There has been speculation this weekend that Pittsburgh Pirates manager John Russell will be fired next week. Dejan Kovacevic mentioned that the Pirates are not expected to bring Russell back, and could dismiss him at the start of next week. Two more reports have come out tonight to say something similar.
Jim Bowden tweeted tonight that Russell has been fired, along with Milwaukee Brewers manager Ken Macha (which is fitting, because many will be calling for the Pittsburgh-native Macha to be the replacement for Russell). It hasn’t been confirmed whether Russell has already been fired, and no one else is saying this, so it’s hard to say whether Russell has been fired, or whether Bowden is just guessing he will be fired/reporting that he will be fired in a way that makes it sound like the move has gone through (most likely option B).
Pirates Report also had an article up tonight saying that Russell would be dismissed tomorrow, according to “a highly placed team source”. Pirates Report is owned by the Nuttings, so it would be hard to imagine that this article would be published unless the news was true.
So it looks like Russell will be fired tomorrow with one year remaining on his contract. Let the new manager speculation/requesting begin.
