"The questions were all but entirely personality-related. When the Marlins introduced him as manager, nobody asked President of Baseball Operations Larry Beinfest if Ozzie Guillen stuck with starters too long or sacrificed too much.

It was all about Guillen's makeup — his forthrightness, his charisma, his verve — and how it would mesh with an organization that couldn't make managerial marriages last with other more docile men.

Known for his ceaseless supply of sound bites, Guillen's work as a tactician arguably has been obscured. Two of his former American League Central counterparts expressed great respect for him as a strategist.

"Sometimes people lose sight of the fact of what a smart baseball guy he is because of some of the other stuff that goes with it," said Tigers manager Jim Leyland, who spent the last six seasons going head-to-head with Guillen. "He's kind of a flamboyant guy…That's his personality and I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I think sometimes because of that stuff people forget what a good game manager he is."

How many wins Guillen or any manager is worth is difficult to quantify. One way, albeit imperfect, is to compare the team's actual record to its Pythagorean record. Bill James developed the formula for Pythagorean winning percentage, which estimates a team's record based on how many runs it scored and allowed."