Crane is only the second owner I've known. He is easily better than Uncle Drayton.
Drayton grabbed the wheel a lot while Hunsicker was in the driver's seat. Crane seems to give Luhnow the space he needs to be amazing. Hope that one of the many other teams that needs to rebuild doesn't steal Luhnow away. I want him to have a long and satisfying career in Houston.
Hunsicker did a pretty great job of keeping Drayton from meddling in the day-to-day (McLane didn't and still probably doesn't understand baseball, and all of the complexity of a 30-ish game spring schedule, 162 game regular season, and then playoffs.) Their relationship seemed to be fine as long as Hunsicker operated within the artificial budget that McLane set, and allowed for a couple of big splash trades (Randy Johnson being the biggest) along the way.
When Hunsicker left after the 2004 season, McLane (who still...not understanding the baseball) allowed his farm system (and eventually his major league club) to go to absolute shit under Purpura and Wade. He traded away young talent for aging stars (Miguel Tejada), held a hard line on draft signings ("Why would I give all this money to players that won't be here for 5 years?") and fancied himself a wheeler-dealer with overpriced, ageing Free Agents (see Kaz Matsui, Carlos Lee and his ranch).
While I agree that McLane had his hands in too much, Hunsicker managed that relationship very successfully until he got fed up and left. McLane didn't get the chance to really screw up this franchise until Hunsicker left.
