Arn tempelriddaren part 4 That

Arn tempelriddaren part 4

That s what Francona does best, and it has worked well to this point. People tend to forget that managing the Boston Red Sox is unlike almost any other managerial job in baseball. There needn t be an enormous emphasis on in-game management because, quite honestly, Boston s lineup is typically filled by veterans and All-Stars, not developing talents and rookies like you d find in Florida, Pittsburgh or even Tampa Bay the players know what to do, it s merely a matter of keeping them focused on that. Daniel Drezner echoed Holley s sentiments in an article written in 200 In it, he states that the three most tumultuous tasks required of a Boston Red Sox manager are keeping the players on the same page, handling the media and never panicking during the season; all of which Francona excels at regularly. Drezner even goes as far as saying that Francona is underrated as a manager, pointing out that he s never won a Manager of the Year Award despite the miracle season of 2004, a playoff birth in 2005 while guiding a team lacking any true top-tier starting pitchers or an established closer, and a 2007 team that finished with the best record in baseball en route to a World Series title. Even more insane is the fact that in all the previously mentioned seasons, Francona never once received a single first-place vote in the Manager of the Year balloting. And yes, when the Society for American Baseball Research inevitably conceives a mathematical equation depicting success in relation to the timeliness of a manager s removal of his starting pitchers, Terry Francona may very well be towards the bottom of the league, but that doesn t mean that he s to blame every time. More importantly, it wouldn t justify denying Tito the benefit of the doubt in most cases I think he s earned that much. Yet, here Francona is, two World Series titles later, still being disregarded by not only media-types but his own fans on occasion as well. Here Jacoby Ellsbury is, similarly, watching the finale of a disappointing season that saw him, ironically enough, be ostracized for fighting so hard to be a part of it. And finally, here both Francona and Ellsbury are, interestingly enough, sharing a common characteristic: Reason to believe that the 2011 season will be a deciding factor in their futures at Fenway, and one that doesn t exactly project positively in either case. As I stated earlier, Jacoby Ellsbury will enter 2011 arbitration eligible for the first time in his young career. Arbitration processes are painstaking enough as it is, but Ellsbury s potentially projects to be on a whole different level. After a breakthrough season in 2009, Ellsbury contributed very little to the team in 2010, but as he will contest, it is the Red Sox themselves who are at fault for that something that won t be agreeable by both parties. Given the nature of Ellsbury s relationship with certain areas of the team already, one would think that the team would have approached Jacoby will an extension offer at some point early in the season or even before it to avoid a potential arbitration hearing. Now, with a hearing almost inevitable, it s hard to imagine the two coming out of the process with an improved opinion of one another which also arn tempelriddaren part 4 it nearly impossible to imagine the Red Sox coming to terms with Ellsbury on an extension at all. With trade rumors already beginning as early as this past July, does that set the table for the off-season departure of Ellsbury? If so, how did it get to this point? Who is really to blame? Francona enters 2011 under the final year of his contract; it remains to be seen where the Red Sox stand in terms of their interest in extending Terry s deal. One thing is for certain, following an incredibly disappointing season, will there be enough mutual interest from both parties to work out an extension? You ll be hard-pressed to find a Red Sox fan who doesn t love Tito, but after a season in which they cried Fran coma even more regularly than years past, will they still be adverse to seeing him go? Will he even arn tempelriddaren part 4 to stay? Like Ellsbury s situation, it s almost inconceivable to think that someone so beloved in Boston such a short time ago could be so easily let go; even more so if the fans are truly on board with it. Then again, maybe the correlation between the change in public opinion and the contractual states of both is more than just coincidental; perhaps there is a method behind the madness, so to speak. Theo Epstein will tell you first-hand, sometimes there are situations behind the scenes that the general public isn t necessarily privy to, and often times it s for the better. After all, it wasn t long ago that Epstein himself experienced the ugly side of professional sports during contract negotiations with the very same management currently heading the Boston Red Sox. In fact, Epstein s situation wasn t the first to publicly expose the sometimes ugly inner workings of the Red Sox s front office, and as we ll explore in part two of this submission, it may not be the last. I m in full agreement on Francona, with the way our pitching has been this year there is no such thing as a right decision, if he leaves the starter in he gets nailed, if he pulls them, the bullpen blows it, definition of a rock and a hard place especially when you have two arms who are either young or have shown wear in the past that you want to protect during the early part of the season in Bard and Papelbon. I m mixed on Ellsbury. I still think he s a good player, he s still young enough to improve and to take more pitches but I m not going to complain since he raised his OBP by like 20-30 points last season, knowing he had to learn to walk. I ll still get on him for defense though, a player that fast should never have to die. I will not hold this year s injury against him, he wasn t the only one to feel the wrath of Beltre, next time they should watch it before they touch his head. However, I don t think he should have gotten so defensive about the whole thing, he didn t really talk about it, no one did. When you aren t guiding the narrative yourself you re really asking for it by allowing the media to guide it themselves. You want people to think you re trying hard to come back? Travel with the team for a couple series, let them photograph you on the field doing something easy. Write a darn tweet saying Workin hard 2 git back 2 da game or something. He didn t do any of that and the story turned on him. Part of being a player is dealing with the media, if you want to be a popular player like he seems to be than he is going to have to do better than he did this year. If he doesn t care he can pull a JD Drew and go off the radar, which is fine as long as he keeps his play up. We are not normal, We are Legends. People will tell their kids about us. Deon Butler before Ohio State Game 200 We are not normal, We are Legends. People will tell their kids about us. Deon Butler before Ohio State Game 200 Even though Francona isn t perfect who is?, I think he s done a bang-up job this season. Considering all the injuries, the ineffectiveness of the bullpen and Lackey and Beckett, that we have won so many games is a testament to a good manager and solid organizational depth credit to Theo there I m still a fan of Ellsbury s, as I think he can be a very valuable piece of the puzzle.