After winning two straight games and playing .500 ball over the last 20 games, the Florida Marlins decided that something had to be done. They went ahead and fired Fredi Gonzalez, their manager of the last three and a half years.

As for bench coach Carlos Tosca and hitting coach Jim Presley? They are gone too.

“It is never easy to make a change in managers,” Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria said in a statement. “Fredi has been with our Club for four years. We have become close, and I am extremely fond of Fredi. I, along with all our fans, am grateful for Fredi’s contributions. At the same time, we can’t let personal feelings get in the way of taking steps that we believe are necessary to improve our ballclub.

“Decisions on individual personnel cannot supercede our overall goal, which is to win. We believe we can do better and be better. We owe it to our fans to put this team in the best possible position to win. Everyone knows how I feel about winning. That’s the reason we’re making this change.

“We still have a very long season in front of us, and plenty of time to turn things around. Everyone – our fans, our team, our organization, and myself – wants us to win. That continues to be, and will always be, the goal.”

Edwin Rodriguez will take over as interim manager.

This isn’t terribly surprising. Dan Connolly of the Baltimore Sun reports that the Baltimore Orioles have fired manager Dave Trembley.

Trembley was the manager for the Orioles for most of the last four seasons. He finishes his sparkling tenure there with a 187-283 record.

Photo Caption: Not fully understanding who does the hiring and firing in baseball, Trembley begs for his job back.

Supposedly, this decision was made after the Orioles lost to the Yankees on Thursday 6-3. They are currently 15-39 and in last place in the AL East. Part of that can be attributed to them playing in a division full of studs. Part of that is due to the fact that they stink.

But as always, the coach/manager takes the fall for a team that can’t physically get it done on the field.

Juan Samuel has been hired as the interim manager. Good luck with that, Juan.

The Seattle Mariners needed someone to blame for their miserable 11-19 performance that has landed them in the basement of the American League West. And that person was hitting coach Alan Cockrell.

The Mariners have an AL-worst .617 OPS and have lost eight straight games. They have also scored less runs than 28 of 30 MLB teams. Yeah, that’s not good. But, is Cockrell really to blame? Some of the players don’t think so.

“Let’s not go there,” said Ken Griffey, Jr. “I have no comment.”

Mike Sweeney isn’t keen on the move either.

“It’s brutal,” Sweeney said. “There are a lot of guys in here who deserve to get fired before him.”

So this clearly was not a popular decision in the clubhouse, but since you can’t fire the whole under-performing lineup, the coach is the one to go whether it’s right or wrong. The Mariners need to get it going because I picked them to win the AL West.

The Philadelphia 76ers have done what everyone hoped they would do months ago. They have fired their head coach Eddie Jordan. OTR thinks that GM Ed Stefanski should be hitting the bricks soon too. After all, he’s the one that thought Jordan and his Princeton offense (which is predicated on passing and jump shooting) would be a fit for this current roster.

“What I thought would happen, did not occur,” Stefanski said. “The decision was not the right one.”

What did you think would happen, Ed? It was a mismatch from the beginning. What jump shooters do the Sixers even have on the roster? Andre Iguodala is an elite athlete who just doesn’t have a natural talent for the game of basketball. The only reason he’s been able to play at the NBA level somewhat functionally is because of his athleticism. He certainly can’t knock down jumpers with consistency.

Lou Williams? Allen Iverson? Elton Brand? These guys don’t have games that fit with one another at all. Throw in a coach in Jordan who has a system that doesn’t fit and you get 27 wins in a season.

Oh, and Jordan constantly called out his team after losses for playing with no heart or intensity. OTR spoke with one Sixers player this season that was befuddled at what was going on. He didn’t like Jordan or his system and said that no one had a clue what the hell was happening.

The best move for the Sixers right now is to let someone else besides Stefanski pick the next coach. He gets an F- for his selection of Jordan, who they will now be paying for several more years.

The Oregon Ducks have decided to part ways with Ernie Kent after 13 years as men’s basketball coach.

Kent compiled a record of 235-173 becoming the Ducks winningest coach, but Oregon now sucks.

PHOTO CAPTION: Oregon Ducks alumni are pulling for Isiah Thomas to be the next coach and president of basketball operations

During his 13-year career as head coach, Kent made the NCAA tournament five times making it to the Elite 8 twice (2001-02, 2006-07).  His best season was the 2001-02 season when he finished 26-9 and 14-4 in the PAC 10, winning the conference.  His winningest season was in 2006-07 when his team went 29-8.

The NFL is becoming a lot like the music industry anymore. Record labels aren’t going to wait for you to find your groove and hope the third album is a hit. Your first album only sold 300,000 copies? See ya.

Much is the way of the NFL. You were here for one year and the team wasn’t good? There is the door. And that’s just what the Seattle Seahawks have done with Jim Mora, Jr. They fired him today, according to Jay Glazer. He was 5-11 in his only season.

Photo Caption: One of Mora’s biggest challenges was getting the players to let him in on their freestyle sessions.

The Buffalo Bills and Seahawks are now the only two teams without head coaches. The Seahawks will not start looking for replacements (if they hadn’t already). Minnesota Vikings defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier is expected to be among the candidates.

The New York Giants have fired their defensive coordinator Bill Sheridan after just one year on the job, according to Mike Garafolo’s twitter account.

“Bill Sheridan fired, #NYG announce,” Garafolo tweets.

This isn’t a huge surprise to anyone that caught a whiff of the Giants defense in the second half of the season. They were injured, couldn’t tackle, had poor schemes and were generally outmanned, especially in the secondary.

Photo Caption: Sheridan tries to preach defensive philosophy through his Japanimation drawings.

It’s believed that the Giants will look outside the organization for his replacement. For the love of god the only teams that were worse were the Rams and Lions. Time to look elsewhere.

In a surprising twist at the end of Washington’s season, the Redskins organization has chosen to cut ties with head coach Jim Zorn.

PHOTO CAPTION:  “What do I care, I still got paid.”

Zorn was viewed by many to be the best coach in the toughest division in football, the NFC East.  Although he was 4-12 this season and 12-20 combined for the past two seasons, Zorn was said to be the rock holding the Redskins organization together.

With the firing of Zorn taking place earlier this morning, owner Daniel Snyder now can focus on luring in Mike Shanahan to be the next coach of the sorry Washington franchise.  But whoever is hired as the next coach, fans can expect a complete overhaul of a roster filled with players with no heart or talent.

For the record, what happened in Washington was not Jim Zorn’s fault.  Right Daniel Snyder?

Sources tell the Kansas City Star that Kansas University head coach Mark Mangino and the school have reached a settlement and he will no longer be the coach of the football team. The school has been investigating his treatment of players since November 17th and several players have come forward and alleged verbal and physical abuse. We think what really irked the university was that this abuse didn’t result in a good football program. A 5-7 record combined with a 1-7 record in the Big 12 means that they can’t tolerate the abuse.

You go 10-2? Ehhh….maybe it’s not so bad and these kids need to toughen up. But he was two games under .500 and we think about 35 pounds over .500.

Kansas officials have long suspected that Mangino was eating a few players here and there, but they never found physical evidence. We really aren’t into making fun of someone’s weight, but jeez dude. This is a serious health issue, this guy is huge.

If he can’t find work as a coach, he can always go back to acting.

I don’t think this is much of a shock to anyone, but Notre Dame has fired Charlie Weis as their head football coach.

PHOTO CAPTION:  ‘Charlie Weis’ is latin for ‘man fupa’

“We have great expectations for our football program, and we have not been able to meet those expectations,” said Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick.

That’s putting it mildly. It’s been a string of disappointing seasons for Weis, capped off by a four-game losing streak. Hell, after one of those losses (UConn), a fan flat-out punched Jimmy Clausen in the eye after he had dinner with his family.

The good part for Weis? He has six years left on his contract, so if he doesn’t find a job right away, he’ll be ok.

Rob Ianello will take his place until a new head coach can be found. Ianello’s duties will include talking about how they can’t wait to get after it next season. Not sure what else he’d do since there are no more football games this year. Did they make a meaningless bowl game? We have no idea. But if they did, then he’ll be responsible for that.

A day after ESPN terminated baseball analyst and former Mets GM Steve Phillips, the company today announced Brooke Hundley has also been fired. The reason Hundley (the 22-year-old production assistant Phillips was banging on the side) was let go was not revealed. If we had to guess, we’d say she was showing up late for work.

The network did give a reason for Phillips firing, however, saying his ability to represent ESPN was “significantly and irreparably damaged.” His relationship with his wife, Marni, has also been significantly and irreparably damaged. She filed for divorce last week.

Phillips’ representative Steve Lefkowitz told the media that his client has entered a rehab facility to deal with his behavioral issues.

“Steve Phillips is not a sleazebag. He’s a good guy who just fell off the wagon,” Lefkowitz said. I guess he just took a tumble in 1998 when he had sex with his Mets employee too.

I'm not an alcoholic. I'm a good guy who just fell off the wagon.

Mike Siano of MLB.com tweets that the Houston Astros have fired manager Cecil Cooper.

“#Astros have relieved Cecil Cooper of his managerial duties. 3B coach Dave Clark will take over on an interim basis through remainder of 2009,” he tweets.

OTR does not know at this time if it had anything to do with the team being 16.5 games back of the division lead, but we will look into it.

According to Joel Sherman of the New York Post, the Mets have fired VP of Player Development Tony Bernazard. But why? Because the Mets farm system sucks a big one and they have no one to replace the injured lineup right now? DUI? Dog fighting? What could it be?

Was it a string of recent events including an argument with K-Rod on the team bus? Did that also include a tirade at Double-A Binghamton in which he yelled at the players and took his shirt off to challenge them to a fight? We think that’s it.

“Yeah [it happened], but I’m not going to talk about that,” Rodriguez told The Post. “Not going to get into it.”

So yeah, they fired him and are expected to announce it tomorrow. It seems the VP of Player Development was a team cancer. How in the hell does that happen?

“That guy [Bernazard] is crazy,” the player said. “No one like[s] him.”

After just one year as the Detroit Pistons head coach, Joe Dumars has kindly asked Michael Curry to get the hell out and never come back.

Curry only managed to squeeze out 39 wins for the Pistons this year, including a first round playoff loss against the Cleveland Cavaliers.  The last-year Pistons led by Flip Saunders finished 2nd in the Eastern Conference with 59 wins, eventually getting eliminated in the Eastern Conference Finals by the Boston Celtics.

PHOTO CAPTION: “You realize you’re gonna be the lone reason I get fired after this season, don’t you?”

When dissecting what really happened to the Pistons this year, it’s quite easy to understand why the 20 game drop in wins.  Allen Iverson.  When Joe Dumars decided to trade team-first guard Chauncey Billups for me-first guard Allen Iverson, the Pistons quickly became a horrible team.  Iverson screwed up all team chemistry, couldn’t make his teammates better, and stunted the growth of Rodney Stuckey.  The good news is Allen Iverson won’t be back as a Piston and that alone should swing back 10 more wins for Detroit.

The Minnesota Timberwolves have decided that Kevin McHale can do anything he wants in the whole world, as long as anything he wants doesn’t include coaching the Timberwolves.

“This is going to be a transition period,” said president of basketball operations David Kahn. “And with the changes that have occurred, and with the changes that are still going to come, it would have been difficult to put him in the middle of that again.”

“I was willing to come back, but they never offered me a contract,” McHale told the St. Paul Pioneer Press. “They told me last night they were going in a different direction. I said, ‘I think you’re making a mistake, but that’s up to you guys.’”

So if the Timberwolves are going to continue to be a waste of a franchise, they’ll have to do so without Kevin McHale.

The Colorado Avalanche have told head coach Tony Granato that he’ll no longer have preferred parking at the Pepsi Center. The team fired Granato and five other members of the organization.

In addition to Granato, the Avalanche fired assistant coaches Jacques Cloutier and Dave Barr, goaltending coach Jeff Hackett, assistant to the general manager Michel Goulet and video coordinator P.J. DeLuca.

Seriously, we would really love to know what the video coordinator did to get booted.

Photo Caption: “Why? Who’s parked there now?”

But all this shouldn’t come to a surprise seeing as how the Avs spent the last several weeks trying to get Patrick Roy to come in and coach.