For Braves fans, it's necessary change.The Atlanta Braves did something Monday they haven't done since 1990, they fired someone before a season ended, in this case, their General Manager.
The Braves announced they've parted ways with Frank Wren, who's been overseeing the team since his boss John Schuerholz was promoted to team president in 2007.
Wren has an odd resume during his Braves tenure as the team seemed to excel at finding guys like Aaron Harang and other players who underachieved and getting the most out of them.
But he was horrible at big ticket signings. Wren was responsible for the Dan Uggla and BJ Upton signings, leaving the Braves on the hook for some $45 million in contracts to one player who's no longer with the team and the other, likely to join him shortly.
But the overriding issue was an apparent rift with people inside the organization. There's been rumblings for the past month that he (Wren) may have been running off people like Dave Wallace and others and was responsible for some of the discord bubbling to the surface over the past couple of weeks.
The Braves had been contending and as recently as the end of August were potential leaders for a wild-card berth. But the team continued their habit of September falls and now sit at 76-79 on the season and are officially out of the playoffs.
John Hart, former GM in Cleveland and Texas and special assistant this year to Schuerholz takes over as interim GM with no clear frontrunner for the permanent job.
Rumors say team manager Fredi Gonzalez is safe...for now, but is likely going to have to make wholesale changes in the coaching staff.
We will see.
