By John Fay and John Erardi
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Bob Boone says goodbye to reporters as he leaves the clubhouse at Great American Ball Park Monday. (Gary Landers photo) | ZOOM |

The big question in the wake of Monday's house cleaning by the Reds is this: Will anything really change?

Unless Randy Johnson is named player-manager, and Curt Schilling is named player-general manager, it's highly unlikely.

In announcing the firings of general manager Jim Bowden and manager Bob Boone, the Reds basically promised to stay the course, with new people in charge of the baseball operation.

That doesn't make the starting pitching any better or the player payroll any higher.

"With the Reds, I firmly believe and still believe that the key to our success is a strong scouting and player development system and developing home-grown talent," said Reds chief operating officer John Allen. "Yes, you still have a free agent or two to come in. From that perspective, there's not a change in direction. The change in direction is going to become more in how we organize ourselves and perform those duties to accomplish those goals."

In other words, it's going to take time. The new general manager will not take over until after the World Series. Assistant GMs Leland Maddox and Brad Kullman will run the baseball operations in the interim under Allen.

Former Reds assistant GM Doc Rodgers, who is suing the Reds over his firing, said this is no way to run a ball club.

"It's a ship without a captain," said Rodgers, now the player development director with the Baltimore Orioles. "Nothing against either one of them, but they're not qualified to run the club."

When the new GM does take over, he inherits a club with myriad problems that developed and festered on the watch of Allen and CEO Carl Lindner.

Bowden had been the GM since 1992. His firing cuts the last tie to the Marge Schott regime. The Reds were 829-830 in Bowden's tenure and made the playoffs only once (1995).

Allen took over the day-to-day operations of the team on June 12, 1996, and Lindner took over as majority owner Oct. 1, 1999.

The Reds are 275-315 since Lindner took over as CEO. They are 590-601 under Allen.

Lindner showed increasing interest in the Reds up to Monday. He attended three of the four games against Houston right after the All-Star break and watched the other game on television.

The Reds lost all four, falling hopelessly out of the National League Central race.

"(The moves were) certainly performance-based," Allen said.

While Lindner generally left the day-to-day operations to Allen and Bowden, he's made three key decisions that have negatively impacted the Reds.

• He approved the deal that brought Ken Griffey Jr. to the Reds from Seattle, and agreed to sign Griffey to an eight-year, $112 million contract in February 2000.

• He signed Barry Larkin to a three-year, $27 million contract in July 2000. The move came after Allen told Larkin the Reds could not fit such a salary in their payroll structure and after the Reds had worked out a Larkin trade with the New York Mets.

• He balked at paying Ron Oester more than $300,000 to take over as manager of the Reds in October 2001. Oester and Bowden had a major falling out, and the job went to Boone.

Signing Larkin and Griffey to big contracts, without increasing the overall payroll, severely hampered the way the Reds put the 2003 club together.

Bowden, particularly before the bump to $60 million this season, continually was forced to trade players to balance the budget.

Dmitri Young, an All-Star this year; Pokey Reese, a Gold Glove winner; Todd Walker, last year's leading hitter; and Elmer Dessens, last year's ERA leader, were traded to trim payroll.

Lindner and Allen also would not approve payroll increases last year to accommodate trades for Bartolo Colon, Chuck Finley or Scott Rolen.

Instead, the team traded for Ryan Dempster, Brian Moehler and Shawn Estes. St. Louis ultimately ran away with the division, with the Reds 19 games back.

The same cast was back this year - minus Dessens and Walker, who were traded in the cost-cutting moves.

The Reds re-signed Jimmy Haynes and added free agent Paul Wilson. But the $60 million payroll in a division in which St. Louis is at $83 million, the Chicago Cubs are at $79 million, and the Houston Astros are at $71 million, meant everything had to go right for the Reds to compete.

With injuries to Griffey, Larkin, Austin Kearns and Gabe White, the Reds sank fast.

Allen and Lindner may have erred by waiting too long to clean house. The non-waiver trading deadline is Thursday. Bowden was restricted from making major deals leading up to his firing, and it's unlikely that the Reds will make any trades in the next three days. But Allen did not rule it out.

"Certainly, there are some deals we've been talking about the last week or so, week to 10 days. Those talks will continue."

The club is in need of a radical overhaul to compete in the near future. The Reds have the worst starting pitching in the National League. The starters are 21-48 with a 6.19 ERA.

The club has $12 million committed to three starters - Danny Graves ($6 million), Paul Wilson ($3.5 million) and Jimmy Haynes ($2.5 million). Ryan Dempster made $3.25 million this year and is eligible for arbitration next year.

Griffey ($12.5 million) and Sean Casey ($6.8 million) also are under contract next year. Aaron Boone, Scott Williamson and Jason LaRue are eligible for arbitration.

So the new GM will face the dilemma Bowden faced every year: Trading players to make the budget work. That really didn't change at all Monday.

Possible successors

GENERAL MANAGER

• Leland Maddox: Assistant GM.

• Johnny Almaraz: Special assistant who signed Adam Dunn.

• Tim Naehring: Player development director.

MANAGER

• Dave Miley: Interim manager and 23-year veteran of the Reds organization.

• Ken Griffey Sr.: Special assistant who applied before Boone got job.

• Ron Oester: Thought he had the job before Boone, but had misunderstanding with Bowden.

Monday's key players

Carl Lindner, Chief Executive Officer

• He has kept a low profile throughout the season and did not comment on Monday's firings.

John Allen, Chief Operating Officer

• He made the announcement Monday: "Certainly, there were high expectations for this season. I'm not saying we necessarily expected to go to the World Series, but we certainly didn't expect to be sitting 10 1/2 games out and significantly under .500 at this point in the season."

Jim Bowden, General Manager

• Was youngest GM in baseball history when he was hired Oct. 16, 1992. Fired in the middle of 11th season in that position. Reds made one playoff appearance under his leadership, in 1995.

Bob Boone, Manager

• Boone took over in 2000 and never produced a winning record. The Reds went 190-238 under him.

Tom Robson and Tim Foli, Coaches

• Both were hand-picked by Boone. Robson, the hitting coach, oversaw the NL's last-ranked offense.

Brad Kullman, Asst. GM and Leland Maddox, Asst. GM/director of scouting

• The 36-year-old Kullman was promoted to his position after 2002. Maddox has been in his position since February 2002. He had been director of player personnel since 2000.

They will in essence replace Bowden.

Dave Miley, Interim manager

• The 41-year-old was the Louisville Bats manager. He's in his 14th season managing in the Reds organization. He has a 1,115-840 (.570) record.