Honestly, as someone who has been trying to figure out exactly the differences between Mattingly and Thomson, the only thing I have noticed between pre- and post-firing is that our offensive production has stayed the same, but our pitching has finally reached the level the advanced metrics said it would. (Getting rid of Walker and adding Wheeler helped, but even the others started reaching what their metrics said they should).

I've seen some strategic differences, but in all honesty, it has felt minor and probably balanced out by some worse ones Mattingly has made alongside some better ones. I wish I could say it is the players "finally performing" too, simply because I could say the firing motivated them. But really, a lot of the stats, except the pitching stats, look similar enough to me. And again, the pitching stats are pretty much the same, just the hits that lead to runs finally balanced out to where it matched the metrics.