THE BUZZ ON BAVASI

Eddie Murray was a bust, even by the sorry standards of an Angel franchise notorious for signing free agents years past their prime.

Blame Bill Bavasi, right?

Not so fast. The Angel general manager knew he had made a mistake, probably long before anyone else had figured it out. But to understand how Bavasi made the mistake, and how he finally rectified it, you have to understand an unwritten job description that requires him to balance corporate policy and budgetary restrictions with talent acquisition.

The Angels have won nothing since Bavasi replaced Whitey Herzog as general manager five years ago. And with Bavasi soliciting bids for his top players before Saturday’s trading deadline, the Angels are essentially conceding they will have won nothing by the time Bavasi’s contract expires next year. By that bottom-line standard, Bavasi has failed.

But, in an era that requires him to wear the caps of accountant, corporate spokesman and crisis manager, as well as deal maker, several prominent baseball people outside the organization credit Bavasi with a job well done.

“I think he’s one of the better GMs in baseball, and I don’t say that lightly,” agent Scott Boras said. “There’s a lot of guys that have no business doing what they’re doing in this game. He’s somebody that really understands what he’s doing.”

Said Chicago White Sox General Manager Ron Schueler, “I think he’s done a very good job. It’s just unfortunate when it comes to the health of his players. The past two years, if he could put his whole club out there--I’m not even going to say for 162 games, but for 130 games--they’d be right there.”

In the final two years under Herzog, the Angels posted consecutive 90-loss seasons for the first time since 1968-69. In the first four years under Bavasi, the Angels finished second in the American League West three times. But in that span was the infamous 1995 season, in which they coughed up an 11-game lead.

They finished second again in 1997, when a productive designated hitter might have helped close the six-game gap between the Angels and first place. Bavasi, directed to upgrade the team and its pitching without significantly upgrading the payroll, sacrificed Chili Davis--and his .292 batting average, 28 home runs and $3.8-million salary--in a forgettable trade for pitcher Mark Gubicza, who got hurt and won no games.

Bavasi applied the money saved to the signing of infielder Dave Hollins, who helped, but the Angels still needed a designated hitter to replace Davis. So Bavasi signed Murray, who had no other offers, for $750,000.

“We got what we paid for,” Bavasi said. “It was a shot in the dark.”

Once spring training started, Bavasi quickly realized Murray’s bat speed had evaporated and began trade talks for a replacement. The San Diego Padres thought they were getting close to a deal when Bavasi cut off talks, leaving the Padres with the impression that Disney bosses had quashed any trade once word leaked. Bavasi later acknowledged he had terminated discussions because of the leak but said he was not ordered to do so and said he had not considered a trade imminent.

“The Disney people can be pretty hard--and it wasn’t anybody from their side [who leaked the possible deal],” Padre General Manager Kevin Towers said. “Any time you have a discussion with Bill, because of Disney, it’s very important nothing gets out.”

So Murray started the season with the Angels, but eventually became a sour and divisive presence, frustrated by injury and poor performance. Bavasi finally acquired a replacement in August, but only after Tony Phillips had been arrested for cocaine possession.

Bavasi, acting quickly and decisively with a pennant up for grabs, secured corporate approval for a budget-boosting trade. Within 24 hours after Phillips had been formally charged with a felony, Bavasi acquired Rickey Henderson from the Padres. Bavasi then released Murray, who was hitting .219 with three home runs.

“You can get a good feel with Bill when he wants to do a deal,” Towers said. “He’ll tell you when he’s ready to make a deal, and we’ll get on with it or he’ll move on. I can’t say that about all GMs.”

No longer do agents and opposing general managers need to wonder whether to call Herzog at his St. Louis home or Dan O’Brien in the Anaheim office, mystified at which executive made the Angel decisions and whether either man talked to the other. Bavasi empowers his lieutenants--assistant general manager Ken Forsch, scouting director Bob Fontaine Jr. and contract negotiator Mark Rosenthal--to act promptly.

“They may give you an opinion you dislike, but they’re very responsive,” agent Paul Cohen said. “It’s good to deal with an organization like that.”

Doing business promptly does not necessarily mean doing business well, however. Bavasi’s trades and signings have been undistinguished at best, at least until Disney authorized $80 million to sign free-agent first baseman Mo Vaughn last year.

And even that deal has not revived the Angels--so far. Vaughn, who hit 40 home runs and had 115 runs batted in last season for the Boston Red Sox, quickly fell victim to the Angel injury jinx and spent much of the first half of the season on the bench, serving as the team’s frustrated designated hitter. He is batting .283 with 18 homers and 64 RBIs but has been unhappy--with his situation and with the team--most of the season. Still, the Vaugh acquisition may yet have an impact, since he is signed for five more years and announced the other day that he has no intention of requesting a trade.

Fast First Move

Bavasi moved quickly and decisively in his first major move, which turned into a disaster. Two months into his tenure as a rookie general manager, Bavasi sought but was denied permission to fire Buck Rodgers, the veteran manager he had inherited. Two months later, when he asked again and received permission, Bavasi called Marcel Lachemann late one night and persuaded him to manage the Angels. Lachemann, a pitching coach, had never managed in the major or minor leagues.

Lachemann quit two years later, suggesting that the team might play better without him.

“I thought Lach was the right guy. I still do,” Bavasi said. “He didn’t like the job. That’s a fatal flaw.”

Bavasi’s first major trade was his best. In 1995, he sent Chad Curtis to the Detroit Tigers for Phillips, which opened center field for future Gold Glover Jim Edmonds. Phillips sparked the Angels in the clubhouse and on the field, setting a franchise record with 113 walks. For the only time in club history, three players--Phillips, Edmonds and Tim Salmon--scored more than 100 runs.

Later that year, as the Angels pushed toward their first division championship since 1986, Bavasi made one of his two worst trades, sending four prospects to the Chicago White Sox for pitcher Jim Abbott. Three of the prospects--pitchers John Snyder and Bill Simas and outfielder McKay Christensen--loom as White Sox stars of the 21st century.

“They asked for all the right guys,” Bavasi said.

At the time, the Angels rated catcher Todd Greene and third baseman George Arias as their top two prospects. Greene, returned to triple-A Edmonton three weeks ago, and Arias, now with the Padres, have yet to prove they can hit consistently in the major leagues.

The Angels refused to include either Greene or Arias in the Abbott trade, although they offered both in proposing trades that were rejected--by the Toronto Blue Jays for pitcher David Cone and, in trying to replace injured shortstop Gary DiSarcina, by the Kansas City Royals for Greg Gagne and by the New York Mets for Jose Vizcaino.

Cone, Gagne and Vizcaino all would have left the Angels as free agents after the season. Abbott pitched well enough that year, stopping two nine-game losing streaks and going 5-4 as the Angels skidded to a 26-34 finish.

The Angels retained Abbott, signing him for three years and $7.8 million, but he inexplicably plunged from ninth in the league in earned-run average in 1995 to last in 1996. They released him the next spring, and the combination of paying off the last two years of the contract and watching prospects blossom in Chicago makes Angel President Tony Tavares cringe.

“That was a terrible mistake, giving up what we gave up,” Tavares said. “You get Jimmy, and he really doesn’t do much for you that year. He costs us a lot of money. And you give up the kids that have turned out really well in Chicago. That was a bad trade.”

In trying to bolster the Angels’ chronically thin starting pitching, Bavasi made two more bad trades, acquiring Gubicza for Davis and Allen Watson for first baseman J.T. Snow. The Angels also virtually gave away pitcher Brian Anderson, their first-round draft pick in 1993, trading him to the Cleveland Indians to resolve a contractual error that could have resulted in his free agency.

Bavasi has done an admirable job of acquiring useful role players--catchers Chad Kreuter, Jim Leyritz and Matt Walbeck, pitchers Chuck McElroy and Mark Petkovsek and utility men Gregg Jefferies and Phil Nevin--for expendable major leaguers and fringe minor leaguers.

Ken Hill has not yet pitched well enough to justify his three-year, $16-million contract, but acquiring a starting pitcher for a surplus catcher, Leyritz, was the steal of 1997. The trade also allowed Greene to catch every day. He hit nine home runs in a month and then lost the rest of ’97 and most of ’98 to injury.

Bavasi also signed useful free agents at reasonable rates, among them pitchers Shigetoshi Hasegawa, Omar Olivares and Lee Smith and infielders Hollins, Jack Howell and Randy Velarde (Olivares and Velarde were traded to Oakland Thursday night). With his first truckload of Disney dollars, Bavasi signed Vaughn, impressing the superstar as much with a touching personal letter as with that $80 million.

“That was a major feather in his cap,” agent Boras said. “They got a franchise player, and there aren’t that many franchise players in the big leagues. He’ll be the centerpiece in that organization for a long time.”

Said Tavares: “What Vaughn did was shut up some of the skeptics that said the Walt Disney Co. would never go out and spend that kind of money.”

No Complaints

Bavasi never has complained about financial restrictions--not under Disney, not under the previous, thriftier management of the Autry family, and not during the ownership transition that handcuffed him in 1995 and 1996.

And in the wake of Phillips’ arrest, Bavasi also served as a sturdy buffer between the Burbank executives deliberating corporate punishment and the Anaheim baseball staff screaming for a speedy resolution so the Angels could stop playing one man short during a division race.

Tavares credits Bavasi with working well within a budget. But, with Disney doubling the Angels’ payroll over the last two years, Tavares also takes exception to the perception that Bavasi has not had the financial resources to win before this year.

“In recent years, he has,” Tavares said. “The payroll we have today is an aggressive payroll. It’s not the New York Yankees, but it’s on the aggressive side at $60 million. He’s got a lot more bullets here than they have in Pittsburgh or Oakland.”

Bavasi identified a core group of talented young players, providing fans with an identifiable nucleus and relieving the need to fill every vacancy through trade or free agency. Bavasi also saved Disney, and the Autrys before that, a bundle by signing those players to long-term contracts.

Boras, adding veteran pitcher Chuck Finley to that group, said Bavasi might have saved Disney close to $20 million this season alone.

“In keeping Finley, [Gary] DiSarcina, Salmon, [Troy] Percival and Edmonds, he’s kept the services of the No. 1 pitcher, the closer, the center fielder, the power hitter and the shortstop,” Boras said. “And he has stolen every one of those players, literally.”

Boras negotiated none of those contracts. Cohen, who represents Percival and Edmonds, pointed out that players get guaranteed security although the team does not get guaranteed performance.

“There is a lot of risk for a general manager,” Cohen said. “There are three possibilities, two of which are bad. Either the player is going to get hurt, and that’s bad for the general manager, or the player is going to play bad, and that’s bad for the general manager. If the player performs up to expectations, that’s good.

“There’s always hits and misses, but I think Bill is very skilled. The most interesting time is coming soon. If the team wins, you want to keep the team together. If the team doesn’t win, you have a lot of contracts starting to turn over.”

The most significant of those might well be Bavasi’s. Does Tavares believe Bavasi is doing a good job?

“I think, generally, yes,” Tavares said.

Still, Tavares said, Disney plays to win. The Angels fly no championship flags.

“We’re all judged on that,” Tavares said. “It’s not all about developing players and keeping budgets.

“That’s how I get measured. That’s how he gets measured. That’s how players and coaches get measured.”