Manny Acta: The Day After

In the shadow of All-Star Weekend, where the giants of the game gathered like towering oaks, a shrub of a story was lost. Manny Acta was fired as manager of the Washington Nationals. At 26-61, the Nationals have made their home in the league’s underbrush. They hold the worst record in Major League Baseball by nine games. A team doesn’t flirt with failure on an epic level when only one thing goes wrong.  It’s like gaining weight—you don’t gain 30 pounds from one meal—it takes years of bad decisions. And firing Acta wasn’t the first step on the road to recovery. He was a nice guy and he cared, sometimes too much. Unfortunately, the same effort can’t be said for all his players.     My Acta Moment On July 31, 2008, a handful of reporters meandered down to the Nationals postgame press conference. It was another depressing 8-4 loss to the Philadelphia Phillies, the Nationals ninth-straight. One in which the National...