Who Should Rizzo have help him with the interview/selection process for a new Nats Manager?

In After parting ways with Matt Williams, Nationals need to find a true leader, Tom Boswell made an interesting point about Rizzo’s choice of Matt Williams:

We now know that Nationals General Manager Mike Rizzo blundered in hiring a manager with no experience to run a World Series-ready club. But there was another problem: Rizzo himself has had little experience in picking managers. His first big hire was a grab for a comfortable simplistic archetype that’s been around for a century. I’ve called the type The Peerless Leader — the nickname for handsome, tough Frank Chance, a successful Cubs manager a hundred years ago.

So that leads to an interesting question for us to debate: Who should Mike Rizzo involve in his process to hire a new manager?

Here is a brief description of the four manager types that Boswell described in his book Why Time Begins on Opening Day:

1. Little Napoleon
2. Peerless Leader
3. Tall Tactician
4. Uncle Robbie

Which type of manager (or combination thereof) the Nats need can be a topic for a future post. For now, let us get the debate started on who Rizzo should consult. Either to just get their advice or perhaps to include in the interview process.

Here are a few names to consider either to get input from or perhaps involve in the interviews. Some serious, so not so serious; and at least one that is simply way out there.

1. Davey Johnson. He knows many of the players and is a pretty sharp baseball mind. He has been around the block with multiple teams and is a baseball lifer.
2. The players???? Or at least a couple of them? In most professions it is not unusual to have the folks (i.e., the team) that someone will work involved in the interview process and provide feedback. Some candidate players to perhaps consider:
   1. Jayson Werth
   2. Ryan Zimmerman
   3. Bryce Harper
   4. Jonathan Papelbon. Oh, wait. Never mind.
3. Former/retired managers. There really aren’t (other than Davey) any former Nats managers whose opinions are worth much that are options. Frank Robinson probably can’t because he is still an MLB official (he is a senior advisor to Rob Manfred). There are quite a few retired managers who might be able to give Rizzo good feedback, assuming they are interested. Here is a short list of two guys familiar to Nats fans:
   1. Bobby Cox
   2. Charlie Manuel
4. MLB Officials. If getting advice from MLB officials is kosher then these two names have to be on Rizzo’s list to get input from:
   1. Frank Robinson
   2. Joe Torre
5. Scott Boras. Most folks already think he is the de facto GM. He is pretty insightful about baseball and his perspective might be interesting. Probably never going to happen, but it would make for some interesting headlines.

DISCLAIMER: We are not really advocating any of the above ideas. They may all be bad ideas. But maybe one or more might be worth considering. We just thought this would make for an interesting discussion.