The Pittsburgh Pirates have completed their manager search, and have hired Clint Hurdle, according to Jon Heyman of SI. Hurdle’s deal is for three years, according to Ken Rosenthal.
Rosenthal mentioned yesterday that the Pirates had increased their efforts to lock down Hurdle, who was believed to be a finalist for the New York Mets’ position. John Perrotto had a great feature on Hurdle in the Beaver County Times, detailing some personal reasons why Hurdle would want to come to Pittsburgh, and some of the holdups with the deal. One of the top reasons for Hurdle to come to Pittsburgh, according to Perrotto, is that his daughter was born with Prader-Willi Syndrome. The Children’s Institute in Squirrel Hill is one of the nation’s foremost providers of care for those affected with Prader-Willi.
Perrotto also mentioned some interesting notes about the holdup in the negotiations:
One of the possible holdups in a deal is length of contract. General manager Neal Huntington is signed only through next season and Hurdle, naturally, is seeking multiple years.
Rarely is a manager signed longer than a general manager, which leaves the Pirates with two choices. One is they can sign Hurdle for one guaranteed year with an option for 2012 that would have an extremely high buyout. They could also give Hurdle two guaranteed years and add another year to Huntington’s contract, something ownership is said not be keen to do after a 57-105 season.
Since Hurdle received a three year deal, that raises an interesting scenario. The Pirates have a manager under contract for three years, and a General Manager under contract for one year. There are two scenarios with Huntington: either he gets extended beyond his one year, or the Pirates replace him when his contract is up. An extension seems more likely, considering Hurdle was signed for multiple years. Any new General Manager is going to want his own staff working under him.
If the Pirates replaced Huntington, they’d be looking at the possibility of eating two years of Hurdle’s contract. Any potential replacement for Huntington would want a say in who the manager of the team is. Having a manager in place could limit the potential candidates. I don’t think Huntington would get an extension to match the length of Hurdle’s contract, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he receives a one year extension.
