Posted by
TommyO on Sunday, October 02, 2011 9:29:03 AM
The seemingly endless charade that was billed as the dueling press conferences by Red Sox management and Tito Francona are , mercifully, over.
Tito is gone and mangement has embarked on their biggest repair job yet, to wit, where do we find a manager with cache, an undying adoration of stats, and an ability to cajole, coerce, or otherwise corral a bunch of fat, overpaid , egotistical, lazy louts and convince them that they are paid to perform, not just arrive and go thru the motions.
Tito, as demonstrated in his dual appearance with Theo, is a broken man. A leader turned upon by his men. The worst fate a leader can endure. The troops knew halfway thru the season that Tito was dog meat when no renewal of the contract was forthcoming from upstairs, and promptly went into 'me' mode. It appears that only a few carried on [Ellsbury Pedroia to name two] while the rest waited for the axe to fall on Tito.
I am no fan of Tito Francona. I have criticized him for years on his coddling of players [the players manager] and his utter failure to school the troops in the fundamentals most learned in Little League. He was unable or unwilling to manufacture a run when needed depending on the 'big hit' to get him thru. The lack of conditioning and a lax spring training can be traced as a primary cause for the swoon, but the attitude of the team was the primary factor.
I thought that the press was sorely lacking, especially in the management presser. Even though they knew that the answers were to be pure bullsh.t, the questions were not asked:
1. Theo, as GM, were you aware of the drinking going on during games, and if so, what did you do about it? Answer: We are aware that some modification of the clubhouse culture must be addressed before next season.
2. Larry, Tito threw management under the bus just before he left. Can you comment. We are aware, suprised as I am that Tito said that, that some modification of clubhouse culture must be addressed bsfore next season.
3. Tom, why didn't management offer Tito an extension either in the Spring, or, at least in July?
We were not sure that Tito wanted an extension, so we waited until the seaon was over to discuss it, which we did this morning. This is our normal procedure. It turned out that we were correct in our assessment of his intentions.
I can't go on.