OK. Now That’s Settled

The Red Sox have officially gotten their man. I still don’t understand why we needed John Farrell so badly. But, they got him. The Sox wanted him last season, and were willing to wait as long as it took to get him. Looks like they lucked out and got him a year earlier than they thought. Great.

Don’t get me wrong. I like the choice of Farrell. I just don’t think he was much better than the other options that didn’t cost us a starting shortstop.

I even liked some of what he said during his press conference, and other various interviews he’s give since being announced. I’m sure some of it is stock answers, that any new manager would give. I like that he wants to run, but knows enough not to fall in love with a philosophy. David Ortiz, if he’s here, will not be asked to go first to third all that often. It’s important to know that different techniques work in different situations. You can’t say, “I don’t bunt.” because, sometimes the bunt is the right call. That’s something that Bobby Valentine said too. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.

Speaking of the former manager, he got himself into the news yesterday as well. He suggested that David Ortiz quit on the team once they made the stupid trade. Seemed like a reasonable comment to me. I thought the same thing. Ortiz saw the season was thrown away, so he took his sweet time coming back from his heel injury. What is startling to me is the reaction. I heard some radio hosts going on and on saying Bobby V had gone too far. How dare he, they screamed, question a player who was injured. Sure, Ortiz took longer to come back than the timetables we were given, but that’s the nature of the injury. Sometimes it just takes longer to come back than you thought. I realized they were right. I mean, the media has never questioned the dedication of an injured player. They have never said a player was slacking off when they didn’t come right back from an injury. They’ve never run a shortstop out of town because he was taking too long to return from a heel injury. They never forced a leftfielder out of town because they didn’t believe the severity of his injury. Not once have they questioned the toughness and commitment of a center fielder that seemed to be on the DL longer than initial reports would have us believe.

Wait. They do that ALL the time. So, what’s the difference with Ortiz? Why does he get the benefit of the doubt when Nomar, Manny, and Jacoby didn’t? It couldn’t be the string of great quotes that Ortiz gives the media. It couldn’t be because he makes their job easier.

Surely they have more integrity than that.