Jim Riggleman quits

[JEA2880]

I respect the hell out of Jim for leaving like he did. He had let it be known to Rizzo that he wanted to try and at least get his option exercised to help establish credibility in the clubhouse and Rizzo kept shrugging it off. A GM can dismiss a manager at any time, why can't he step down if he's unhappy? As others have said, he's been working with a joke of a contract for a while now, more power to him for standing tall. Bad ass move.

 

[90FTaway]

Law # 101 of the land is: you don't quit your job until you have ahold of another branch to swing from or you fall and hit the bottom of the jungle. The Nats knew he didn't have another job lined up, so I think they wanted to see how hard he will fall. That organization is a mess...

 

[mchenrycards]

I respect the hell out of Jim for leaving like he did. He had let it be known to Rizzo that he wanted to try and at least get his option exercised to help establish credibility in the clubhouse and Rizzo kept shrugging it off. A GM can dismiss a manager at any time, why can't he step down if he's unhappy? As others have said, he's been working with a joke of a contract for a while now, more power to him for standing tall. Bad ass move.

The GM can dismiss the manager at any time but the contract is still honored and the manager receives the agreed upon pay. He may have been working with a joke of a contract but nobody twisted his arm to agree to it. He could have walked before he signed the agreement.

I am sorry...a contract is a contract and should be honored. Nobody forced Riggs to sign it and he should have at least finished the year and his contract. Its a bush league move and will effectivly leave him out of the majors for the rest of his life, at least in terms of being a manager. he will never get another chance to manage a major league baseball team.
He quit on his team just when they were starting to buy into his direction. He is wa quitter in my opinion and effectivly said to his players that if they dont like their agreement that they too can quit on the team.

 

[notjomommasclint]

what they had there was a failure to communicate.

manager went for the power play... general manager figured he wont leave a team playing this hot and if he does i will find a trained monkey to manage until i get my guns loaded and a big name in here...

as far as who wins it really depends on how the team plays. if they play like crap rizzo loses if they play well riggleman loses. i hope they play poorly because i believe that the gms job is to communicate and make all of his employees feel wanted and desired. an atmosphere i do not believe he fostered.

 

[ChasHawk]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

 

[mchenrycards]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

How much do you really need to know? Basically Riggs didnt get what he wanted so he quit on the team instead of honoring his contract. Nothing more, nothing less. The team was under no obligation to negotiate but he was under and obligation to complete his contract.

 

[SeattleSports]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

 

[mchenrycards]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

Couldnt agree more!!!

 

[aarne13]

Riggleman was making a pittance compared to some of the other managers. Rizzo's contract was extended in the offseason and it was obvious that Riggleman wanted to know what his future on the team was. Apparently he approached Rizzo on numerous occasions to talk about his contract but wasn't even given the time of day. He was a lame duck manager with no freedom to do what he was paid to do. I can't say that I agree with what he did but I can understand his reasons.

 

[bricewaynebisel]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

How much do you really need to know? Basically Riggs didnt get what he wanted so he quit on the team instead of honoring his contract. Nothing more, nothing less. The team was under no obligation to negotiate but he was under and obligation to complete his contract.

The beauty of "at-will" employment allows for people to leave employment contracts such as this at any time, for any reason.

While I do think this isn't the best route to take, the whole quitting on your team part, I do think you have to respect the guy a bit for the move. First, it is pretty clear that Washington didn't hold any hope for keeping him around in the future. Their failure to lock him up shows at least that much. His decision shows several things: 1) a little greed on his part 2) a sort of allowance for the team to find a manager who will actually be kept around throughout this process while keeping the team from being subjected to that change later on in the process (sort of a shaky argument as he quit once they finally experienced some success).

Whether people like it or not, he exercised a perfectly valid and legal option of his terms of employment. I guarantee you that his contract has the "at-will" language in it, as any employer who fails to include such language opens themselves up a bit to wrongful termination issues.

Plus, I don't think it's about the money as much as we may make it seem, I mean the guy has been making decent money for a long period of time, so financially, I'll assume he's very secure. I think it's more about his annoyance at the fact that management failed to commit to him for any definite period of time after he's done so much for the organization, especially this year.

 

[notjomommasclint]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

i would love for you to come work for me for 1/6th of the money the top earners in this field are making and when you ask me if i am going to keep you or adjust your pay to scale and i say i dont wanna talk about it. you wouldnt stay for that would you? cause i sure as hell wouldnt. i would bounce... or bizza lizz ah lizz ounce. to me it seems as though riggleman felt disrespected and i hope and pray he lands a job with the mets, ascends to the top spot, and runs it right down rizzos throat.

 

[bricewaynebisel]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

i would love for you to come work for me for 1/6th of the money the top earners in this field are making and when you ask me if i am going to keep you or adjust your pay to scale and i say i dont wanna talk about it. you wouldnt stay for that would you? cause i sure as hell wouldnt. i would bounce... or bizza lizz ah lizz ounce. to me it seems as though riggleman felt disrespected and i hope and pray he lands a job with the mets, ascends to the top spot, and runs it right down rizzos throat.

Thanked purely for the Snoop-esque language in there.

 

[SeattleSports]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

i would love for you to come work for me for 1/6th of the money the top earners in this field are making and when you ask me if i am going to keep you or adjust your pay to scale and i say i dont wanna talk about it. you wouldnt stay for that would you? cause i sure as hell wouldnt. i would bounce... or bizza lizz ah lizz ounce. to me it seems as though riggleman felt disrespected and i hope and pray he lands a job with the mets, ascends to the top spot, and runs it right down rizzos throat.

Do not compare this to a normal job. He was MANAGING a baseball team that is finally turning it around. They sweep the Mariners and win 10 of 11 and he quits on his team. If I was in such a terrible situation and not getting the light of day about a contract situation, I would be frustrated, but I would do my job till the end of the season and say thanks but no thanks. If the team starts to struggle, this isn't a blame game on Rizzo for him not extending Riggleman, I blame Riggleman for quitting on his team and hurting the clubhouse.

 

[notjomommasclint]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

i would love for you to come work for me for 1/6th of the money the top earners in this field are making and when you ask me if i am going to keep you or adjust your pay to scale and i say i dont wanna talk about it. you wouldnt stay for that would you? cause i sure as hell wouldnt. i would bounce... or bizza lizz ah lizz ounce. to me it seems as though riggleman felt disrespected and i hope and pray he lands a job with the mets, ascends to the top spot, and runs it right down rizzos throat.

Do not compare this to a normal job. He was MANAGING a baseball team that is finally turning it around. They sweep the Mariners and win 10 of 11 and he quits on his team. If I was in such a terrible situation and not getting the light of day about a contract situation, I would be frustrated, but I would do my job till the end of the season and say thanks but no thanks. If the team starts to struggle, this isn't a blame game on Rizzo for him not extending Riggleman, I blame Riggleman for quitting on his team and hurting the clubhouse.

my job is no regular job. my job is a competitive numbers based position where you are compensated for your production. if you came in and produced better than those around you but made 1/6th you would be unhappy to say the least. as far as the team turning it around who had more to do with that than riggleman? surely not rizzo... so why not at least entertain the opportunity to make the man who turned your boat around happy? that sounds pretty unstraight.

 

[bricewaynebisel]

lots of gun-jumping in this thread with little to no knowledge of what really happened

It's cut and dry. Riggleman quit on his team because he couldn't get an extension, I heard the interview with him AND his agent. He didn't get the chance to discuss a contract extension so he threw a fit and quit on his team. Blacklist him.

i would love for you to come work for me for 1/6th of the money the top earners in this field are making and when you ask me if i am going to keep you or adjust your pay to scale and i say i dont wanna talk about it. you wouldnt stay for that would you? cause i sure as hell wouldnt. i would bounce... or bizza lizz ah lizz ounce. to me it seems as though riggleman felt disrespected and i hope and pray he lands a job with the mets, ascends to the top spot, and runs it right down rizzos throat.

Do not compare this to a normal job. He was MANAGING a baseball team that is finally turning it around. They sweep the Mariners and win 10 of 11 and he quits on his team. If I was in such a terrible situation and not getting the light of day about a contract situation, I would be frustrated, but I would do my job till the end of the season and say thanks but no thanks. If the team starts to struggle, this isn't a blame game on Rizzo for him not extending Riggleman, I blame Riggleman for quitting on his team and hurting the clubhouse.

For the sake of playing a little devil's advocate, shouldn't the players be expected to perform without being influenced by outside factors such as Riggleman quitting? I mean, that's the same standard that detractors are holding Riggleman to: blaming him for not performing his job when negative circumstances surrounded his job.

Having played baseball through college, I realize that this argument won't fly too far, as manager's do have great influence on a clubhouse. Just throwing it out there as it is a bit of a double standard to excuse players for being negatively affected by something such as this, while placing all the blame on Riggleman for standing up for himself. To be honest, if I was a Nats player who was affected by this, Rizzo would be hearing from me, as well as the rest of the team regarding his handling of the clubhouse, manager, etc.

 

[seitas]

I have a feeling those hammering Riggleman are unemployed or have terrible jobs. If my boss wasn't paying me what I felt I was worth and wouldn't commit to my future at the company I would quit too. And to Riggleman this is a normal job, he's not doing it for fun...hasn't he proved that?

 

[SeattleSports]

I have a feeling those hammering Riggleman are unemployed or have terrible jobs. If my boss wasn't paying me what I felt I was worth and wouldn't commit to my future at the company I would quit too. And to Riggleman this is a normal job, he's not doing it for fun...hasn't he proved that?

I own my company and I'm hammering him.

He quit on his players and the fans. Simple as that. If this is a 'normal job', lets see how quickly he gets a coaching job after pulling this. Why would ANYONE hire a manager that will quit in the last year of his contract if he isn't given an extension is beyond me, he wont be a head coach again.

 

[mchenrycards]

I have a feeling those hammering Riggleman are unemployed or have terrible jobs. If my boss wasn't paying me what I felt I was worth and wouldn't commit to my future at the company I would quit too. And to Riggleman this is a normal job, he's not doing it for fun...hasn't he proved that?

I am working full time as a human resource professional (and understand at will states believe me) as well as attending college full time to obtain a degree and a masters in human resource management. Your feelings were not correct and I have to warn you against making assumptions about people you know zero about!!

 

[matchpenalty]

Way to be a leader Riggleman. What a joke to quit on your team. About as selfish as it gets.

 

[SamHell]

I think Riggleman was right in that the Nationals didn't see him as a long term manager for them(otherwise they would have at least discussed his option) but quitting mid-season was not the right thing to do for his future or the team. He should have finished the year and forced the Nationals hand. They either pick up his option or he is top candidate for teams with an opening. Now he doesn't have a job and his reputation has taken a huge hit.