, yet the interim GM who has been in the organization for over a decade seems to be the favorite.

Another point is that hiring from within would further erode fan trust in ownership. Not getting an outside candidate would look like a cheap and lazy decision from the Lerner family. The Lerner family is getting more criticism now than at any point in their tenure as Nats owners.

The criticism is justified as well. Since the World Series win in 2019, the ownership group has become increasingly distant. Payroll has been slashed and a losing culture has been allowed to settle into D.C. Everything Ted Lerner and Mike Rizzo built in the 2010’s has rotted. Only the Rockies have more losses than the Nats since 2020.

Mike DeBartolo has been there this whole time. That is the biggest thing I cannot look past. He has been involved during this period of regression, while coaches like Darnell Coles have been given years to mess up. How much can he really change?

The Verdict:

In my opinion, the Nationals need to hire a GM from outside the organization. This organization became too insular under Mike Rizzo and was resistant to new ideas. While Mike DeBartolo is at least willing to bring new ideas, it is not enough. 

This franchise needs a new voice from an organization that is on the cutting edge. The Nationals should be looking at executives from teams like the Dodgers, Brewers or Tigers instead of settling for a guy who has been with the Nats for over a decade.

Getting rid of Davey Martinez and Mike Rizzo should mean full scale change and full scale change does not come from Rizzo’s long-time number two. The organization is in desperate need of a reset. I actually think Mike DeBartolo could be a part of that, but he cannot be leading the way.

If the new GM wants to keep DeBartolo, that would be fine by me. DeBartolo is a smart guy, who knows his way around the organization. He can be an asset for the next GM. However, it would not feel right to give DeBartolo the full time job.

There is a chance that he would do a decent job. J.J. Picollo of the Royals was actually in a similar spot. He replaced a World Series winning executive that struggled to adapt to the analytics revolution in Dayton Moore. Picollo has actually done a decent job in his tenure as Royals GM, even if he has not been elite.

However, in my opinion, the Nationals need a clean break from the Mike Rizzo era. Things got very ugly at the end and fan apathy has started to set in. This ownership group is on the hot seat with the fans and hiring the fired GM’s number two would not exactly be a statement of intent.

 The Lerner family needs to show they are serious about turning this around. They can do this by hiring an executive who has experience working with an elite operation. The only way that can happen is if they hire a candidate from outside the organization.