The timing was stunning. It was impossible to ignore. Less than two and a half days after the previous column on the very subject was posted on this website, a news article popped up on MLB.com. It carried the byline of the MLB.com reporter who for years has written house pieces about Major League Baseball and its commissioners. Mark Newman probably wrote enough puff pieces about Bud Selig when he was commissioner to fill a book.

It was as if Rob Manfred or an aide to the commissioner summoned Newman and said, “OK, Mark, we got another one for you.” I don’t want to be fanciful about this, but Newman might also have been told …

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This might be my favorite time of the baseball year. No, not because of the playoffs and the World Series. This is the time of year when teams fire managers (three already) and general managers (one), and we can witness the futility of Commissioner Rob Manfred’s wishes for teams to fill their vacancies with Latinos or African Americans.

Manfred has talked a lot about diversity hiring but has done little to achieve it. He talks a far better game than he plays.

Today, however, Manfred is ahead of his usual game. Hensley Meulens told me from his home in Curacao Saturday evening that the Detroit Tigers interviewed him last week. Given that the Tigers told Meulens that he is one of 8 to 10 candidates they plan to interview for their managerial vacancy before paring the list to four or five for in-person interviews, a telephone interview might not seem like a big deal. However, in Meulens’ case, it is.

Meulens is the San Francisco Giants’ 50-year-old hitting coach. More relevant in this case, he has …

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For most of August and September, the Red Sox led the Yankees in their American League East race by 3 to 5 games but mostly 3 or 4. Some time in the first week of September or the last week of August – I didn’t note the date – I made a bold declaration. If the Yankees got to where they were 2 games out, I said to no one in particular, they would win the division championship.

Well, the Yankees cut the Red Sox lead to 2 games but not in August and nearly not in September. They arrived at that critical juncture of the season last Friday with only two games left on the schedule. For me to be right, the Yankees had to win the last two games while the Red Sox lost their last two, and if those scenarios developed, the Yankees would have to beat Boston in a playoff game Monday.

The Yankees played their part …

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