I like the old O's manager. Last year he did a pretty good job with a scrub team in the same division as the BoSOX and Yanks. If he could be a pitching or hitting coach or are team I think he would be great, I also think he would be great as a minor coach but i dought he would want to go down there. What do you guys think. 
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I think he's a scapegoat for the O's deepers problems, but also think that he's a horrible choice as manager. If you read between the lines of the stories being written now in the WaPo and Baltimore Sun about the Mazzilli firing, it's clear that he had completely lost the respect and following of the team long before he was fired. One anecdote was particularly telling: the team's together for a meeting, but Mazzilli hasn't shown up. Someone says "hey, we can't begin the meeting without the mananger," and Miguel Tejada turns to Sam Perlozzo and says "our manager is here already." Tejada is NOT a troublemaker in any conceivable sense of the word - he's probably one of the most team-oriented players in Major League Baseball - so if he's reached that level Mazzilli must really have lost the players.
There's no question that one of the intangibles this team has benefited from, for better or worse, is the respect the players have for Frank. I think FR's gotta go sooner or later as manager, but it's CRUCIAL that he be replaced with someone equally capable of inspiring respect. Mazzilli - taciturn, sedate, impossible to get emotional - is not that man.
Additionally, he made a lot of bad calls managing the bullpen, something that would be
poison to the Nats, who rely so deeply upon the strength of our relief pitching. He was infamous for leaving starters in one inning too long, for giving too wide a berth to his relievers (as they let opponents score the tying or go-ahead runs), etc. Say what you will about Frank, one of his best qualities as a manager is his impatience with shoddy performance on the mound. He's completely unafraid to pull you out of the game if you give up that crucial walk, or if your pitch count's too high, or if you look gassed. (Well, unless Livan's pitching.) He got burned once quite badly back in late April, I believe, with Loaiza coming out to pitch the 8th inning of a 0-0 shutout when Ayala or Majewski should have gone in instead. The result was a 3-0 loss. Since then he's been happy to yank anyone who looks like they're going wobbly. Mazzilli seems incapable of learning that lesson.
I'd be happy to see Lou Piniella or Jim Leyland or (oh this would SO SWEET in SO MANY WAYS) Davey Johnson as manager of the Nats. Johnson in particular, a real nail-spitter who's got a lot of the Old School in him, seems like he'd be a great fit for this team.
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