Might the rocky and dubious tenure of Diamondbacks general manager Dave Stewart come to an end soon? According to Jon Heyman, that's a possibility. Here's what Heyman writes in Today's Knuckleball:
The front office, which is packed with big achievers and bigger personalities, is predictably not taking this well. Stewart's own option comes up at the end of the month (though they could conceivably wait until the end of the season, too), and while it's unusual for a GM to be on the hot seat after only two short years, the D-Backs are a team that's shown to be unafraid of change, so perhaps anything's possible.
Heyman's piece also includes some quotes from Stewart himself.
Without question, Stewart has not enjoyed much success while in the GM's chair in Arizona. Stewart was hired near the end of the 2014 season, and in his near two full seasons on the job the Diamondbacks are a combined 24 games under .500. As well, Stewart orchestrated the thus far disastrous December 2015 trade that saw, most notably, Dansby Swanson go to the Braves in exchange for Shelby Miller. This season Miller, when not injured, has pitched to a 7.14 ERA for Arizona, while the shortstop Swanson, the top overall pick in 2015, has emerged as one of the top prospects in baseball. On Wednesday, Swanson made his major-league debut for Atlanta.
Other trades have worked out much better for Stewart and the D-Backs, but he's also at times seemed simply out of his depth as the organization's key decision-maker. For instance ...
If accurate, that's indeed not a good look for a major-league GM. Given the depths they've reached in 2016 -- depths that are squarely at odds with the internal belief that they'd contend this season -- an organizational reset may indeed be called for in Arizona.