Postseason Managerial Report Card: Dave Roberts

Dale Zanine-Imagn Images If grade schoolers have to come home with a report card, why shouldn’t big league managers? We at FanGraphs tend to veer towards egalitarianism, and if little Liam or Daenerys can be sent to bed without Roblox or whatever it is the kids like these days, then why can’t Big Stephen or Dodger Dave? That’s why every time a postseason manager is eliminated from contention, we run down their playoff performance and see who gets a Grape Job! sticker. Ben Clemens already assessed the work of Will Venable and Aaron Boone, while Jon Becker broke down the October runs of Walt Weiss and Craig Stammen, as well as the losing managers from the Wild Card round. Today, it’s Dave Roberts’ turn. Crafting these report cards can be an odd exercise. Major league managers simply don’t have as large an effect on a team’s on-field performance as, say, an NFL team’s head coach. Baseball is a game of player execution, and a manager’s job mostly comes down to making sure that the best players are on the lineup card and that everyone refrains from killing each other in August. But that doesn’t mean that managers have no effect on their team’s fortunes. Baseball is, by its very nature, a very coin-flippy, volatile game, where the fates of both teams hang on a knife’s edge. Small decisions can have a big impact. Last year, I gave Pat Murphy somewhere between an A- and a B+ overall. Let’s see how Roberts fares!FanGraphs Playoff Coverage Is for MembersYou must be a Member in order to read our postseason coverage. You can read our announcement here, but it's not the only reason you should consider becoming a Member. Membership includes:✓Ad-free browsing✓Unlimited FanGraphs & RotoGraphs articles✓Historical & platoon projections✓Leaderboard & player-page stat heatmaps✓One-click data exports✓Customizable player-page dashboards✓Dark & Classic site modes✓Weekly Members-only mailbag✓FanGraphs Walk-Off, your year in review✓Optional homepage photo removal✓Gift articles to non-Members✓Full postseason coverage