worst GM in sports?
 

who has done the worst job in pro sports at running their franchise?

My vote: Glen Sather

Billy Knight, Atlanta Hawks

Any Knicks GM.

case closed.

Ed Wade

Ed Wade of the Phillies or Jim Rutherford of the Hurricanes.

Cam Bonifay of the Pirates was pretty bad throughout the 90's...

Kenny Williams.

Interesting choice. Probably not the first one that would have occured to me, but hard to argue with. Has any GM ever gone from genius to dummy over the course of a career like Sather did?

Gord Ash, former Blue Jays GM.

Presently? I dunno. I do know two of the best are based in Jersey.

Another interesting call. I always liked Ash, if only because he started with some low-level front office job and literally worked his way up to become GM. What sports fan hasn't dreamed of that?

Speaking of the Canadian teams, I get the feeling Omar Minaya might be on the list in a few years.

Whoever has been running the Arizona Cardinals? :P

Elgin Baylor, Clippers

That part, I agree with. I think it was awesome. He started with the team in the beginning as a ticket office guy and worked his way up to GM and that is cool. And I'm probably too hard on him because he was screwed when ownership changed during his tenure.

But we sucked and so, I guess I blame him.

Bonifay was terrible. He made a lot of useless players into millionaires.

Pretty much anyone and everyone who has ever held the position for the Clippers.

Baylor has not been awful for the clips. Every year he seems to make good draft picks, even though they may be high ones. Its just that their owner rarely wants to pay to keep the team together, or to add additional players. Donald Sterling redefines cheap.

My thoughts exactly. He's running the Mets like he took a GM course from Isiah Thomas.

Jerry Jones.

I vote J.P.

Anytime you refuse to take a Canadian in a deal (Gagne) and insist on Prokopec instead (that worked out well), that's just bad, but considering what he's done to our bullpen and his Delgado replacement plan, he's making a serious case for himself on this list. Now had he resigned Woodward, he'd easily make the top 3.

Amen to that one. The Clippers are always getting top talents in the draft just to let them go to FA.

Mitch Kupchek

He's actually done a great job IMO. It's the owner that does a crappy job. The Anti-Steinbrenner

Read above. It ain't Elgin lettin' these guys go. Not saying he's the greatest GM (Lamond Murray and Kandi are two big examples of mistakes he made), but he's pulled off some good moves, too, bringing in Brand for the pick that became Chandler, making a move for Maggette when everyone thought he was just an athlete with questionable basketball IQ, picking out terrific under-the-radar talents like Jaric and Simmons, etc.

No, the problem is Donald Sterling, who would immediately get a vote from me if someone started a similar thread about worst owners.

CR

Potentially the Clips could be one of the better teams in the league soon if they can keep Simmons, and if Livingston develops like expected. But there's little chance of that happening.

I dont think the Clips taking the Kandi man was a bad move, he was just the top pick that everyone else probably would have done in that position

Any NY Knicks Manager. Isiah Thomas specially.

If you have a low budget, maybe you are forced to do some weird movements (Clippers, Pirates), but if you have a big budget, you have to be an contender any year

The Yorks in San Francisco trump even Sterling, I think. But I have the Red-and-Gold tinted glasses on, which make me blame them for everything bad that ever happens to the team. With those on, they're by far the worst owners in any sport, at any time throughout all of history, for ever and ever.

That being said, Sterling is friggin horrible.

Edit: End threadjack :)

I want to throw another vote for Ed Wade Phillies GM. He ran a team that was always battling for the cellar with a limited payroll. With the new stadium the owners have opened the pocketbooks up some and we still haven't made it to the postseason. We fire managers only the expansion Tampa Bay Devil Rays have a GM with as long a tenure and no post season.

Case and point this offseason offered Placido Planco 2b-abitration not because we wanted to keep him but because he wanted compensation for when he signed elsewhere. So now we have a backup 2b making 5 million dollars and putting undo pressure on prospect 2b Chase Utley. Neither have been moved and the Phillies sure could use another pitcher. Also after this was awarded the Phillies signed 3 relief pitchers all making under 1 million dollars who stink but will be cheap and will balance out the extra money being paid to the backup 2b by having a bad bullpen. Way to go Ed.

You can also point to the last 2 seasons the Phillies were close to being in the mix to making a wild card spot and at the trade deadline we get other teams old bad relief pitchers when we needed a center fielder and a good relief pitcher. Wade refuses to deal his "gems" from the minor leagues (overall the farm system is rated close to the bottom last i checked which Ed has to shoulder some responibility for) yet the best guy to come thru Scott Rolen left because he felt the team was poorly run, go figure.(there isn't another guy who come thru the system in the last 15 years that has done much of anything).

Okay, call it off topic, but there's a funny catch in there...

Spielman for the Dolphins is so bad he's not even good enough to be called incompetent. I think utterly unqualified it the right description. Although he's not really the GM by name, and Nick Saban has pretty much relegated him now to a guy who sits in an office collecting checks until his current contract expires.

Wade is awful, too, I will agree. In the past 5 years, roughly, our win total has gone from 86 to 86 while the payrol has gone from 30 million to roughly 90 million. Last season he trades Silva and some other players for Milton. Then Silva has a superior season to Milton, and will sign for about half as much. Existing contracts on our payroll suggest that the team has little to no chance to add salary anytime soon. Its possible that Rollins will be too expensive for us to keep(not that Wade wouldnt overpay him if he could).

Then you factor in all the little things like giving picks for Leiber, but not getting any out of Polanco. Past draft transgressions like taking JD Drew, and then not being able to pay him, and oodles of bad trades. I agree he sucks, but i hope when we lose 80+ games this season the front office brings in someone with a clue.

I know Hockey is in nobodies mind, but how can we not mention Mike Milbury?

Any Chicago Blackhawks GM or puppet GM for Mr Wirtz.

Got to agree here. I listen to sportscasters talk about him like he's a highly respected hockey mind, but since this team moved to Carolina they've played hard for a grand total of about 1 season. They got motivated enough one year to squeak into the playoffs and play the Devils tight, then turned things around one December and managed to finish a season with a trip to the finals, and that's it. I watched them lose more winnable games just through lack of effort than I can count. I remember a must-win game vs. Montreal where the only people chasing down pucks were Gary Roberts and most of the Canadiens, in a down year for Montreal.

He may be able to find talented players, but he needs to start finding some talented MOTIVATED players for once.

Kodos, he's run his team into the ground!

Wade isn't that bad. He had some underperformance issues from his players last year. He did overspend on Wagner, though. Thanks on that one from an Astros fan.

Cam Bonifay had about the worst stretch of GM performance in my lifetime for the Pirates. Just awful. It was like the guy went out and took a player's career-best in each statistical category, combined them all into one super player, and then paid the guy as if his performance would match that ridiculous expectation on a yearly basis until the player turned 45.

Just amazing.

I was thinking of suggesting that, but it's a group effort because even with the league's best GM, Wirtz's tightfistedness would prevent them from doing anything more than a decent job.

SI

Hockey is always on my mind. I cant believe there are so many bad GMs in New York (Sather, Milbury, Thomas, Accorsi, Bradway and i guess Minaya, but I'm not ready to throw him under the bus yet)

Interesting parallel: Any player who comes to the Rangers goes from a stud to a dud.

And yet I still think Milbury is worse...

I have beef with the McCasky family. Now that Jerry Angelo is in town, things appear better, but Mike M. sucked from the fan's perspective.

Excellent call.

I'd agree with you, but methinks the problem isn't with the GM as you alluded to. The problem is with Mr. W.

Whoever is running the Arizona Cardinals, though I have no idea who it is.

Denny Green

I'd frankly say it is too soon to say that Baylor has sucked.

Jerry "You mean I was supposed to check that box?" Angelo.

Basically every GM in the NBA

I said it was better, not good.

Any Bullets/Wizards GM Prior to Ernie Grunfield.

- Drafted Rasheed Wallace instead of Kevin Garnett
- Traded Rasheed Wallace for Rod Strickland
- Traded Chris Webber for Mitch Richmond
- Drafted Kenny Green instead of Karl Malone
- Drafted Kwame Brown #1
- traded Rip Hamilton for Jerry Stackhouse
- traded Ben Wallace for Ike Austin

But they did manage to trade Tom Gugliotta and three picks for Webber.

I think any Warriors GM has done a terrible job. I mean, Penny and three picks for Webber for Gugliotta, for Donyell Marshall might be the worst progression of a trade in the history of basketball.

Or Tim Hardaway and Chris Gatling for Bimbo Coles and Kevin Willis.

Joe Smith for Jim Jackson and Clarence Weatherspoon (although Smith wasn't that great and he was going to walk anyway...but still....)

Adonal Foyle
Todd Fuller
Andrew DeClerq