Was Casey Stengel a good manager?

[Seven]

I've found myself watching a handful of baseball documentaries, reading books, and occasionally having an older game on in the background. It made me think a lot about the legacy of Stengel, and his tenure with the Yankees.

I can't seem to determine whether or not he was a good manager. A character sure, did incredible things with those late 40's and 50's Yankees teams, but never had success anywhere else. Stengel was fortunate enough to manage some of the great Yankees teams of all time. I think if you stick really anyone in the dugout with some of those teams they find success. Someone such as Walter Alston would've probably replicated what Stengel was able to do with the Yankees.

Curious to hear what everyone thinks.

[pclpads]

Prior to the Yanks, not much success as a mgr. In fact, he kind of bottomed out in the PCL with Oakland. But, after joining the Yanks, his managerial attributes were great. But, that comes with a qualifier. If the Three Stooges had the Yankees talent in the 50's that Stengel did, even they would have had equal success.

[Jim65]

Most managers are only as good as the players they have, I view Casey the same way I view Joe Torre, mediocre managers who benefited from having great players.

[John1941]

I think Stengel was a good manager. His managing style, with platooning everyone but Mantle, switching players in and out of the lineup, not giving any single pitcher too much work, all are strategies which work if you have a lot of good players and don't if you don't. The Yankees were the team he was made to manage.

I'm not sure how much credit you should give Stengel for this, but the Yankees were very smart with players in the '50s. Maybe Weiss was a bigger part of that, but Stengel at least cooperated.

[frankbmd]

Ford never started more than 30 games until Houk took over.

Larsen was an accidental starter in the fifth game of the 56 WS.

If a pitcher did well against a certain team, he might have to wait 7 days for a start until that team showed up.

Not conventional but he got results.

The Yankees might have done as well or better with another manager, but the process would have been different.

[egri]

Stengel didn't have a whole lot of success before or after New York, but he wasn't given much to work with either. The Dodgers, Braves and Mets were all bottom-feeders during his tenure. As I recall, he was one of the first managers to take his hardest throwing pitcher (Joe Page) and use him in relief, not as a starter.

[ALR-bishop]

I am from St Louis. In 1967 the Cardinals had just moved from Grand Avenue to a new round stadium in downtown and the All Star Game was held there in July. Stengel who was asked what he thought of the news stadium. His response was a classic

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