Hurte: The Chicago Cubs’ college of coaches
From SABR member Bob Hurte at Seamheads.com on November 5, 2012:
An old proverb states that two heads are better than one. During the early part of the 1960s, Cubs owner Philip Wrigley took it a little further. He felt that eight heads were better than one. Wrigley decided to employ eight rotating managers. There would be four on the major league staff and four at the at the minor league level. Wrigley pointed out that in football; a cadre of specialized coaches was utilized to improve a team’s performance.
Since the 1946 season, when the Cubs won 82 games, they had not finish above .500. They had become the definition of “doormat” of the National League. The 1960 season was the straw that broke Wrigley’s back! That year their record was a worse than dismal 60-94!
The Cubs’ failures forced Wrigley to think “out of the box.” He called his new innovation, the “College of Coaches.”
Read the full article here: http://seamheads.com/2012/11/05/higher-education-the-chicago-cubs-college-of-coaches/
Originally published: November 5, 2012. Last Updated: November 5, 2012.