2021 MLB general manager ratings: The American League East

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The job of an MLB general manager is to supply his or her team with the talent necessary to make a post-season run. Which GMs did their job in 2021, and which came up short?

Today we look at the performances of the men who filled the role of general manager for the five AL East teams. It is a compelling division since three teams did indeed reach post-season play, and a fourth barely missed.

Our standard for evaluating the performance of a general manager (or other chief executives who holds a functionally similar title) is simple. We attach a value to every personnel move made by the general manager since the conclusion of the 2020 season last October. The sum of the values is the GM’s rating.

The value is determined by the Wins Above Average (WAA) generated by the player during 2021. WAA is an offshoot of WAR, and it is ideal for this purpose because unlike WAR it is zero-based. That means if we say a GM impacted his team by +2.5 games in 2021, he cumulatively improved his team’s fortunes by that many games.

Conversely, an MLB GM with a negative cumulative WAA can be said to have hurt his team’s pennant prospects by that amount.

Broadly speaking, a general manager can impact his team in any of five ways: by the trades, purchase, and waiver claims he or she makes, by free agent signings or extensions, by farm system callups, by the players he or she trades away, and by the players who are releases or lost to free agency.

Each general manager should, of course, be judged in the context of what they are attempting to accomplish. As an example, Cubs general manager Jed Hoyer conducted a mid-season tear-down of his roster that was virtually guaranteed to produce a negative rating for Hoyer by season’s end.

Hoyer would probably be OK with that; the moves were designed for future, not present impact.

In the end, the best way to understand the rating is this: It tells how much better or worse a GM made his or her team’s roster compared with what would have occurred had he (or in the case of the Miami Marlins, she) done nothing at all.

For that reason, the ratings do not necessarily correlate with the final standings. Some GMs are starting from a better position than others.

With that as an explanation, here’s how the five AL East general managers scored in 2021.

Toronto general manager Ross Atkins. (Photo by Tom Szczerbowski/Getty Images) /

Ross Atkins, general manager, Toronto Blue Jays

+14.7 WAA

Atkins’ Blue Jays came up one game short of qualifying for a shot at an MLB postseason spot. But that shortfall should not obscure the job Atkins did this past year in boosting his Jays into contention.

The Jays’ front office boss made 52 player personnel moves that affected the Major League roster since the conclusion of the 2020 season. An impressive 28 of those moves – that’s 58 percent – improved the team.

And several of Atkins’ moves hit big. He signed free agent shortstop Marcus Semien to a bargain-basement one-year, $18 million deal and was rewarded when Semien delivered 45 home runs, 102 RBIs, and a 4.9 WAA.

The more heralded signing of free agent outfielder George Springer did not generate the same value, largely because injuries limited Springer to a half season. But he did hit 22 home runs, drive in 50 runs and generate 1.4 WAA in that time.

Atkins promoted pitcher Alek Manoah from the farm system and Manoah went 9-2 with a3.22 ERA in 20 starts. That was worth another 1.8 WAA.

Atkins not only knew who to sign or promote, he also displayed a keen eye for whom to dump. He traded away, sold, or released 13 players who produced value for another major league team in 2021. In none of those 13 cases did the player’s value to his new team turn out to be positive.

The sum total of Atkins’ contributions to the Jays’ season amounted to +14.7 WAA. That’s far and away the largest contribution by a GM to team success this season.

Brian O’Halloran. (Photo by Billie Weiss/Boston Red Sox/Getty Images) /

Brian O’Halloran, general manager, Boston Red Sox

+6.3 WAA

O’Halloran is completing his second season as chief of Red Sox baseball operations. The sorry state of the team’s 2020 performance makes his 2021 a solid rebound effort.

O’Halloran made 44 personnel moves affecting the Sox’ major league roster this season, of which 24 (55 percent) were positive and six others neutral.

What retarded the value of O’Halloran’s moves compared with, for instance, Atkins, was his greater willingness to gamble. Six of his personnel decisions generated value in excess of one full game as measured by WAA, and those six moves split right down the middle, three positive and three negative.

He hit big in the December Rule 5 draft, claiming pitcher Garrett Whitlock from the Yankees system. At virtually no cost to Boston, Whitlock generated an 8-4 record, two saves and a 1.96 ERA in 46 relief appearances, translating to 2.0 WAA.

More impressive still was the signing of free agent Kiki Hernandez to a two-year, $14 million contract after Hernandez was deemed excess baggage by the talent-laden Dodgers. Alternating at several middle-defense positions, Hernandez contributed a 3.0 WAA.

He took a chance on rookie pitcher Tanner Houck and got 13 starts with a 3.52 ERA in return. Houck’s 1-5 record is not impressive, but his net 1.0 WAA is solid for a rookie.

But O’Halloran also had his blunders. His decision to give rookie outfielder Jarren Duran a shot backfired when Duran batted just .215. Preseason free agent signee Marwin Gonzalez flopped and was released in August.

O’Halloran got Franchy Cordero in the trade that sent Andrew Benintendi to KC. The touted Cordero hit just .189 with one home run. The Cordero, Duran, and Gonzalez pickups undermined Boston’s hopes by 3.5 games.

Still, O’Halloran’s final score of +6.3 games to the good exceeded the one-game margin by which the Red Sox qualified for postseason play. That makes him one of only two GMs this season who could legitimately claim that they maneuvered their ballclub into a playoff position.

Brian Cashman. (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images) /

Brian Cashman, senior vice president and general manager, New York Yankees

+5.2 WAA

The veteran Yankee front office leader, whose team made the MLB postseason by the hairs-breadth margin of a single game, is the other GM with a solid claim to having kicked his club over the top.

Cashman made 41 player personnel moves that affected New York’s major league roster. Although only 17 yielded positive value – 19 were negative, five were neutral – the positive moves included three in excess of one full game of WAA.

Since Cashman made no serious personnel mistakes this season, those three big plus moves were enough to produce his +5.2 rating.

The most significant was a quiet one, the signing of free agent pitcher Nestor Cortes Jr. in January following his release by the Mariners. A former Yankee traded to Seattle in 2020, Cortes rewarded his old-new team with 14 starts, eight relief appearances, and a 2.90 ERA in 93 innings.

To a Yankee staff that sometimes seemed to be in perpetual crisis, Cortes’ +2.1 WAA was a godsend. In fact, based on that yardstick he was the second most valuable Yankee pitcher, trailing only Gerrit Cole.

Cashman’s October decision to release veteran pitcher J.A. Happ appeared at the time to raise questions about the depth of the Yankee rotation. Happ had been decent for New York in 2020, with a 2-2 record and ERA under 3.50.

But Cashman was prescient. Happ went off to Minnesota, where he crashed and burned bad enough that they traded him to the Cardinals. His net for the season was a 5.69 ERA and -2.7 WAA, numbers Cashman did well to avoid inflicting on his own club.

Erik Neander. Kim Klement-USA TODAY Sports /

Erik Neander, senior vice president and general manager, Tampa Bay Rays

-1.8 WAA

It says something about the depth and talent of the Rays’ roster that they were able to win 100 games and easily clinch the AL East with basically no help from Neander.

Neander was in there trying. He made 51 personnel moves affecting the major league roster, and those 59 included eight that impacted the Rays by a minimum of one game.

The problem was that the eight big moves essentially offset one another– four positive, four negative – the net impact being a standstill. Happily for the defending American League champions, they happened to be in a very advantageous position, so the Rays were able to withstand the front office’s modestly negative overall impact.

In fairness to Neander, let’s begin with the four very good decisions. He promoted shortstop Wander Franco…possibly tardily, but he did it. Genius! Once he arrived, Franco yielded 2.5 WAA.

He landed free agent pitcher Collin McHugh, and McHugh went 6-1 with a 1.55 ERA in 37 appearances. That translated to 1.3 WAA. He let Pittsburgh claim catcher Michael Perez on waivers, freeing Tampa of what would be Perez’s .143, -1.6 WAA season.

The Willy Adames trade Is much-discussed, especially given the role Adames played in Milwaukee. Beyond opening up shortstop space for Franco, the deal actually amounted to nearly offsetting impacts. Tampa lost the 2.1 WAA Adames would bring to Milwaukee, but got 1.3 WAA in pitching help from Drew Rasmussen (+1.1) and J.P. Feyereisen (+0.2).

The signing of free agent pitcher Michael Wacha (3-5, 5.05, -1.8 WAA in 23 starts) was an unforced error. So was the decision not to pursue departing free agent Charlie Morton, who signed with Atlanta and went 14-6 in 33 starts. If Morton beats the Rays in the World Series, Neander may live to regret that oversight more than any other.

Mike Elias. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images) /

Mike Elias, executive vice president and general manager, Baltimore Orioles

-11.3 WAA

This was the third year of Elias’ rebuilding program in Baltimore, and so far progress Is not discernible.

Elias made a division-high 54 transactions affecting the team’s major league roster since the end of the 2020 season. But only 20 of those 54 moves (37 percent) netted positive value, six others being neutral.

That means more than half the times Elias pulled the trigger on a personnel move in 2021, he shot his own team. Worse yet, the damage was often serious. Seven of Elias’ moves created an impact in excess of 1.0 game, and six of those seven negatively impacted the Orioles.

The half dozen are not exactly an Orioles Who’s Who. Adam Plutko (-1.2) was a March purchase from Cleveland, Maikel Franco (-2.8), Spenser Watkins (-1.3), and Matt Harvey (-1.7) all signed as free agents,

The farm system produced Dean Kremer (-1.3) and Keegan Akin (-1.2), who may one day be useful contributors. But 2021 was not that day; they combined for a 2-17 record with ERAs above 6.50.

Next. 30 records that will not be broken. dark

The Orioles have a few obvious stars-in-the-making, Cedric Mullins, John Means, and Ryan Mountcastle among them. But it is not clear that the team as a whole is making progress under Elias.

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